By SJ
Otto
Remember
a time when our elected leaders lied to us about the war? Remember when the pentagon
just ignored common sense and let our you men and women die for no real reason.
Sure that happens now, but back in the 1970s the news media actually covered
those things and let us know about them from time to time.
Tonight
I watched the movie The Post
and it was a breath of fresh air and badly needed. The movie shows us what it
was like before The Washington Post
decided to publish the Pentagon Papers. I remember that time well. Suddenly a whole
edition of that paper let the American people know that our leaders, going back
for decades, knew the Vietnam war was unwinnable and yet kept it going. They
lied about the war. As I watched the movie, it appears these revelations almost
never made it to print. There were legal battles that could have ended with
reporters going to jail. There were threats from government officials. Katharine
Graham, the first female publisher of a major American newspaper, had concerns
that The Washington Post would lose its financial backers and go out of business
if it printed the Pentagon Papers. Many of the newspapers editorial staff tried
to talk her out of it. But in the end, these papers, about 4,000 pages, made it
into the news and it affected the Vietnam War.
What
I like most about this movie is its timing. Right now there is virtually no
opposition to the wars this nation is fighting in, including Afghanistan, Iraq,
Yemen and elsewhere. The press is not covering the details of our military
actions, and the popular culture just glamorizes the war with such TV shows as Seal Team, Valor and The Brave. Stores and sporting events
also promote the military
without any questioning. Polls show a lot of young people are pro-military. So
this is a good time to remind people that military leaders and presidents lie
to us about the wars we fight.
That
was true in the 1970s and it is true today. Let's hope this film reminds people
of that.
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