Is There Courage In This Generation?

[Hissyspit]

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/6/24/14753/1741

Is There Courage in This Generation?
by Pericles
Sun Jun 24, 2007 at 12:36:29 AM PDT

"I asked myself: What can I do to end this war if I'm willing to go to prison for it?" I heard that statement this afternoon. But unfortunately it came from an old man remembering something he did a long time ago. In fact I was listening to three old men: Daniel Ellsberg, Mike Gravel, and Robert West. Thirty-five years ago they came together to publish The Pentagon Papers and puncture the public's illusions about the Vietnam War.

To understand what The Pentagon Papers were, imagine that Donald Rumsfeld had the true and secret history of the Iraq War locked in safe somewhere. Imagine what would happen if somebody opened that safe.

Well, replace Rumsfeld with McNamara and Iraq with Vietnam, and you pretty much have it. Daniel Ellsberg was a Rand Corporation analyst who had the clearances necessary to see the Papers. He funneled them to Gravel, a senator from Alaska, who made them virtually unsuppressible by reading them into the Congressional Record. And West ran Beacon Press, the 36th publisher that Ellsberg and Gravel went to, the one that said yes. I heard them tell their story today at the General Assembly of Unitarian Universalists, the annual national meeting of my faith. We UUs have a certain amount to crow about in this story: Beacon is our house press and Gravel is a UU.

- snip -

So what does Ellsberg recommend to those hundreds of people who have the goods on our wars and potential wars? Don't wait. He thinks that if he'd done in 1963 what he did in 1969-72, the Vietnam War might never have become the fiasco it turned into. An informed public might not have stood for it. "Don't wait until the bombs are falling," he said this afternoon.

But he's an old man now. What does he know? Things were different in his day.

[zippy890]

1. that's the key question, isn't it. do we have the courage?

to set things on the right path.

Face the fear-mongering down. I have some hope, the press is starting to get it.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/cheney/

[ThomWV]

2. How much courage do you think it took to attend a Peace Rally in 1969?

Burn a bunch of weed and scream sloagans 'till your throat hurt and try to get laid. How much courage do you think that took?

[Solly Mack]

3. 1969: Millions march in US Vietnam Moratorium

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/15/newsid_2533000/2533131.stm

"In towns and cities throughout the US, students, working men and women, school children, the young and the old, took part in religious services, school seminars, street rallies and meetings."

"The Moratorium for the first time brought out America's middle class and middle-aged voters, in large numbers. Other demonstrations followed in its wake."





You honestly believe that's what they were all doing? Getting high and getting laid? That image of an anti-war protester was sold to the public for a reason - to discredit the protesters.

[H2O Man]

5. Gracious.

Being so negative surely can distort one's perception.

[ikojo]

6. As four students at Kent State and the two who died

at Jackson state would say if they were alive...it took a lot of courage to attend demonstrations in the 1960s. Police were there with weapons and hoses to confront the students.

I know a woman who was in the Peace Corps in 1968. She tells me that she was really concerned about the US breaking apart as a result of the Vietnam war.

[acmavm]

7. You don't know much about those times, do you?

Or are you being insulting because this generation is clueless and doesn't think they owe it to the country to do anything.

Wait until the draft.

[ThomWV]

12. I was there ....

You seem to think that every one at each of those peace marches was in lock step with the cause and nothing else mattered but to end the war. Not true. Half of the people were there just for the party.

By the way, I had never attended a peace march before my first tour in Viet Nam. My first peace march was in 1968, between my first and second tours in Viet Nam. Peach marches got better after that. I found that out between my second and third tours when I also attended them. After I got out of the Army, after my third tour, I went attended two peace marches, one in my first home of Washington DC, and the second in my newly adopted home of Miami, Florida. By then it had fizzeled and the world had got to be a meaner place.

I presume you remember all of this, what with you being so well aware of what the times were like. Maybe you'd like to give me your take on those times from your first hand experience.

[RestoreGore]

8. Tremendous Courage

And they obviously had more than we do now.

[Pyrzqxgl]

9. When their were people beating on your head and cops shooting at you it took a damn lot of courage!

[cassiepriam]

4. Little courage, wisdom or moral compass in most Americans.

Sad to say.

And those who have it, like Cindy Sheehan, Patrick Fitzgerald, are drawn and quartered by everyone.

[DemReadingDU]

10. It does seem to be in short supply

I'm hoping there are some courageous people quietly in the background, that will become known to us as the Bush cabal is taken down.

[cassiepriam]

11. There have to be people working in the background. That is why the crap is hitting the fan,

on so many levels.

[mmonk]

13. Here