he really said slavery was good

The New Jersey state assembly is considering a measure to apologize for slavery, the AP reports today. NJ could become the fifth state to do so.

There are some arguments on both sides of this, but leave it to Michael Patrick Carroll, an assemblyman from Morris, to really pull out the big-picture thinking:

"But, on a current note, if slavery was the price that a modern American's ancestors had to pay in order to make one an American, one should get down on one's knees every single day and thank the Lord that such price was paid," Carroll said.

He said his ancestors came from Ireland around the 1850s, fleeing the potato famine he said was worsened by British indifference.

"Far from holding it against the modern British, I delight in the cruelty of their forebearers. Without same, I might be hanging around in Inisfree," Carroll said, referencing an Irish island.