Andrew's Tiki Lounge

The Meaningful Apology

William Calley (pictured left in 1971) made history -- for all the wrong reasons. Calley is the former U.S. Army lieutenant who was convicted on 22 counts of murder in the 1968 My Lai Massacre in Vietnam. 

For years, he was the human face of responsibility for the My Lai Massacre. 

Now, four decades later, Calley has apologized for his actions at My Lai. His apology was heartfelt and moving. 

Earlier this month, speaking to the Kiwanis Club of Greater Columbus in Georgia, Calley said, "There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai. I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the American soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry." (Source.) 

Many observers insisted the apology was long overdue. But it was still a very brave thing for Calley to do. He could have gone to the grave without apologizing. Tragically, most people in history who orchestrate massacres and other heinous acts of violence do not express remorse for their actions. 

The My Lai Massacre occurred on March 16, 1968. The Army tried to cover it up. The American public didn't learn about the massacre until almost a year later.

The story of how My Lai became a story is almost as harrowing as the massacre itself. Ron Ridenhour collected accounts of the massacre in the spring and summer of '68 from eyewitnesses. Ridenhour's information found its way to budding young journalist Seymour Hersh, who struggled for a long time to find a publisher for his freelance articles on the massacre. Hersh eventually gave the story to a buddy of his who ran a tiny wire service in his basement. 

Calley certainly played a crucial role in carrying out the horrific event -- an orgy of murder and depravity that took the lives of more than 500 Vietnamese. 

He was the only person punished for the crime, despite the fact that every authority figure in America, from Presidents Johnson and Nixon all the way down to drill instructors at military bases, dehumanized Vietnamese. It was common in the military and government in the 1960s to view the Vietnamese as subhuman. This led to a number of awful policies such as Search and Destroy Missions, Free Fire Zones and Carpet Bombing. 

Untold numbers of civilians perished in Vietnam. The infamous air war -- dropping 3 times more bombs on the Indochinese Peninsula than all the theaters of war in World War II -- claimed far more innocent Vietnamese than massacres like the one at My Lai. 

During his trial in the early 1970s, Calley became the "fall guy" for the My Lai Massacre. The event triggered a debate in the United States about the role of the country in the world. Some people actually defended My Lai as a positive thing, but millions of Americans asked themselves, "What are we becoming?" 

Sadly, the nation failed to fully grapple with the meaning of My Lai four decades ago. Calley was put on trial, sent to a country club prison with color TV and liberal leave policies, and most people forgot about My Lai. 

Back in 2002, I went to Vietnam. I visited My Lai. To see the ditch where the massacre occurred is profoundly sad. It has been turned into a memorial site. There is a small museum there, and an enormous statue (pictured right) that commemorates the tragic event. 

There was a frail old lady who was a caretaker at My Lai. She looked after the garden and made answered visitors' questions. It turned out that she was a survivor of the massacre and for all these years, she has been coming back to the place of the bloodletting to teach people about it.

Back in the early 2000s, a group of Vietnamese and American veterans raised funds to plant trees at My Lai to honor the dead. 

Over the years, there have been small numbers of decent, committed people who refuse to let their fellow human begins forget about My Lai. 

Add William Calley (left) to that list. Calley is now 66. He has been out of prison for years. He served his time after being convicted of 22 counts of murder. For years, he disappeared. He stayed out of sight. He refused to give interviews (and there were many, many requests). His silence was discouraging. 

But now Calley has apologized. The director of the museum at My Lai heard about Calley's apology and said, "Lieutenant William Calley's apology for his massacre comes too late, but I think it is better late than never." 

It is easy to understand the bitterness that endures in Vietnam. But Calley's apology is quite remarkable. People in higher places -- in government, in the military -- responsible for far more deaths in Vietnam than Calley, have remained silent. Calley's moving and heartfelt words reveal him to be a man with a conscience, a strong sense of right and wrong. What a tragedy that his superiors -- all the way up to the White House -- haven't shown similar remorse. 

My Column on Canada & the Health Care Reform Debate in the U.S.

Here is my latest column from The Waterloo Region Record. 

Canadian health care system isn’t perfect, just better than in the U.S.

August 08, 2009

Long before the current debate over health care in the United States took centre stage, my stepmother used to forward me these disturbing mass emails she received about the Canadian medical system.

My stepmother is liberal in her views. The emails she forwarded to me were written by right-wing foes of socialized medicine and sent by friends of hers who opposed government-run health care. These friends knew she supported health care reform and hoped to win her over.

