Polarization during Vietnam compared to now

[nonconformist]

I'd love to get some perspective from DU'ers who were around, and perhaps very political, during the Vietnam War.

I was just a young child when Vietnam ended, but I've been told by a few that the division, while very much about the war and policy, was actually more generational. That the social and age differences on both sides were clear and the division had a great deal to do with strides in racial and sexual equality and freedom - a generation coming into it's own. On the other hand, I've also been told that this country hasn't been as divided since the Vietnam era - implying that the current polarization is comparable and is equal to, if not less than, the division during Vietnam.

I've been thinking about this, because it seems to me that the current divisions are just so straight across the board it's literally torn the country in half. You have all races, ages, economic classes and sexual orientations on both sides of the issue. Sure, as is traditional the majority of blacks and gays are on our side while the majority of affluent whites (it seems) and fundies are on the other. But it really seems to boil down to fundamental policy disagreements that can't be flippantly brushed aside as "a bunch of hippies on drugs". There is a rabid desperation on both sides to take control.

I'm really interested in hearing first-hand accounts and perspective from DU'ers that have lived through both times.

[napi21]

1. Far more people were against the war in 'Nam..

Why do you think Johnson didn't run again?

By far, a majority of the country was against the war back then. That's one of the big problems now. People still feel guilty about how badly they treated the soldiers when they returned home. What they did wasn't their fault, but people were so bitter, they took it out on those who fought the was.

[lanparty]

2. The BIGGEST problem is ...

...

The biggest problem is that the right has NEVER let go of Vietnam. They thought it was winnable if we only put enough resources into it. They thought the Vietnamese defending their hooches from foreigners GAVE A SHIT, OR EVEN KNEW ABOUT protesters in the United States!!!!

We saw the Vietnam scenario play out with the USSR in Afghanistan. It was NEVER about communism. It was about people defending their homes from foreign invaders. It was about self determination of a people.

No, the Vietnamese did NOT defeat us militarily. They just wore the US down and made us THINK about the the value of Vietnam vs the cost. We did the EXACT same this to England during the Revolution.

My only hope is that the right wingers will FINALLY learn this lesson in Iraq-nam. If not, we're doomed to repeat the same stupid ass mistake OVER and OVER and OVER again!!!!!

[NewJeffCT]

44. But, that was 1968.

We were in Vietnam actively for several years by that time... we've only been in Iraq actively for 18 months. Did people in '64 and '65 feel it was wrong / a mistake?

[NMDemDist2]

3. i remeber it as more generational and not so hateful

there were "Love it or Leave it" people and "Peace and Love" people but it didn't seem to gather up the entire country at the start

after kent state and the Cronkite editoral most of the country was pretty against the war

I couldn't vote against Nixon (teens didn't get the vote til later) but we hated LBJ for the VN policies and worked hard for McGovern. Nixon just didn't seem so frightening as the neocons. He promised to get us out of the war (he ended up bombing Cambodia but hey :shrug: ) I didn't get to vote for President until 1980

this seems to be more hateful and frightening than it was in the 70's IIRC. I was 18 in 1973. but I did live in california, marched in Berkely starting in 1970 and while we got tear gassed in the streets, it didn't seem to be as divisive as this administration has been.

[sandnsea]

4. It's worse, it's boiling

It hasn't exploded yet.

I disagree that there were more people against the war back then. If there were, we wouldn't have so many supporting these Swift Boat Liars now would we? It's like when Kerry thought he could win Lowell, he was surprised to find out the poor weren't really willing to vote for an anti-war candidate. Many weren't even wild about the "peace with honor" line and thought we were distinctly running like cowards. They're the ones who still think we could have won if we hadn't had one hand tied behind our backs. Never mind the fact that we were illegally bombing N Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia; and killed 2-3 million people over those 10+ years.

There were divisions among older people too. I remember my dad being very upset when my sister wanted her own apartment, while my mother fully supported her. Look how long it took for the country to figure out Nixon was a lying crook. And he wasn't anywhere near as bad as Bush.

It's similar I think, war and a fight for values; civil rights vs. "tradition". But without the hippie counter-culture movement. Without the riots, yet. We had alot of other wild things happen too, like the Cuyahoga River catching on fire. That woke people up to the need for change.

If Bush is elected, I fear it will lead to riots. With Kerry, I can hope people finally see him for who he is, trust him and come around. Maybe more is at stake, but maybe from minorities' perspective, maybe not. Scary times, that's for sure.

[The Traveler]

6. Other big differences

The institutions of democracy were not so overtly under direct attack from within. The media was more independent of corporate direction. There was an established balance of power (Capitalist West vs. Communist East).

Now, new balances of power are being sought and most nations view us as the power that needs to be contained. Now, the Consitution Reformation Act of 2004 is being pushed to achieve the first step towards establishment of theocratic rule in America. Now, there are real indications that we are nearing peak oil and that global warming is accelerating.

