Nov. 22, 2008 (World News Trust) -- Let’s say the New York Times
hired a charismatic black man in his late 40s to run the newspaper
and this popular man promised change. And let’s say I wrote an
article that talked about what this man should do, what I hoped he’d
do. For example: reduce the business section to a page, add a labor
section, start covering people’s movements and protests, refuse
advertising dollars from corporations that pollute, and hire me to
run the op-ed page. Justifiably, I’d be called delusional and I’d
be ridiculed for even suggesting such insane expectations.
Let’s say Perdue hired a charismatic
black man in his late 40s to run the company and this popular man
promised change. And let’s say I wrote an article that talked about
what this man should do, what I hoped he’d do. For example:
renounce the chicken slaughter business, shift operations to selling
organic, locally-grown vegan food, and donate vast amounts of money
to farm sanctuaries. Justifiably, I’d be called delusional and I’d
be ridiculed for even suggesting such insane expectations.
Let’s say America elected a
charismatic black man in his late 40s to run the country and this
popular man promised change. And let’s say Howard Zinn wrote an
article that talked about what this man should do, what he hoped he’d
do. For example: “Announce the withdrawal of
our troops from Iraq and Afghanistan” and “renounce the Bush
doctrine of preventive war as well as the Carter doctrine of military
action to control Mideast oil.” Also: “radically change the
direction of U.S. foreign policy, declare that the United States is a peace-loving country which will not intervene militarily in other parts of
the world, and start dismantling the military bases we have in over a
hundred countries. Also he must begin meeting with Medvedev, the
Russian leader, to reach agreement on the dismantling of the nuclear
arsenals, in keeping with the Nuclear Anti-Proliferation Treaty.”
Then raise taxes on the rich and combine that windfall with the
hundreds of billions of dollars freed from the military budget to
“give free health care to everyone (and) put millions of people to
work” and thus “transform” the United States and “make it a
good neighbor to the world.”
Well, Howard Zinn
has
published such an article ("Obama’s Historic Victory," earlier this month) but is anyone calling him delusional and ridiculing him
for even suggesting such insane expectations? The tens of thousands
of readers who look to Zinn as a trusted voice of wisdom and reason
are being dangerously misled by an article that omits the reality
that every indication points to Barack Obama doing the exact opposite
of what Zinn writes. Zinn knows as well as anyone that not an iota of
evidence exists that Obama would do anything approaching what is
described above. For a man of Zinn’s stature on the Left to even
hint of such a possibility is a shockingly irresponsible act and one
that only contributes to the misguided perception that Obama’s
election is somehow a victory for the progressive Left.
Mickey Z. can be found on the Web at
http://www.mickeyz.net.