She forwarded the emails to me — hoping I’d set the record straight about the Canadian medical system. That way, she could go back to her friends and refute the information about Canada.

The emails were over the top, to say the least. They discussed the “horrors” of the Canadian medical system: long waits, people with no access to family doctors, patients dying as a result of not getting routine surgeries. They made Canada sound like a Third World country.

Many of these claims came from anonymous sources – “friends of a friend of mine,” that sort of thing. Sometimes, the emails named the names of unfortunate people who had been through medical ordeals in Canada.

I was honest with my stepmother. The Canadian system isn’t perfect, I said. And there are undoubtedly some true stories about long wait times, problems finding family physicians and so forth. But even with its flaws, the system still enjoys widespread support in Canada.

Unfortunately, there are powerful institutions and individuals in America who have a vested interest in pushing these negative portrayals of the Canadian health care system. These zealots will take whatever negative stories they hear about our system and toss them into their propaganda stew. They add fuel to the fire by financing websites, advertisements, and so-called “citizens” organizations like Patients United Now.

Patients United Now is the group behind the Shona Holmes television advertisements in the United States. These ads were part of a larger propaganda war against President Barack Obama’s health care reform efforts. Holmes, a resident of Waterdown, Ont., went to the Mayo Clinic in the U.S. to get treatment for a growth near her pituitary gland. She became the face of the U.S. lobby against Canadian-style health care when she claimed in the advertisement that she “survived a brain tumour, but if I’d relied on my government for health care, I’d be dead.”

The Holmes ad fit neatly into the agenda of this powerful lobby, which just wants to leave the U.S. medical system alone. And they’ll use any and every little bit of negative information about the Canadian health care system—such as the Holmes case—to their advantage.

Keep in mind: Not all Americans feel this way. Our neighbours to the south are deeply divided about health care reform. The battle lines have been drawn. In most cases, conservative Republicans and their supporters are one side of the divide; President Barack Obama, the Democrats, and a growing number of doctors’ associations are on the other. Both camps are seeking to win ordinary Americans to their side.

Opponents of reform are often fanatical in their views. You can’t reason with them or calmly explain the complexities of the Canadian system. If you cite the latest Angus Reid poll — showing that 65 per cent of Canadians have a “very positive” or “moderately positive” view of their single-payer health care system — it won’t have much of an impact on those resisting change. Their minds are made up.

But it is useful to remember that these zealots do not represent the entire country.

Andrew Hunt is an associate professor of history at the University of Waterloo.

Farewell to an 80s Icon: John Hughes (1950-2009)

Filmmaker John Hughes -- whose 1980s' youth films (Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off) often captured the essence of what it was like to grow up in Reagan's America -- has sadly passed away. He was 59.

In the mid-80s, Hughes seemed unstoppable. He directed a string of youth-oriented blockbusters that helped define what it was like to be young in the 1980s. 

I came of age when Hughes was at his height. I was among his target audience. And I have to admit, I didn't love everything he did. In fact, when I first saw The Breakfast Club on a dreary winter night back in February 1985, I hated the movie. I was 16 and none of the characters in it spoke to me. Not even Judd Nelson's Bender, the nihilistic punk of the group. 

There was something about the film that rubbed me the wrong way. I found it superficial. I could tell it was made by an adult whose understanding of young people was decidedly limited.

But then I went to school and overheard my classmates talking about it. People at my high school LOVED the movie. It spoke to them. They could relate to the characters. To a lot of young people in the 1980s, The Breakfast Club was sort of their Catcher in the Rye. I might've found it to be pointless and superficial, but I could grudgingly see what others saw in it. A movie about alienated youth coming together and finding things in common with one another really struck a chord with the high schoolers I knew at the time.

Even though I didn't like The Breakfast Club, I loved Sixteen Candles and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, which I thought were wonderfully hilarious snapshots of young, upper-middle class Chicagoans in the 1980s. Ferris Bueller in particular, the Bugs Bunny-esque anarchist played so wonderfully by Matthew Broderick, gave young people an inspiring role model of a smart kid who was always one step ahead of the clueless adults. No wonder the film has achieved a cult status and remains extremely popular in DVD sales. 

Sixteen Candles was a nigh-perfect youth film that still holds up extraordinarily well today. Molly Ringwald as the alienated Samantha Banker has never been better in a movie (where has she gone, by the way???). But the actor who really stole the show was Anthony Michael Hall as "The Geek." 