Perhaps more significantly, roughly equal segments of the population embrace opposing world views and neither shows any side of surrendering to the other or even finding sufficient common ground to coexist.

In many ways, these issues cut deeper. And we have less time to deal with their many implications. All of which adds pressure to the pot ...

[sandnsea]

13. Outright hate

I feel more outright hate and unwillingness to reason now. Everybody in the 60's, or most everybody, seemed to pride themselves on being intelligent, informed, enlightened. Even in my little hobunk neighborhood. Not that you could be overly informed with just the news and the local paper. Still, pride in ignorance didn't seem as pervasive. And there was no Rush Limbaugh, that I knew of anyway.

Agh, you're post gets me thinking of all the things that start getting me even more freaked out about this election. And we've got people saying everything will be alright as long as there's no abortions and no gay marriages.

[monchie]

18. There were equivalents to Limbaugh, Hannity, etc. in the 1960s...

...but they were largely relegated to tiny 500-watt radio stations that had minimal impact. Mainstream Republicans avoided them like the plague.

[The Traveler]

20. There was hate

I remember bigots praying for RFK's death in 1968. I remember older friends coming home from protests bleeding from police truncheons.

In a real sense, the conflict of those days was never resolved ... just shoved under the carpet for awhile. So here we are again.

[sandnsea]

25. Not like today

Sure, there were bigots but the hate was directed at RFK or MLK; not every Democrat in the country. Not like it is today. Although, like I said, I imagine an African American might feel differently. And today, the hate is equal going in the other direction because the right wing is nuttier than they ever hoped to be in the 60's, even the bigots. I always felt like there was alot of fighting going on, but not deep-seated hatred. People were outraged at Kent State. Today, I get the feeling there would be a big national shrug. Or maybe the bleeding then makes the bleeding now easier to take, I don't know. But you're right, it is the same fight over again, forward or backward, what will America be.

[nonconformist]

7. You read my mind

This was definitely one of the reasons I posed this question - if we're more divided and angry now, how will that play out?

I really do feel like if we lose and there's foul play suspected (and it will be) there WILL be riots and mass chaos... which could lead to some seriously scary events *tinfoil*. We're already in the middle of an idealogical civil war... when violence becomes a factor, will it become a real one?

[sandnsea]

16. Maybe not

I was worried we'd have fist fights in the voting lines, so far, so good. That's made me a little less worried. But if there's voting problems, it could blow. Much worse than 2000 because almost all Democrats get that it was completely orchestrated. There's a feeling that the stakes are higher this time too, like posted above. I don't know, pray for rain on Nov 3???

[kokomo]

27. One risks even bring up political topics these days.

I haven't even put up a Kerry/Edwards sign on my lawn as all of my neighbors have Bush signs and I fear my house being egged or worse. I know the sign would not stay up long before being stolen or vandalized.

My Wells-Fargo bank has TV sets suspended from the ceiling and they always play Fox News all day long. I got into a heated verbal battle standing in line to cash a check when I commented to another Democratic friend in the bank that Dan Rather didn't need those documents, that there was already enough evidence on Bush to hang him on the deserter issue. All of a sudden the whole line of folks turned on me, with raised voices. One guy followed me to the parking lot to see what kind of car I was in! At age 65, partially lame from arthritis, I am not looking for a physical fight with a young punk. My age surely wasn't respected that day. My fault for opening my mouth in public, I guess. So much for "free speech".

I don't think Wells-Fargo should be playing Fox News either and plan to write them a letter to that effect.

[sandnsea]

30. That's too bad

We've only had one bad incident like that. Well, rather than me telling Pubs they're idiots. We have an 80 year old couple that had their spot blocked out for protesting the war. Every Saturday from 10-12. Well it make some Pubs mad, so they decided to have their own display. Which is fine, except they insisted on doing it right where this old couple always did it and showing up a few minutes ahead of them. Well this old couple wasn't about to move and it got very heated. And these guys were proud of themselves... now get this... 45-50 year old men proud of pushing around a couple of 80 year olds. I just don't understand that. I don't blame you for being careful either, but it's just not right.

[GarySeven]

49. Sorry, but the LBJ internal polling of 1967

Shows that the core constituency's support for the war had peaked in about March of that year, about the time it was revealed that Westmoreland had secretly demanded more troops despite public assurances that all was well. Public support plummeted after that and only accelerated after Tet. LBJ jumped the shark for the American public long before Cronkite's editorial; Walter just crystalized an argument that the critical could to hang their opposition from.

[Catt03]

5. Very divided

however, one factor makes a big difference. The Vietnam War was televised.

Meaning that we saw the horror of war every day in our living rooms.
We saw the bodies of the dead, the wounded, the enemy and it was devastating.

I remember seeing a truck carrying US wounded out of a battle and it was was traumatic....still think about it today. Daily, planes emptied caskets of Americans, bringing them home. Also daily televised stories of funerals.

