Law Students

Quote of the Day [Updated]

So I didn?t say anything. Trial Team try-outs were about to begin and it wasn?t the time nor the crowd to attempt to rebut that comment. That?s why I have a blog! Two quick points:

First, as a point of clarity, if the USSR, Che Guevara and the United States of America were morally equivalent (i.e., they all murdered lots of people so what?s the big deal), than why is wearing a USSR or a Che shirt cool and wearing anything related to an American flag taboo? In other words, why don?t USSR t-shirt wearers wear a Stalin shirt on Tuesday and an Lincoln shirt on Wednesday? You simply don?t see it. It?s as if that the USSR, Che Guevara, Mao, and others given the benefit of the doubt, in fact seen as heroes because they advocated for left wing policies. Sure these policies were taken to extreme measures with genocidal results, but they cared about the little man so it?s okay! George Washington owned slaves and was pro capitalist so he was evil. In their minds, Guantanamo Bay is no different than the Gulag. People who wear these t-shirts (or are sympathetic to people who do) don?t simply think that the most murderous regimes in history are the same as the United States, they?re actually better.

This is the Howard Zinn/Noam Chomsky philosophy, which, unfortunately, is required reading in most high schools/universities and essentially takes a proctologist view of American history. For example, the American Revolution was not about the historic establishment of human rights, but the oppression of non-white non-land holders. America gets docked for slavery (while every other country and civilization that had slavery gets a pass), but America gets no credit for being the only country in the history of the world that fought and spilled the blood of millions of white Americans in order to liberate black American slaves. World War II was much more about the fire bombing of Dresden and the ?unjust? bombing of Hiroshima than it was liberating the world from totalitarianism. And on and on it goes. Zinn/Chomsky, and those who espouse their philosophy, turns American Exceptionalism on it?s head by arguing the only exceptional thing about America is it?s cruelty and malice. Just as an aside, Jihadists and Communists LOVE Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky and other similar anti-American thinkers.

Second, a quick note on the Native American comment specifically. Germs introduced unintentionally by initial European explorers resulted in killing about 95 percent of the pre-Columbian Native American population between 1492 and the late 1600s before Europeans themselves began settling the New World. Please allow me to borrow liberally from a recent Michael Medved column (read the whole thing):

Obviously, the decimation of native population by European germs represents an enormous tragedy, but in no sense does it represent a crime. Stories of deliberate infection by passing along "small-pox blankets" are based exclusively on two letters from British soldiers in 1763, at the end of the bitter and bloody French and Indian War. By that time, Indian populations (including those in the area) had already been terribly impacted by smallpox, and there's no evidence of a particularly devastating outbreak as a result of British policy? Sympathy for Native Americans and admiration for their cultures in no way requires a belief in European or American genocide. As Jared Diamond's book (and countless others) makes clear, the mass migration of Europeans to the New World and the rapid displacement and replacement of Native populations is hardly a unique interchange in human history. On six continents, such shifting populations ? with countless cruel invasions and occupations and social destructions and replacements - have been the rule rather than the exception?The notion that unique viciousness to Native Americans represents our "original sin" fails to put European contact with these struggling Stone Age societies in any context whatever, and only serves the purposes of those who want to foster inappropriate guilt, uncertainty and shame in young Americans.

In conclusion: America isn?t perfect but it is exceptional. It is not equivalent, morally or otherwise, to the Nazis, Soviets or any other crazy regime. There is nothing clean or innocent about establishing a country, and historically, in every nation, it usually results in bloodshed in oppression of native and minority groups. However, there is no other country in the history of the world that has done more to stamp out these injustices natural to creating a civilization than America has.

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UPDATE

I was watching some Simpsons on my lunch break when I saw an apropos moment at about the 5:00 mark. Enjoy. In fact, the whole episode is pretty fitting. (Note the Howard Zinn book Marge is reading!)

Full post as published by SoapBox Law on April 10, 2008 (boomark / email).