Hughes was involved with plenty of lesser efforts. Pretty in Pink -- a 1986 high school comedy-drama about a girl played by Molly Ringwald in love with a boy played by Andrew McCarthy -- was melodramatic and sappy, but a hit with many teenagers. Hughes didn't direct Pretty in Pink... Lightweight Howard Deutch, Hughes's pal, did. But Hughes wrote the screenplay and his fingerprints were all over the film. Same with the Deutch-directed, Hughes-written 1987 film Some Kind of Wonderful, which was essentially a remake of... you guessed it: the previous year's Pretty in Pink. 

After Ferris Bueller, Hughes directed four more films: Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987); She's Having a Baby (1988); Uncle Buck (1989) and his final film, 1991's Curly Sue. They were all forgettable. Hughes had more success in some ways as a writer. He wrote the script for Chris Columbus's 1990 blockbuster Home Alone. Earlier in his career, he wrote Harold Ramis's highly successful National Lampoon's Vacation (1983). At his best, Hughes was a witty writer who created memorable characters. 

Like so many of the stars of his films, Hughes just kind of faded away. He said he wanted to spend more time with his family. He became a classic recluse, avoiding interviews and remaining generally aloof. Fans waited for a comeback movie that never came. He died much too young of a heart attack earlier today.

Without question, John Hughes was an Eighties Icon. Hollywood rarely ever gets youth films right. Throughout the history of filmmaking, there have only been a few iconic youth films that have withstood the test of time: Rebel Without a Cause (1955); American Graffiti (1973); Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982); Dazed and Confused (1993). It is quite amazing that Hughes wrote and/or directed several important youth films -- movies that still resonate with the mood and values of the 1980s. They weren't all masterpieces. But looking back on my youth, I now realize that even films I wasn't fond of at the time -- such as The Breakfast Club -- still deserve respect. Hughes was an artist with a keen eye for human idiosyncrasies and an uncanny ability to create multi-dimensional characters. His historical moment was the mid-eighties and he captured it with great zest. 

Too bad he never got a chance to make that comeback picture. I would've paid good money to see it and I'm sure I wouldn't have been disappointed. 

Don't look now, but Obama the Socialist is bringing in a Soviet-style medical system

The battle over health care reform has reached absurd heights -- or should I say depths? 

The latest manifestation of right-wing insanity -- and one of the many reasons why conservatives have become so marginal in the United States -- were the creepy President Barack Obama "Joker" posters with the bolded word "socialism" on top and bottom. 

The posters, seen all over Los Angeles, reflect the ugliness of the intensely polarized health care debate in the United States. 

Foes of Obama's efforts to reform health care and create a "socialized medicine" system in America love pointing to "problems" in Canada's health care system. I'm currently writing a column about the myths and distortions in the U.S. health care debate when it comes to Canada's medical system. I won't give away too much of my column in advance, but suffice it to say that some ignorant conservative commentators -- who know absolutely nothing about the Canadian medical system -- have been spreading outrageous falsehoods about health care in this country. 

Here's how they try to get away with their big lie: They dig up a few of the worst, most flagrant examples of people in Canada falling between the cracks and not getting adequate care, then they insist that these examples are the rule -- not the exception -- in Canada. 

As Toronto physician Michael M. Rachlis pointed out in The Los Angeles Times: "Unfortunately, many Americans won't get to hear the straight goods because vested interests are promoting a caricature of the Canadian experience."

True, Canada does not have a perfect health care system by any stretch of the imagination. But it has a pretty damn good system that works a lot of the time. And the cost of basic health care -- such as hospital stays, treatments for illness, etc. -- have never financially ruined any Canadians. 

This anti-Canadian campaign in the United States should come as no surprise. The right-wing smear machine is in high gear around health care. Throughout American history, whenever ordinary people have enjoyed great gains, there have always been men and women from the "pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstrap" school of thinking who've launched their own little jihads against any all humanitarian progressive policies.  

These people are dirty political fighters. They'll tear apart the characters of those who disagree with them, create gruesome caricatures of President Obama, and spread lies and half-truths about the Canadian health care system. No wonder the debates have become so polarized over health care. With one side always so full of vitriol and hatred, it is inevitable that the other side will go to extremes to dig in their heels and resist the nasty disinformation campaigns. 

My take on the Financial Crisis in California

California in Decline

by Andrew Hunt (The Waterloo Region Record)

July 25, 2009

California – once the mightiest state in the United States – is in the worst shape it has ever been since the Great Depression.

Throughout its history, California has been a symbol of the American dream. It’s where movies are made. Its beaches are breathtaking. The temperature hovers somewhere between warm and hot all year long. Suburbs sprawl outward for as far as the eye can see.

But the “Golden State” is in the midst of a terrible crisis, facing a $26.3 billion budget deficit for the 2009-2010 budget year.