The Afghan and Iraq invasions are not allowed to be televised, as are not the bodies of American solders being brought home. This is the only conflict in US history where the press is censored.

[nonconformist]

9. The propoganda machine

The bane of most of our problems. From the fear to the media, it's pages right out of Goebbels' playbook.

[kokomo]

8. I think we are much more polarized now than during Vietnam.

More folks taking it to the streets then with more anger, but it took about 5 years for it to happen. We had just as big or bigger protest marches but Bush, unlike Nixon, didn't seem to even be bothered. We cannot get the attention of this administration. They are even more arrogant than Nixon's White House, I do believe. Who will become the next John Dean, with a conscience? I have given up hope that Colin Powell will come forward and expose these criminals...he seems happy to carry Bush's water.

The anti-war movement then seemed younger (but I was younger, too) whereas folks of all ages and all walks of life rallied against this war in Iraq. The Vietnam protests birthed a whole culture, complete with music. Where are the protest songs now?

I used to argue with my father about Vietnam, he was big in the American Legion at the Post and district/state level and a WWII veteran. But we could still talk, and years later he came around to realizing it was a futile war. Now, I cannot even discuss politics with my wholly Republican family (save for another DUer) anymore. That wasn't the case during the Vietnam war or Watergate.

Watch "Up the River" is you get a chance. The part about the Winter Soldiers and the march on Washington really show how John Kerry's patience and wisdom helped to change a nation.

[nonconformist]

10. Going Upriver made me fall in love with Kerry

That man was born to be President, especially one of this time.

I wonder if the anti-war movement during Vietnam would have grown legs a lot quicker if they would have had the accesss to information like we do now with the Internet? I bet it would have, although it appears the actual press was a lot more honest and forthcoming then too.

And I'm with you on talking to people about it. While fortunately my family is all on the same page, I've distanced myself from some friends because, well, I'm filled with rage.

[PlanetBev]

11. I was eighteen in '68

Folks, let me assure you, this period we're living in is way worse. First of all, the media had way more integrity then and wasn't afraid to take on it's leaders. Journalism was not owned by GE or AOL/Time Warner. We did not have a.m. hate radio or Fox news. The Fairness Doctrine was still in place. There were race riots, but we were moving forward with civil rights, women's rights, gay rights, etc. Change was in the air. The 60's was a mini-Rennaisance. You could see that clearly in the music and art that was available then.

I don't see this time we're in as a period of change or enlightenment. It is a period of stand-off and deadlock, which is extremely dangerous.

Sooner or later, it's going to blow like St. Helens.

[Silver Gaia]

12. Miss_Bevey...

I was a bit younger than you in '68 (15), but my view echoes yours. This is far more bitter, there is more division, and there is no sense of "changing the world" for the better that we felt then. You are correct. This feels far more dangerous and like something building to a climax that could, if unchecked, rip this country apart. I do not like feeling this way, and am hoping that a Kerry presidency will be the healing balm we need.

[leftofthedial]

14. the war focused dissent

now, as in most areas of our social framework, we are much more fragmented

all themore remarkable that the little bushturd could do such an amazing job of uniting us to get rid of his scrawny incompetent ass

[monchie]

15. I'd say we're more polarized now...

...and it's a different kind of polarization.

The Vietnam era was largely, though not entirely, a generational split. For older people, WW2 was a defining event of their lives, and if ever there was a "good war," it was WW2. After all, Japan attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbor, and old Adolf and his pals were as close to pure evil as you could get. And if we couldn't defeat them overseas, Japan and Germany would surely become direct threats to the mainland of the United States of America -- heck, there were even U-boats off the coast of New Jersey and Long Island.

Even most hard lefties agreed: We were the good guys and the Japanese and Germans were the bad guys.

But Vietnam hadn't attacked us, and there was no chance they'd be invading California. So, in the eyes of many in the generation that would have to fight it, the war was at best morally ambiguous.

The Greatest Generation, however, viewed Vietnam through eyes more attuned to the black and white certainties of WW2.

What we have now is, I believe, a polarization more similar to that of the Civil War -- it's a culture war between the moderns and the reactionaries, between those who believe in at least some social evolution and those who'd like to turn the clock back to what they see as simpler, surer times.

And yes, it's a culture war between red and blue America. During the 2000 election, I was struck by how similar the map was to the Civil War split: The blue states tended to be the old Union strongholds of the Northeast, Great Lakes and West Coast, while a large part of the red states was the old Confederacy, with the addition of the Plains States and intermountain West. It's metro vs. retro.

But there's a lot of red in the blue states, and a lot of blue in the red states. Dittoheads aren't that hard to find in NY, NJ, and PA, especially in rural areas, though longtime Republican strongholds in the suburbs have been getting bluer over the last 20 years or so. And in the South and Plains and Intermountain states, you'll find a lot of blue outposts, especially in the more urbanized areas.

