The Uses of History and the War on Terrorism

[marko]

This is an amazing lecture giving by Professor Howard Zinn. Just google Prof. Zinn if you don't know who he is.

You can download and listen to the lecture or just read the transcript here...
http://www.democracynow.org/article..../11/24/1442258

"If the American people really knew history, if they learned history, if the educational institutions did their job, if the press did its job in giving people historical perspective, then a people would understand." ~Howard Zinn

[teamamericawp]

Marco,

Here I thought you were somewate legit. A rant from left winger at Madison no less. Maybe I should trot out my Hillsdale College speaker.

Look at his words "No, it’s not that we are Nazi Germany, but", to compare us is ludicrous. He goes on to compare the great US of A as somewhat Nazi type characters.


Because -- so you respond to terrorism with terrorism, and you multiply the terrorism in the world.

"And, of course, the terrorism that governments are capable of by going to war is on a far, far greater scale than the terrorism of al-Qaeda or this group or that group or another group. Governments are terrorists on an enormously large scale. The United States has been engaging in terrorism against Afghanistan, against Iraq, and now they’re threatening to extend their terrorism to other places in the Middle East."


For those of you who didn't bother to read Marko's propaganda this left wing fellow liken's us to Hitler and Terrorists.


Such drivel from so intellecutal people, give me a break! Yes, the war against Irag, who gave $25,000 to every suicide bombers family who harboured known al quaida members, may have been illconceived but put the middle east on alert that America will not be fucked wit

Shame on you for associating yourself with a man who would call US soldiers terrorists.

[Captain red beard]

"any man who would trade freedom for security, deserves neither freedom nor security" - Thomas Jefferson

think about that quote teamamericawp; the patriot act? sacrificing your constitutional rights for "security"?

Is it right to lose thousands of American lives and spend billions of dollars on a war whose provocating factors were falsified?

Where can you draw the line between terrorism and military acts of torture, intimidation and senseless violence? Just because dubya says it's warranted?

[teamamericawp]

Cunt beard, I agree with you on the Patriot Act and our rights being eroded. I don't however believe that our troops are anything near terrorists.

[gh]

I thought the article was excellent and I enjoyed reading it. I took from it that history shows that governments use fear to goad the entire population into doing something that is against their best interest. It happened in Nazi Germany and its happening here. I dont care if the interview was in Madison or Colorado Springs, made sense to me.

[Captain red beard]

Let us distinguish, then, the actions of our troops versus the actions of our government. I agree with you teamamerica, our TROOPS are not terrorists. Our LEADERS can be construed as such however. In conflicts of this scale it is not the soldiers that should bear the blame for our imperialist war, for the grand plans of our illustrious government are kept secret from it's governed. The troops that are over there fighting and dying have no interest in Halliburton. I would hazard a generalization: the people that actually signed up to fight this war most likely did so for two reasons: 1) As a response to 9-11: to secure the USA from terrorist threats. or 2) Because we, as an American public, were told that Saddam was a vicious dictator that oppressed his people and he needed to be removed.

I believe that these are the two core reasons that this war was deemed necessary. Patriotism is a permutation of these. Fighting for security and freedom are noble things, but the government misinformed us on both of these facts to some degree, added a little fear into the mixture and popped out a multi billion dollar war for oil.

Security? yeah, worse after the war was started. lets not start the WMD thing. Or Saudi Arabia.

Freedom? what about Kim Jong Il? everyone agrees he's even more opressive and rutheless.

The soldiers are not to blame for this war. They, along with the majority of the American populace were tricked into thinking that we NEEDED this war. Only now, years into it are we starting to think of the consequences.