Sacramento, the state capital, is a terrible place to be now. Morale has bottomed out in the legislature. Republicans and Democrats are blaming each other for the crisis. Vital programs are facing deep cu ts, with some even facing extinction. “Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gets a big knife and cuts California budget crisis,” cried a recent headline in the New York Daily News.

The movie star governor of California, once hailed as a fiscally responsible replacement for former Governor Gray Davis, is overseeing the greatest dismantling of social programs in the state’s history. The new budget negotiated between Schwarzenegger and key legislators will likely include $6 billion dollars in cuts to public education (K through 12) and $3 billion in cuts to higher education.

In the Los Angeles Unified School District, a $530 million shortfall has led to layoffs of 2,000 teachers. The state’s two main university systems – the University of California and California State University systems – face 20 per cent cuts. Tuition has skyrocketed. Student fees are exorbitant. Universities across the state have established furlough plans for faculty and staff.

It gets worse. The new budget will close at least 30 – and maybe up to 50 – of the state’s parks. This is an improvement over Schwarzenegger’s original plan to close all of the state’s 220 parks. But there will still be numerous park closures, a wor risome prospect for Californians.

Not surprisingly, the poor are suffering the worst under California’s budget-cutting orgy. Welfare, health and education programs are experiencing the deepest slashes. In California, there is a low-cost medical insurance program to help the working poor called Healthy Families. It could lose 40 per cent of its $1 billion budget.

Gov. Schwarzenegger hasn’t been very reassuring through this crisis. Sounding a lot like his movie persona Conan the Barbarian, the so-called “Governator” recently remarked, “Not that I have fun with making the cuts — they sadden me — but… that doesn’t mean that you cannot wave a knife around, or to wave your sword around, to get the message across that certain cuts have to be made because it’s budget time.”

Without question, the causes of the current crisis are complicated and numerous. California’s economic implosion has been years in the making.

Yet it is important to pinpoint some of the main culprits here. California has been the victim of excessive greed, too much deregulation, and too many policies that have enriched the wealthy while lowering the standard of living for the poor and middle class. California is unraveling due to too many irresponsible tax cuts and policies that have emphasized short-term financial gains for a tiny handful of the state’s most powerful citizens over prudent planning for the future.

These policies, largely the creation of Republicans (who enjoyed support from weak and vacillating Democrats in the legislature), have crippled California. They were in place long before Arnold Schwarzenegger led a recall campaign that booted ex-governor Gray Davis out of the governor’s office in 2003. And unless the state’s political establishment considers new directions and adopts different priorities, California’s future prospects appear grim.

Andrew Hunt is an associate professor of history at the University of Waterloo

Some Choice Reading in the Dog Days of Summer

I am Blogging less these days. I've been doing some traveling, visiting family and friends in Salt Lake City, Utah (where the temperature has hovered in the high 90s). I've been doing a lot of reading these days. There are some wonderful summer books out there that are worthy of a spot in your library. Here are a few of the more interesting books that I've been reading over the summer:

The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly: Prolific veteran crime writer Michael Connelly is back. This time, his protagonist is aging and cynical L.A. Times cop reporter Jack McEvoy. Hardcore Connelly fans will remember that Jack is a recurring character from the author's previous novel, The Poet. In The Poet, McEvoy went up against a literate and very brilliant serial killer. The Scarecrow pits McEvoy against a high-tech serial killer adversary who is spying on him from a mysterious place called "The Farm." I won't give too much away, but this is truly Michael Connelly at his best. The twists and turns are abundant, and you spend much of the novel wondering whether McEvoy has any hope of catching the killer. McEvoy doesn't go it alone. He is reunited with his old flame, FBI agent Rachel Walling. I won't give away any more, except to say that the last few Connelly novels -- namely, Echo Park and The Overlook -- left me wondering whether the master was losing his touch. But The Scarecrow convinced me that he's still got it and he's more potent than ever. The book had its flaws. I can't really give them away too explicitly without divulging some of the mystery. But overall, it comes together beautifully and fully restores my faith in Connelly's brilliant prose. It's in hardcover and hardcovers are always more expensive (give it about a year and it'll be out in softcover). But this time, believe me, the hardcover is worth it.