Someone on DU came up with the best description I've seen for our very dark era: "The Cold Civil War."

[sandnsea]

17. My DH

Told a Rep friend, it's a "civil" war right now, let's hope it doesn't get any worse.

[mhr]

37. I Believe That I Will See Open Revolt In My Lifetime

I do not believe that the right-wing fundamentalists will ever cease their activities.

I do not believe that the right-wing propaganda machine will go away.

I do not believe that the right-wing business community will ever become less strident.

Hence I believe that what we are seeing is open warfare on those with a progressive agenda.

Regrettably, this will not lead to peace and harmony and we will see bloodshed in the streets.

My advice to progressives, live like Gandhi, but train like Marines.

[LibertyorDeath]

38. Great post

"live like Gandhi, but train like Marines"

[kurt_cagle]

19. Religious Factors

I think there's another profound difference between the Vietnam War and the present. The evangelical Christian movement has gone from being barely a factor to being one of the biggest factors in the polarization of this country. At his height, Richard Nixon was never considered by his followers to be one step from God. Bush's followers are -- many see him as the incarnation of Christ on Earth in the 21st century, and they see him leading them into a theocratic "heaven" where all of the Godless heathens will be interned or even killed outright.

This is a factor that is often hinted at but not mentioned outright in most of the recent media analyses that I've seen of the campaign. The religious fundamentalists feel that they are within a few years of achieving total dominion, at which point they can freely persecute the gays, the witches, can move women back into the kitchen and make minorities subservient once again. They want this country to be one where you MUST sign a loyalty oath that binds you as a "Christian" in order to do anything from voting to holding public office to seeking employment. Once all of the Godless have thus been purged, then they will use the US as a platform to do the same kind of conversion on the rest of the world.

I grew up in the early seventies, helping my father repatriate both soldiers and refugees in Hawaii after the fall of Saigon. We talked a lot about what was going on in the country, but in general most of the division was more about believing whether or not the administration was doing the correct thing. This deep seated Dominion politics is very new, and in some ways the most terrifying aspect of the whole Bush ascendancy, because these people are not motivated by logic but by faith, no matter how misplaced that faith may be.

[Silver Gaia]

23. kurt... you make an excellent point

about the religious fundamentalists and Dominion politics. THIS is what scares the hell outta me the MOST about the current division. A friend of mine was telling me about seeing this woman in the audience at a * rally on TV (CNN maybe?) sometime over the weekend. He had just arrived and was walking past her. She looked like someone caught in a religious frenzy... you know... like any moment she might begin speaking in tongues. She said she only caught a moment of it because the cameraman must have realized it looked pretty freaky and moved on quickly. Those people scare the crap outta me. Ever read Margaret Atwood's book The Handmaid's Tale? Combine that and 1984, and maybe we're close here.

[nonconformist]

29. They think this is all prophecy and that the Rapture is coming

End-timers scare me more than anything. And this is why there are so many people who chose to ignore the facts right before their eyes. To them, this is biblical prophecy and means Jesus is coming soon. You can't reason with them and that is very dangerous.

[gavodotcom]

36. Good luck to them dominating.

I'd imagine it'd be hard to make the next generation of military hardware when your biology book says that dinosaur fossils are a test for humans and the Grand Canyon was the creation the great flood.

(This is a very interesting discussion, by the way, thanks for everybody's stories)

[Hamlette]

21. it was worse then

I disagree with the comment that more people were anti war then. It was 50-50 in 1968 and stayed there, mostly, throughout.

The civil rights movement was worse. It was scary and people were dying.

College students took to the streets. Don't see that now.

Remember too that "it" was happening in Europe too. There it was just a generation gap as the war wasn't as critical to them as it was to us. But it existed there as well. The governments acted more responsibly there though. They set up programs to bridge the gaps. Here we ignored it and hoped it would go away.

This go around, ask the republicans you know to be honest: if Clinton had started the war in Iraq telling the people it was because of WMD and no WMD were found, would they still support the war? If they are honest they will say no. Which makes us different because it was mostly democrats who were against the war and their prez, Johnson. It's my gut check.

[demzilla]

22. Today's right wingers are a reaction to the progress made back then

The right-wing movement of today is a reaction to the left-wing "triumph" of the 1960s -- civil rights, Medicare and the Great Society programs, sexual and cultural liberalization, women's liberation, the gay rights movement, environmental issues, more freethinking approaches toward religion, etc. Vietnam acted as a catalyst of the left against the old order; enough liberal ideas got into the mainstream that by the mid-70s we had Roe v. Wade, we had a Republican president supporting the Equal Rights Amendment, affirmative action was national policy, etc.

But, gradually, with the late 1970s Moral Majority of Fallwell, the triumph of Reagan and the return to the yuppie materialism if the 1980s, and gains by fundamentalists in the structure of the Republican party, we ended up with a new "old order" that feels threatened, desperate, put upon, endangered by liberalization of the culture.

