Tag Archives: American History

Rebecca Solnit : Reflections on Fanaticism

Posted on December 1, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

John Brown depicted in detail from a mural by John Steuart Curray titled “Tragic Prelude,” in the Kansas State Capitol in Topeka.Today’s fanatic, tomorrow’s saint It’s popular to think that the world gets changed by nice people, but the lives … Continue reading →

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Paul Krassner : In Praise of Indecency

Posted on November 24, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Paul Krassner depicted in Oui Magazine advertisement for an upcoming October 1975 interview. Graffiti includes references to the Realist mascot, Lenny Bruce, and Jerry Rubin. Image from the Realist Archive Project.In praise of indecency:Paul Krassner is our ‘Satirist-Laureate’ By Harvey … Continue reading →

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Robert Jensen : How I Stopped Hating Thanksgiving

Posted on November 20, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

“The First Thanksgiving,” painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris (1863–1930) / Wikimedia Commons.How I stopped hating ThanksgivingAnd learned to be afraid This is a society in which even progressive people routinely allow national and family traditions to trump fundamental human … Continue reading →

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Bitter Tears : The Untold Story of Johnny Cash

Posted on November 15, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Top, Cash’s album, “Bitter Tears,” met with opposition from the music industry. Below, Pima Indian Ira Hayes, celebrated by Johnny Cash, helped raise the flag at Iwo Jima, an act caught in the famous photograph by Joe Rosenthal. Hayes died … Continue reading →

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American Health Care : Monster Run Amok

Posted on November 7, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Cartoon by RS Janes / LTSaloon.Once the envy of the world…The American health care disgrace By Dr. Stephen R. Keister / The Rag Blog / November 7, 2009 Between 1910 and 1970 American medicine was the envy of the world. … Continue reading →

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Harry Targ : Legitimacy Crisis and the Vietnam Syndrome

Posted on November 3, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Public suspicion of government on the rise:The return of the Vietnam Syndrome By Harry Targ / The Rag Blog / November 3, 2009 I teach a course on United States foreign policy. I was just finishing up a discussion of … Continue reading →

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Dick J. Reavis : SDS and the Great Divide

Posted on October 29, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Image from Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History.Today’s Red Book and the demise of SDS Nobody present had repudiated Leftism, but everyone seemed to have reached a consensus that the heedlessness of youth had been our common flaw. … Continue reading →

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Dick Flacks : Pete Seeger’s Project

Posted on October 18, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Celebrating Pete Seeger:Our political troubador More than any other individual, he had conceived and fostered a tradition of protest song that drew from a number of cultural roots, had significant political consequence, and reshaped the forms and content of popular … Continue reading →

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Afghanistan : Get Out Before It’s Too Late

Posted on October 3, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Learn from history:Withdraw from Afganistan now …the United States and its NATO allies [have] slipped deeper and deeper into the Afghanistan quagmire with the same historical ignorance that characterized American lack of awareness of Vietnamese history. By Harry Targ / … Continue reading →

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Greg Moses : Cramming for the Downside

Posted on October 3, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Downside up.Riding down the moody Dow: Cramming for the downside If the humming engine of human history rides a geometry of social mood, then downtimes cannot be caused by anything that uptimes do… By Greg Moses / The Rag Blog … Continue reading →

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Security Tapes Shoot Blanks : Oklahoma City Bombing Revisited

Posted on October 1, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

Screen grab from security video after the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995 shows people moving through nearby building. Photo from the FBI via The Oklahoman / AP.Gaps in security tapes:Revisiting the Oklahoma … Continue reading →

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Harvey Wasserman : Obama’s LBJ Moment

Posted on September 27, 2009 by Thorne Dreyer

President Lyndon B. Johnson listens to tape sent by Captain Charles Robb from Vietnam, July 31, 1968. Photo by Jack Kightlinger / LBJ Library.Obama’s LBJ moment He has inherited from George W. Bush the beginnings of a horrific quagmire. How … Continue reading →

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