Like over 3000 other academics, I’ve signed the “Support Bill Ayers” statement defending Ayers from the desperate, opportunistic attacks of the McCain campaign. I think it important to combat the depiction of a distinguished scholar as a “terrorist” by the likes of Sarah Palin, whose ignorance and extremism terrify many. But I also think that the campaign might be doing us all a favor by drawing our attention to the 500 pound guerrilla in the room: the ’60s.
Or more properly, the ’60s and early ’70s: that era shaped by an unpopular imperialist war and massive social movements demanding racial and gender equality. The antiwar and civil rights movements mobilized millions and influenced everybody. Without the gains of those years, arguably, a black man would not be leading in a presidential race today. The public would not reject the Iraq War as a wrong war based on lies but rather rally around the flag, trusting the leaders.
John McCain has built a political career on one episode in his life: his plane was shot down in October 1967 as he was bombing a power plant in a heavily populated area of Hanoi. (In 1995 the Vietnamese government estimated that two million North Vietnamese civilians died during the war, mainly due to such bombing.) His downed plane landed in Truc Bach Lake, and his life was saved by a Vietnamese civilian. The Vietnamese, realizing the McCain came from a distinguished military family, granted him special medical treatment although he had suffered no mortal injuries. He was held as a POW to 1973. During that time he publicly praised his captors for providing him “very good medical treatment.” While he has claimed to be the victim of torture, and claimed his statements acknowledging war crimes were forced, he has also opposed the release of his government debriefing that might shed light on these subjects. He was reportedly bound by ropes, and subjected to beatings during his confinement. But no one has suggested he was terrorized by attack dogs, sexually humiliated, water boarded or subjected to the refined torture tactics used in Gitmo or Abu Ghraib. It is doubtful that his treatment would fit the Bush administration’s current (very narrow) definition of torture.
Somehow McCain’s been able to parlay this history into a reputation as a “war hero” whose faith in God and country kept him strong against his evil “gook” captors. This is the account the mainstream media accepts, as it accepts and promotes the idea that somehow McCain is “strong on national security.” Up until recently polls showed the public generally buying this line, however logically inconsistent it may be with the general assessment of the Vietnam War as a “mistake” if not a crime. How can you be a “war hero” in a war that was so unheroic and so wrong?
Bill Ayers represents an era of widespread outrage at American imperialism, including in the U.S. itself—an era of deep division unparalleled since the Civil War. An era McCain and his right-wing fringe running-mate would like to forget or undo. They see nothing wrong in the Vietnam War except for a lack of will to win. The ’60s “protesters” for them were a genus of traitors, whose very right to protest was somehow being defended by those bombing Hanoi. If the communists weren’t stopped in Vietnam, they argued, they’d be invading the west Coast. Rational people see this argument as highly stupid now.
Three years after McCain was shot down over Hanoi while on that bombing mission, Ayers by his own admission participated in a bombing of a New York City police station, and went on to bomb the Capitol and Pentagon in the next two years. Each action came in response to a specific escalation of the Vietnam War. There were no casualties, and Ayers was never convicted of a crime. He denies that the bombings were acts of terrorism and points out instead that the war in Vietnam was a war of terror. (During this time, by the way, the 11 to 13 year old Obama was living in Indonesia and Hawai’i.)
Bill Ayers like many of his generation was a follower of Martin Luther King before joining the SDS then some of its spin-offs which (like many in the New Left) parted company with the doctrinaire non-violence they perceived as ineffectual. But consider his background. While studying at the University of Michigan in 1965, he joined a picket line protesting an Ann Arbor pizzeria’s policy of refusing service to African-Americans. (18 years later, when I studied at UM, such racist exclusion was unimaginable. How the world had changed because of people like Ayers!) He participated in a draft board sit-in, punished by 10 days in jail. He worked in progressive childhood education. These are the kind of rebellious activities that enraged the white supremacists (then far more respectable and mainstream than now), the knee-jerk anticommunists, the reactionaries terrified by rock ‘n roll and the youth counterculture. But what’s there to damn here, for those who aren’t misled by a washed-up generation of racist uptight bigots?
People over 50 remember that period very well, and many much younger people view it with envy and fascination. After all, today’s youth listen to the Beatles, Stones, Doors, Jefferson Airplane and Grateful Dead, considering them their own. (We in the ’60s rarely listened to the music of the ’20s, ’30s and ’40s.) College students flock to courses on the ’60s, viewing that decade as one of turmoil, excitement, and progressive change. The verdict’s in: the war was wrong, segregation and all racism was wrong, sexism and homophobia were wrong—and the limited social progress as we’ve seen since the ’60s is largely rooted in the tireless efforts of the activists of that decade. The ’60s were good!
Continued>>>
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/10/raising-the-specter-of-the-%e2%80%9960s/
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