So where the 1960s into the 70s saw the whole culture shifting leftward, we now have a cultural divide, 50/50, in which the right is a reaction to the cultural progress of the '60s and '70s, much of which actually stuck. This is why they hated Clinton so much -- he seemed to embody everything about that era that they hated. Since Chimpy was appointed president, the views of each side have become more and more hardened toward the other. Our side is finally becoming as angry and as threatened as they are. What this bodes, I do not know. But I have not felt tension like this since the Vietnam era.

[Silver Gaia]

24. Yes, demzilla...

I agree that this is a backlash effect. All movements that create great change in society tend to have some degree of backlash it seems. This is a particularly large-scale and very scary backlash effect, however.

[neomonkey]

26. Excellent post noncomformist

Well-stated.

I was born in '64 so I really have no recollection of those wild and wooly 60's.

I can say this though, from my knowledge of history: the media was much stronger then.

If you doubt this, I ask you, would the Pentagon Papers have surfaced in today's mainstream/sheople-hypnotized mindset?

[nonconformist]

31. Bush could be videotaped reading Mein Kampf and taking notes

Or some such and it still wouldn't make our news.

[sherilocks]

28. I was active in the Vietnam anti-war movement

As many who replied here have noted, the media at that time reported the news, all of it. They did not allow themselves be censored by the government.

I marched in DC. I still have the pictures of protesters flinging off their clothes and jumping into the fountain on the mall, naked. Yes, many of the older generation were horrified by this form of activism. But there were many older people marching, along with the younger generation.

I can remember crossing the bridge to Arlington, not as part of the protest, but with several friends, during the protest. The police showed up and raised their guns, telling me that I would be shot if I continued.

I had a similar experience when I crossed into East Germany from Check-point Charlie in Berlin in 1976. Only it was a Communist soldier who raised his gun. He was searching my van and throwing away my books and I started screaming at him to stop. Est nicht korrecte, is what he told me, as he raised his rifle to my chest.

In 2001, pre 9/11, I went to the Daytona Beach Airport to protest at the arrival of the newly selected pResident at the airport. I took my sign and walked over to the area where dozens of GOPers were holding their signs. The parking lot was cleared, sharp-shooters were on the roof and security was everywhere. A Daytona Beach police officer walked over to me with his hand on his holster. He told me that he would throw my ass in jail if I didn't get out of there and move to the protest area blocks away. I had never heard of a free speech zone until that day.

Things change, but they stay the same. The biggest difference, and the biggest thing we have to fear, is that in 1969 we had a free and reliable press. Today we do not.

[RafterMan]

32. "Today we do not"

Yes, but you didn't have the internet. That is the wild card today, and I don't think Fortress Media can hold out.

[sherilocks]

33. I agree, but can the internet reach

its prime before it's too late? I keep hearing whispers of censorship in the name of porn, but it isn't a far stretch from there to outright censorship. I know that sounds paranoid and histrionic. But I don't put anything past the current administration. Pray for a John Kerry/John Edwards win.

[RafterMan]

50. Nope, doesn't sound paranoid at all

Except I don't think the censorship won't be just in the name of porn, it will be in the name of porn, copyright protection and ending terroristic anonymity. But the people trying to build that coalition will be media companies who want to maintain their stranglehold on the distribution of information and those who find that situation useful.

Clinton had an abysmal record of capitulation to the media companies, so after we get KE into office we'll have to watch them very closely.

[kurt_cagle]

35. The Internet

I suspect that a part of the reason why Bush is now fighting for his political life instead of resoundingly leading in the polls right now is directly due to the Internet. This administration has tried everything in its power to control its message. The "media" is bought and paid for, the pollsters basically dance in lockstep with the RNC, the churches continue to churn out the Reich-wing's credo, and by all rights, we should not only be handily winning in Iraq, we should have taken over Iran and Syria right now.

Yet * and Co have repeatedly underestimated the Internet and the power that it has to subvert their message. MoveOn would have been impossible before the Internet, ditto DU. Howard Dean would never have managed to get the ball rolling with his Internet campaign, which in many ways seeded the current political effort. The PNAC papers would have remained in some obscure drawer, the consistent pattern of deception by Bush would have been all but unnoticed, and most of the inconsistencies of 9/11 would not be known. Michael Moore would have gotten nowhere, half a million marchers wouldn't have converged on the RNC convention, nor would nearly four million marchers strike in a coordinated fashion in protest of the Iraq War.

This is a hunch, with only slight empirical evidence to back it up, but I would be willing to bet that if you sliced up the electorate between Democratic and Republican, you would find that most of the Internet-savvy people are in the Democratic camp, and with the exception of the Libertarian wing (which has strong associations with the Paleo-Republicans) most of the die-hard Bush supporters are either not on at all or connect through very limited and highly controlled portals such as AOL (which is, of course, part of the CNN/Time/Warner family).