1959: The Year Everything Changed by Fred Kaplan: If you prefer books where the book's title reveals the book's thesis, then this is the volume for you. Fred Kaplan, author and editor at Slate.com, takes us on a tour of a year that he insists was watershed year in American history. You'll have to read it to determine whether you agree with him. His observations of the many developments in 1959 -- the Space Race, Beat literature, jazz music, the indie filmmaking of maverick director John Cassavettes (who debuted in '59 with his film important independent film Shadows), the heyday of the "sick comics" Lenny Bruce and Mort Sahl, the origins of the Vietnam War, etc. -- are compelling, witty and insightful. But many of the trends he identifies with 1959 had deeper roots in American history. American intervention in Vietnam didn't start in 1959 and he does not prove his point that '59 was necessarily more or less important in America's deepening involvement in Southeast Asia than any other year. The Beats were around long before '59. And the jazz music Kaplan loves so much -- Miles Davis, Charlie Mingus Dave Brubeck, Ornette Coleman, etc. (music that I, frankly, can take or leave) -- had been around long before '59 and it is hard to detect a striking change in it in '59. Still, the book is loads of fun. The chapters are short and self-contained, reminiscent of David Halberstam's epic tour of the 1950s from fifteen years ago. All in all, I gave the book a thumbs up and I highly recommend it. 

A Bright and Guilty Place: Murder, Corruption and L.A.'s Scandalous Coming of Age by Richard Rayner: You can probably tell that I'm an "L.A. Nut" and I read just about anything I can get my hands on that has anything to do with Los Angeles. So I put a rush order on Richard Rayner's A Bright and Guilty Place. Interestingly, there was a so-so review of it in the recent New York Times Book Review. The reviewer dissed some of Rayner's writing style and didn't like how Rayner kept moving away from the central focus -- the murder of L.A. gangster Charlie Crawford and subsequent trial of handsome lawyer Dave Clark, who was accused of committing the crime -- to highlight lots and lots (and lots) of other L.A. scandals and crimes. So far, I'm loving the book, though. Granted, I'm only about one-third of the way through it, but is it ever a page-turner... I can understand the NYT Book Review reviewer's gripes. But Rayner's prose is fast-moving and sparkles with vivid descriptions of the events he's covering. This is a man that loves L.A. crime and L.A. noir and the seamy side of Tinseltown. He gets off on it, in fact. And he is a wonderful tour guide who loves leading the reader through L.A.'s back alleys, homes and halls of power. I'm not finished yet, but I am thoroughly enjoying what I've read so far. 

My Take on the Crisis in Honduras

 

This is my latest column from The Waterloo Region Record on the crisis in Honduras. I'm posting it here because visitors to the Tiki Lounge don't always see my columns in the Record. And this issue is particularly important at this time. I hope you enjoy it. -- A.H.

U.S. stand on Honduran coup is a welcome change

July 11, 2009

Andrew Hunt

Central America used to be one of the planet's hot spots, yet for the last 25 years the region has been relatively quiet.

But the recent crisis in Honduras, triggered by the undemocratic ouster of President Manuel Zelaya on June 28, has brought the once-tumultuous region back into the spotlight. Zelaya's failed attempt on July 5 to fly back to Honduras to resume power proved the stuff of high drama.

The world's response to the anti-Zelaya coup has been encouraging. Last weekend, the Organization of American States (OAS) -- the 34-member pan-American political body that monitors events in this hemisphere -- voted to expel Honduras in response to the coup.

Most governments around the world, including Canada, have also condemned the overthrow of Zelaya. Peter Kent, minister of state for foreign affairs for Stephen Harper's government, issued a statement: "Canada condemns the coup d'etat that took place over the weekend in Honduras, and calls on all parties to show restraint and to seek a peaceful resolution to the present political crisis, which respects democratic norms and the rule of law, including the Honduran constitution."

Hondurans are divided, with some supporting the coup. Outside of Honduras, the most outspoken backers of the coup have been American conservatives. Most of them are happy to see Zelaya go. In the past, Zelaya has built ties to leftist governments in Cuba and Venezuela. The American right sees him as an anti-democratic leader who leans too far to the left.

Hans Bader, a legal expert with the right-wing Competitive Enterprise Institute, voiced the anti-Zelaya argument: "I don't think they needed to wait until he actually made himself into a dictator. I think they were entitled to take action against a budding dictator."

But conservatives in America are no longer controlling the nation's foreign policy. Had John McCain been elected last year, the White House likely would've supported the coup, the same way so many past presidents in the 20th century backed undemocratic coups in Latin America.

Conservatives are not in power, though. And President Barack Obama's administration opposed the coup.

Immediately after Zelaya's ouster, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made the Obama administration's policy clear: "The United States has been working with our partners in the OAS to fashion a strong consensus condemning the detention and expulsion of President Zelaya, and calling for the full restoration of democratic order in Honduras."

