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smooth · 08-26-2004, 06:02 PM

Tophat, I just wanted to give you a title of a book, written by a vet, Lembke, called The Spitting Image.

He's a sociologist at Holy Cross and his text documents how the right consistently revises history to portray peace activists as being anti-patriotic and atagonistic toward whatever country's troops. You pointed out that activists have at least learned that much, so I wanted to give you this so you could see the documentation that we haven't, in fact, changed. The story just keeps being recycled. It's a short, and very interesting read.

He actually documents how the then current administration began a campaign to create the fiction of the "crazy" vet as opposed to the "sane" vets (those opposed versus those in support of the war, respectively) because, if we remember, vets were the first protesters (especially since the war had been going on for a the better part of a few years before the public was even aware of it) and people fighting a war and coming home to speak truth to power presents the largest threat to jingoistic hegemony.

But I hope you read it because it really is interesting but I don't want to retype a synopsis of it. I already did that on previous TFP versions and the info has been lost.

As for Kerry's position, I don't know what the ramifications would have been if he had done what you suggested. I'll have to marinade on it some more, but at first stab I would suspect that he would have been accused of negative campaigning and not sticking to issues, & etc. The right's favorite position of doing something and sitting back and playing the victim. Then we would be discussing how Kerry had to resort to defending himself in that manner instead of the way he is doing it now.

08-26-2004, 06:02 PM	#25 (permalink)
smooth Junkie Location: Right here	Tophat, I just wanted to give you a title of a book, written by a vet, Lembke, called The Spitting Image. He's a sociologist at Holy Cross and his text documents how the right consistently revises history to portray peace activists as being anti-patriotic and atagonistic toward whatever country's troops. You pointed out that activists have at least learned that much, so I wanted to give you this so you could see the documentation that we haven't, in fact, changed. The story just keeps being recycled. It's a short, and very interesting read. He actually documents how the then current administration began a campaign to create the fiction of the "crazy" vet as opposed to the "sane" vets (those opposed versus those in support of the war, respectively) because, if we remember, vets were the first protesters (especially since the war had been going on for a the better part of a few years before the public was even aware of it) and people fighting a war and coming home to speak truth to power presents the largest threat to jingoistic hegemony. But I hope you read it because it really is interesting but I don't want to retype a synopsis of it. I already did that on previous TFP versions and the info has been lost. As for Kerry's position, I don't know what the ramifications would have been if he had done what you suggested. I'll have to marinade on it some more, but at first stab I would suspect that he would have been accused of negative campaigning and not sticking to issues, & etc. The right's favorite position of doing something and sitting back and playing the victim. Then we would be discussing how Kerry had to resort to defending himself in that manner instead of the way he is doing it now. __________________ "The theory of a free press is that truth will emerge from free discussion, not that it will be presented perfectly and instantly in any one account." -- Walter Lippmann "You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists." -- Abbie Hoffman