Bush, Chenery, Rumsfeld, etc., are none of them geeks. Cheney, Ashcroft and Runsfeld concentrated on politics, not technology, during the last three decades, and like Papa Bush before them, their experience with the power of the computer as an innovation tool is limited at best.

This is a big part of the reason why most of my work to date has been in the realm of cyberspace. The GOTV is VERY important, but so is providing (and corroborating) breaking news as it happens. This aspect of the story is also one that the conventional news-sources are VERY scared of talking about, because people can very readily be sucked away into the Internet world and leave the canned naval stuff behind.

[Bongo Prophet]

34. Then, we were polarized based on reactions to same data,

or at least similar. Different interpretations, but from same media and thread of history.
Today, we are polarized with totally separate data sets.
Separate realities.
One evolving and fact -based, one dogmatic and ideology based.
Elements of apocalyptic wish-fulfillment, Dominionism.
Psyops are more sophisticated today.
The bi-polar coldwar mindf*ck is replaced by the generations long terra war mindf*ck. Similar, but different.

but....similar.

[nonconformist]

40. That is a really good point.

I think that even if the fundies knew the whole truth (and some I'm sure do), they wouldn't care because they're obsessed with believing this is "gods plan" and it's leading to the Rapture. As well, the neocons know and agree with what they do because they have the same fascist world domination mentality.

But to the unwashed masses, if we had fair and factual major media and they knew what we know this would turn them against Bush. And that's all it would take - they're actually the "majority" of his supporters, albeit not the most influential to him. You take away the scared shitless - but otherwise fairly normal - chunk of his support and you've successfully marginalized the fascists and the fundies.

Alas, that will never happen until we can break up the big media conglomerates - which will take fundamental changes in current U.S. policy to happen. So it seems like a lost cause.

I do have to say though that while I realize not everyone is a political junkie like myself, the information IS out there and available to the majority of U.S. citizens and there are no excuses for being a clueless sheep in this day and age.

[nonconformist]

39. Kick

Kick for the morning crowd since this is a very interesting discussion.

:kick:

[RichardRay]

41. I was there, involved and political

Mostly doing organizing work as active duty enlisted, then community organizing work in urban areas in the east and mid-west. From that perspective it was pretty polarized!

I also think the 'polarization' was different in nature from what it is now. We struggled to connect the Vietnam War to other issues. Most folks saw it as a single issue without connection to racism, sexism, colonialism, etc. It was an uphill battle to get even progressives of the time to work from an analysis that put all of those together, and, in fact, we failed to do so. Had we done so more effectively then our current disaster might never have occurred. It finally came to pass that a single issue analysis was most effective in mobilizing resistance to the war in Vietnam and that's where many of us went. That decision was also a death knoll for the Old Left, marginalizing many Old Left organizations. Lots of those folks are still around today, still canting the same lines they used then and just as ineffective today.

While a more general analysis is far from dominant today in regards Iraq I think it's more common and more people are willing to at least consider that it might have utility. I don't think many folks are acting from a general analysis, but many more are seeing the outlines of such a framework.

That makes for a sharper gap on a wider variety of issues, although perhpas not as deep on the single issue of the war. It makes it harder to find common ground with 'the other side' since more of what divides us becomes clear. On the other hand, it becomes easier to reach across the divide since there's less visceral anger (at least on some issues, and for some people) then there was then. I'd say that the religious conservatives are the new element and the one in which the depth of disagreement is the most virulent.

So, maybe say that the polarization in those days was narrow but very deep; today it's much broader, but not yet as deep.

Richard Ray - Jackson Hole, WY

[Jacobin]

42. "I'm proud to be an okie from muskogee"

We don't burn our draft cards, Murkin flag, no long haired hippies, yadda yadda yadda

I was draft age during Vietnam and didn't go. It was a fucking civil war here in this county. Hundreds coming home in boxes every week. Government LYING its ASS off about Vietnam. Completely unwinnable bullshit war for no reason whatsoever.

Protesters being SHOT AND KILLED on campus, burning down selective service buildings, fleeing to Canada by the thousands.

The country was melting down.

[MADem]

43. Youth activism was more obvious back then

It was the "long haired punks in the street" who really started it up. Nowadays, kids do not yet feel the draft like they did back then. Colleges were chock a block full, competition was fierce, everyone sweated getting into school--even shitty podunk colleges were bursting at the seams. It helped to "know someone" to get a slot. People were desperate to do well on the SATS or ACTS. High schools could ENFORCE discipline because if you were too much of a punk, Uncle Sam was gonna have you the minute you turned 18. Colleges could threaten you if you didn't go to class--they'd turn your name over to the draft board if you got suspended for poor academic performance.

The divide was definitely generational, there were plenty of WW2 vets who could not understand why the long-hairs didn't want to go. Nixon's "silent majority." My country, right or wrong. They refused to see the difference between a war of necessity and a war of choice. They only came around when the body count got terrible and people were rioting in the streets.