This is an encouraging position and a welcome break from Washington's long-standing tradition of interfering in Central American nations to protect American business and strategic interests.

Over the past two decades, Central America has moved steadily away from the guerrilla wars that typically pitted Marxist insurgencies against undemocratic, pro-U.S. governments.

To be certain, poverty and corruption still exist. Yet the old Cold War struggles in the region -- so destructive for so many years -- have become a thing of the past. Former Marxist revolutionaries have traded their radicalism in for pragmatism and have been elected to democratic governments. In Nicaragua and El Salvador, leftist parties that once fought against U.S.-backed forces now run the governments.

Central America has come a long way. And thankfully, the Obama administration has reoriented American foreign policy in a more positive direction.

Instead of subverting democracy in Central America (as earlier presidents have done in the past), the Obama administration has backed democratic forces in a nation with a long history of violence and turmoil.

Whatever happens in Honduras, it is safe to say that, on the whole, Central America is far better off than it was 25 years ago.

Andrew Hunt is an associate professor of history at the University of Waterloo.

The Last of the Cold War Liberals

By the time the Academy Award-winning documentary The Fog of War was made in 2004, its subject matter -- former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (who died yesterday) -- was already something of an anachronism. He was a Cold War Liberal, part of that generation of policy makers in the immediate postwar era who were liberal on domestic issues and fiercely anticommunist when it came to foreign policy. By 2004, Cold War Liberals like McNamara were a vanishing breed, largely replaced in Washington's foreign policy establishment by neoconservatives.

Democrats like McNamara (who was also president of the Ford Motor Company before he became Secretary of Defense) led America through its most prosperous years, the period roughly between 1945 and 1965. But the Robert McNamaras and Lyndon Johnsons and Hubert Humphreys -- and the others who shared their faith in Cold War Liberalism -- fell victim to the contradictions of their own beliefs. They endeavored to be humanitarians at home and militant anticommunists overseas. They failed to understand the inherent tensions within their own beliefs. 

When McNamara appeared in Errol Morris's The Fog of War, many liberals celebrated the former Secretary of Defense for his critical self-reflection and his sober analysis of American foreign policy in the Kennedy and Johnson Years (1961-1968). During that period, McNamara exercised a profound influence over foreign policy. So his observations in The Fog of War, on everything from the Bay of Pigs fiasco to the bombing of North Vietnam, made for an incredibly compelling documentary. The Fog of War was a hypnotic film. It was a mesmerizing mix of startling film footage and McNamara's wise-sounding words. 

The documentary was so powerful that it was easy to miss the fact that Errol Morris handled Robert McNamara with kid gloves. He never challenged anything that came out of McNamara's mouth. And viewers with liberal sensibilities ate it up. While Christopher Hitchens and others on the Left wrote of the "crimes" of Henry Kissinger, McNamara -- whose wrongdoings were as great as, if not greater than, those of Kissinger -- was essentially let off the hook, presumably because he was more critical of American foreign policy in the 1960s and 1970s than Kissinger. 

Unlike Kissinger, McNamara was genuinely tormented and haunted by the policies that he played a key role in creating. Is that what makes McNamara is the good bureaucrat versus Kissinger's bad bureaucrat in the eyes of so many liberals? A war crime is a war crime. Kissinger was part of an administration -- the Nixon administration -- seeking an end to the war that the Kennedy and Johnson administrations initiated and expanded. Kissinger remains unrepentant and unapologetic for the policies he helped create. By contrast, McNamara, in his powerful book In Retrospect, apologized for his actions.

So McNamara is cleared of wrongdoing in the eyes of most liberals, while Kissinger continues to be the "bad guy." This approach -- to lionize McNamara and vilify Kissinger -- ignores the role that liberals played in the catastrophe that was the Vietnam War. Cold War Liberals were, in fact, the architects of the Vietnam War. 

Liberals need to own up to the role that Cold War Liberals played in helping to devastate much of Southeast Asia. One of the most insightful speeches from the 1960s was delivered by Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) leader Carl Oglesby at a mass protest on November 27, 1965. At one point in the speech, he said:

The original commitment in Vietnam was made by President Truman, a mainstream liberal. It was seconded by President Eisenhower, a moderate liberal. It was intensified by the late President Kennedy, a flaming liberal. Think of the men who now engineer that war — those who study the maps, give the commands, push the buttons, and tally the dead: Bundy, McNamara, Rusk, Lodge, Goldberg, the President himself. They are not moral monsters. They are all honorable men. They are all liberals.

The purpose of this Blog isn't to attack McNamara. Oglesby was right: He was an honorable man. But he wasn't a hell of a lot more (or less) honorable than Henry Kissinger. The reflective self-criticism of McNamara's later years does not change the fact that his legacy is a mixed one. The dark parts of his legacy are every bit as horrific and destructive as the dark side of Henry Kissinger's legacy. To let him off the hook because he was wise and thoughtful in In Retrospect and The Fog of War is to absolve liberalism itself. If we succeed in this, we need not explore the tragic contradictions of American liberalism's checkered history. What a tragic mistake that would be. 

Some random observations about America on July 4, 2009

This past Wednesday, July 1, was Canada Day. It was a holiday, with fireworks and celebrations of this wonderful country. The local newspaper, The Waterloo Region Record, published thoughtful pieces in its editorial section on what it means to be a Canadian and the state of Canada today. 

As a Canadian and an American who lives in Canada, yet studies the United States and its history and inhabitants for a living, I find myself reflecting a lot these days on the state of America -- where the nation is at, where it's going, the problems it is experiencing.

The historian in me wonders: How will this moment in history be remembered a hundred years hence? Which events that happen now -- July 4, 2009 -- will stand out in the history books on July 4, 2109? We'll never know. We'll all be dead by then (unless science figures out a way to prolong our lives substantially). But it's worth guessing. 

Here are some of my picks for the events happening now that will resonate in future history books...

1. The Obama Presidency: President Barack Obama has been incredibly shrewd. He has mixed idealism and pragmatism. He has moved swiftly with huge economic stimulus packages to revive the ailing economy, yet his policies -- so far -- have done little to alter the traditional power structures in America or (on a less ambitious scale) even help the poor very much. Overseas, he has been cautious -- pulling troops gradually out of Iraq, keeping his cool on the developments in North Korea's nuclear program, and acting as a true broker (rather than a slavish lackey) when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is impossible to pass judgment on his presidency such a short time into it. At times, he appears to be a bold liberal internationalist; other times, he seems to be a timid pragmatist. But his presidency will be the subject of countless books in the future.

2. The Economic Catastrophe: It will take years -- possibly decades -- before we're out of the tar pit of economic recession. You hear a lot about "populist rage," but that rage doesn't always translate into protest in the streets. In fact, often, it does not. Still, the old Reagan era celebrations of wealth -- as embodied by such television shows as Dallas and Lifestyles of the RIch and Famous -- have pretty much gone the way of the Tyrannosaurus Rex. And now it appears that populist outlaws such as John Dillinger are back in vogue (as evidenced by Johnny Depp's brilliant performance of the gangster in Public Enemies) after a forty-plus year hiatus following the box-office smash/masterpiece hit Bonnie and Clyde (1967). So don't expect any far-reaching critiques of capitalism to come out of this. But at least people will be more open to the same kind of populist/proletarian/social protest pop culture/

3. The Implosion of the Republican Party: Al Franken finally winning the U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota. Internecine battles between Rush Limbaugh and fill in the blank with the name of anyone who's slightly to the left of Attila the Hun. Debates over Sarah Palin's future. Governor Mark Sanford's recent scandal. The defection of Arlen Specter. The list goes on and on. All of it adds up to one thing: The once-powerful GOP, which seemed to achieve a permanent triumph a mere fifteen years ago during the heyday of the Contract with America, is collapsing and there is nobody with the vision, personality or clout to reverse its unravelling. What this will mean to the realignment of American politics remains to be seen. My guess is that the Far Right will lose a great deal of strength. Hopefully, the adherents of extreme right ideology will never gain back the credibility they once enjoyed in the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s. 

4. The Death of Michael Jackson: I said it before in my previous Blog Entry. I'll say it one more time. We witnessed history last week when Michael Jackson died. He was arguably the most famous man on Earth. It would be foolish to say that his death marks the end of an Era (Eras are not determined by one entertainer). But Jackson -- as both the product of and a rebel against our times -- is a towering figure, even in death, and his life story tells us much about the age in which we have lived. 

Finally...

5. The Shadow of September 11: The other day, something quite striking occurred to me: I'm amazed -- shocked is maybe a better word -- at how little anybody discusses the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, anymore. Sure, every now and then you hear about it in the news. The recent reopening of the Statue of Liberty's crown, for example, resulted in a mention of the attacks. You'll recall that the crown and pedestal were closed after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks for security reasons. Likewise, in late June, Reuters announced that the United States Supreme Court decided that "Saudi Arabia, four of its princes and other Saudi entities cannot be held liable for the September 11, 2001, hijacked plane attacks in the United States." (Source.)  So September 11 occasionally creeps back into our collective consciousness. But on the whole, it is safe to say that it is also dimming in the nation's memory. Yet we are still living with two wars -- Iraq and Afghanistan -- as well as the threat of other conflicts (Iran and North Korea), the continued imprisonment of "terror suspects" at Guantanamo in Cuba, debates over the future of America's security, and post-9/11 sensibilities and paranoia. The American people might not always stop to remember the tragic events of 9/11, but they are living in the shadow of that terrible event. Even President Obama, with his rejection of the War on Terror and the language of the Bush administration, has been able to do much to pull the nation out of that long and ominous shadow. 