I remember those times as HORRIBLE, and sometimes depressing, other times energizing. People really did believe they could change the world. A lot of these people are the geezers you see in the streets today. Who would have thought we would have to do this AGAIN?

Nowadays, although there are some kids who are engaged in the debate, there are way too many kids who are more interested in STUPID shit--clothes, largely lousy music, hooking up. Back then, you did not meet an apolitical person between 16-25...their futures were on the line. They HAD opinions. No doubt, some of them were more interested in smoking grass, getting laid, and listening to LPs, but even the dunces were a bit political, because it was personal. The college rightwingers were definitely in the minority, but they did exist. Both sides really knew the issues, too.

It's funny, they only had the Nightly News (Dan Rather, reporting from Viet Nam, did some fine work) and there were no computers or cable news outlets, but the kids were MUCH better informed than they are nowadays. They read the paper, they watched the news, they went to demonstrations, they listened to activists. At least that is how it seems to me. The war was on TV EVERY DAMN NIGHT. Nowadays, you see nothing--some bozo in a safari jacket sitting on the roof of a hotel, the cameraman taking pictures of smoke in the distance. During Nam, you could see Dan Rather hiding behind a wall peeing himself. The footage was very different than what we see nowadays. It was close-up, it was immediate, and there was so much of it that it was almost numbing. Of course, the concept of embedding reporters did not exist then--the reporters would cadge support off the military in Nam, but there were no agreements or ground rules.

The interviews with the soldiers were more real back then too. A draftee will tell you the truth, and they did. An AVF servicemember in Iraq will spout the "Public Affairs Guidance" under penalty of discipline, unless you turn the camera off or just photograph their boots or hands.

I hated all that shit. I hated that war. I understood that it was necessary to fight the power, but I was pissed that the sweet bloom of youth had to be spent bitching about a LUNACY. The fucking grown ups should have KNOWN BETTER, but they didn't.

And here we are again. When will we ever learn???

[nonconformist]

45. The apathetic are just as guilty as the supporters anymore

In my mind, they're both enablers in their own way. You would have to be completely oblivious at this point to not even pick up on all the things that are going wrong, people always talking about this being the most important election of our lifetimes, draft talk and the Vote or Die campaign aimed at that age group. Even with our theatrical media these are obvious and in-your-face things. You would think that someone would stop for a minute and say "holy shit, what's going on? must be really BAD" and look into it.

It does seem to me that a lot of the 25 and under crowd have been paying more attention the last few months, if only marginally. I think we can credit Howard Dean for some of that, as well as the GOTV efforts and vocal celebrities. Not to mention Michael Moore. I'd like to see this age group get very involved, hopefully it won't take a draft for that to happen.

[kurt_cagle]

46. Demographics

In the late 1960s/early 1970s the Boomers were in college and high school, and the population was overwhelmingly young. The war was generational, because it was the old who were sending the young to fight and die, and the young resented it.

In 2004, this is not a factor at all. The average age of military personnel in the Iraq theater is quite high - 27 or 28, compared to maybe 20 in 1969. The "backdoor draft" of National Guard and Reservist troops has also pushed that age up as well; many more people going to war in the 40s, 50s and 60s that hadn't planned on being back in uniform.

The national population is older in general, even with some strong cohort echoes, and I have been surprised at the number of grandmothers in the protest lines; yes, older voters tend to be more conservative, but this is not a hard and fast rule anymore, and some of the most effective protesters are people who are in their sixties and seventies and have seen all of this shit being thrown at them.

Surprisingly, I'm not really seeing all that many of the "aging hippies" in that crowd. Many of the hippies of the 1960s have become solid "establishment" figures by 2004. The ones that are left, the Howard Zinn's of the world, as often as not are advising their juniors what THEY did that DIDN'T work. While this isn't always true, activists in general tend to be fairly intelligent people ... they learn from their mistakes and they adapt. The protests in the last couple of years have served less to raise public awareness - I think all but the most pollyannish of activists knew that the establishment media would no more wish to pay attention than that Bush would voluntarily admit he was wrong and step down - but rather have made it possible to build up the networks such as MoveOn and the current GOTV efforts.

The liberal of the 1960s is dead. The progressive of 2004 is in many respects more conservative, more connected, recognizing that the problems facing us are not limited to one focus (the war, the environment, the economy) but rather are systemic. They are much less inclined to trust the official version presented not just by the government but by the establishment media, and there is an odd libertarian streak that runs through the progressive movement.

Just my observations. It's why I think that its dangerous to compare this time with the 1960s. Most of us would be embarassed by the progressives of the 1960s as being too naive, and I've heard the sentiment more than once echoed here that there's actually a certain admiration for the Old Guard Conservatives that are becoming as rare as long-haired hippy liberals. It's a different progressive world ...

[diamond14]

47. After Vietnam, there never was a national conversation about "why"

....even today, some traumatized people (swift-boat liars) still think the Vietnam WAR was GLORIOUS and wonderful and honorable...

everybody just took a deep breathe and moved on from this NATIONAL disaster....NOBODY was able to bring up the issue for YEARS....it just quietly fermented, under the news radar.....the whole mess just wasn't talked about NATIONALLY...nobody wanted to face the issues.....and that is why TODAY, we are trying to discuss issues of WAR and PEACE that should have been discussed after Vietnam....it was so tramatic, we thought we won after nixon left in shame, and we all went home to nurse the Vietnam soldiers who came home mentally and physically maimed (the 'spitting on soldiers' crap was part of the reTHUGlican "we love WAR" and we'll do anything to trash those who object....just look at what bush* has done to today's pro-peace people)

it wasn't until the 1990's that John Kerry went over to Vietnam to FIND OUR DEAD and account for OUR POWs.....because reTHUGlicans tried to pretend that Vietnam was wonderful, glorious, and brave, while they neglected OUR wounded Soldiers, who are STILL laying on the streets homeless in OUR Nation's Capital....and John Kerry busted this totally imagined image...suddenly, books and movies about Vietnam, showing the REAL war, came out to the American Public....


My cousin, Charlie (HM2 Medic, Silver Star, Purple Heart, 19 years old DEAD) was KILLED in Vietnam in 1966, when I was finishing high school. He was my friend, my childhood playmate, and I still miss him. His Dad died from grief, shortly after Charlie (only son) was KILLED. I attended the University of Michigan at the height of the KILLING in Vietnam, and when Nixon ordered the National Guard to SHOOT TO KILL students on our campuses.


when puppet/actor reaguns came along....he PROUDLY announced that his WAR ON GRENADA was going to make America proud for the first time since Vietnam....it was pathetic to watch the HUGE American Navy attack a 'little tiny' island with no military at all....pathetic....

and the budget for the MILITARY weapons and war machine has continued to GROW every single year of my life....because of some phanthom "communists" or "terrorists" or "cold war" or whatever it takes to GRAB MORE MONEY from American Taxpayers for KILLING....tiny conflicts have been continuous over the years, and pro-peace people have STOOD UP to control these and keep them from getting bigger....but if you build all the weapons that American has, you always need somewhere to use these up and replenish those war-profiteers with American taxpayers hard-earned money...


in the current bush* wars....Americans have been much more respectful of the military machine, but that could change in a flash...while the soldiers do as they're told, every once in a while, the pentagon will allow us to see the real psychotic madness of the insiders at the highest levels: those who actually relish making WMDs, those who calculate how efficient it is to KILL PEOPLE with new and improved napalm, or new and improve thermonuclear bombs or other insane ideas.....there may come a day, when Americans get real ANGRY at those who design and make WEAPONS and order OUR soldiers to their deaths....for Vietnam, that ANGER was somewhat misplaced against a few of OUR Soldiers, rather than against their commanders, and the WEAPONS makers and the pentagon planners (the real culprits)....

it is the IDEA OF WAR that has to be challenged...the IDEA of making and maintaining (as we currently do) over 20,000 nuclear bombs, and then telling other countries that they can't have even one....the IDEA of America spending HALF of OUR taxes, every single year on military (which includes Veterans, defense dept., nukes, etc., all spread into different areas, so YOU won't notice that it's all MILITARY).....


during Clinton, I thought we were making progress, especially because Clinton closed down a LOT of expensive PORK military bases, toned down the military, and cleaned up a LOT of military environmental disasters...but now, bush* has opened so many new bases, for CRAZY reasons....


there are very few people who notice the BIG picture today....


http://www.warresisters.org/piechart.htm


T o t a l F e d e r a l F u n d s ( O u t l a y s ) :
$ 1 , 9 2 6 B i l l i o n





The pie chart below is the government view of the budget. This is a distortion of how our income tax dollars are spent because it includes Trust Funds (e.g., Social Security), and the expenses of past military spending are not distinguished from nonmilitary spending. For a more accurate representation of how your Federal income tax dollar is really spent, see the large chart (above).

Source: Budget of the United States FY2005,
Feb. 2, 2004, Table S-12.

[GarySeven]

48. Hate to say it, but WE created today's right wing.

It's a terrible thing to contemplate, but our generation created a huge distrust in the government that became a meme for our entire society. Of course, our belief was rooted in fact: LBJ had deceived us in the Gulf of Tonkin; Nixon illegally escalated the war into Laos and Cambodia and Watergate revealed his naked grasp of power. It was on this mistrust of the government that built the political careers of many liberal politicians, putting them into the establishment. Meanwhile, the animus toward government was still out there, simmering, and the right wing exploited it, commingling mistrust of government into fear of liberalism.

The huge irony, of course, is that now that the right wing is in power it is tantamount to treason to question their use of it. The same politicians who came to power preaching the need to limit government now support expanding it to every feature of our lives, particularly into our churches and bedrooms.