On that somewhat grim note, Happy July Fourth...

Michael Jackson's Enduring Legacy

Note: I wrote much of this entry on June 27, but this is my first opportunity to post it. I hope you enjoy it. 

On Facebook, Blogs and a variety of Websites, I keep reading posts from irate people who are sick and tired of hearing about the death of Michael Jackson. A few of my Facebook friends have commented that the people who died in the pro-democracy protests in Iran are just as important as the famous King of Pop. Within hours of Michael Jackson's death, certain curmudgeons began suffering from JDF... Jackson Death Fatigue. 

Maybe you can't blame them. Turn on Larry King Live, pick up any newspaper, go to any news website, turn on any radio station -- several of them here in Ontario are playing weekend-long M.J. Retrospectives -- and you'll be inundated with news about "Jacko." 

News of the death of Michael Jackson is impossible to escape. And you aren't going to escape it by coming to Andrew's Tiki Lounge, either. I don't have anything necessarily new or earth-shattering to add. But Michael Jackson was a giant in the world of pop culture and to not comment on his passing would be to miss out on an important moment in American history. 

Like him or not, Jackson left a profound mark on this world. Notice that when he died, the reactions varied widely. People looked to Jackson and saw what they wanted to see. A substantial minority of commentators focused almost exclusively on the allegations of child molestation that plagued Jackson until the day he died. Most people focused on his astonishing talents -- especially his music and his dancing. Some preferred to emphasize his troubled childhood and estrangement from his father. 

Michael Jackson symbolized an entire era -- chiefly, the Eighties (even though he was also big in the 1970s and 1990s). Why is he remembered as a giant? Probably because his music shattered so many age-old racial barriers as he recorded some of the best-selling albums in the history of the United States. 

Jackson rejected virtually every artificial construct in modern America by hovering somewhere between Black and White, Male and Female, Child and Adult, Celebrity and Recluse. Many of his songs turned out to be pleas for racial tolerance ("Black & White," "Man in the Mirror," etc.). And more than any other black artist or performer, he had the greatest appeal of any African-American performer in modern history to white audiences. 

Retrospectives on Jackson have focused heavily on his music and dancing. Television stations play and replay his videos. Radio stations are playing his songs all the time, even up here in Canada. The curmudgeons who are experiencing Michael Jackson Death Fatigue have no where to go. 

Jackson is a historical figure. Future generations will be writing scholarly accounts about the man. He symbolized so many trends that were so important in post-Civil Rights Era America. He blurred all kinds of lines in American society. This is undoubtedly one of the reasons that his detractors have chosen to focus on the accusations of child abuse against Jackson. In the 1990s, allegations of child abuse failed to result in an arrest or prison time. In 2005, Jackson was cleared of all charges after a 14-week child molestation trial. But the anti-Jackson crowd will always insist that Jackson "bought" his way out of a looming scandal. Certainly, the charges drove him deeper and deeper into his sheltered life, outside the view of the public.

Then there were the other "Jackson Mysteries" that fueled speculation: an alleged skin disease that made him turn whiter and whiter; Jackson dangling his baby at a hotel window for everybody to see; Jackson's Never Land compound, full of rides and petting zoos; his plastic surgery disasters and disappearing nose. 

By the time he died, Jackson was deep in debt. He was planning a "comeback" tour. He hoped to revive his ailing career. He'd become a Charles Foster Kane-type figure. He still enjoyed gigantic legions of fans, which speaks to the potency of his musical contributions in the 1980s. Millions mourned his passing. But there were also huge numbers of observers who chose to revisit the dark and eccentric side of Michael Jackson's life. 

We'll see a lot more of Jackson in the days ahead. Expect his funeral to be huge. Expect the debates about his legacy to continue. And expect to continue hearing his music and seeing images of him dancing. Michael Jackson is dead. But as one of the most important pop culture icons of the final decades of the Twentieth Century -- possibly the most important pop culture icon in the world in the 1980s and 1990s -- Michael Jackson isn't going anywhere.