IT DON'T TAKE A WEATHERMAN TO KNOW WHICH WAY THE WIND BLOW
The Academy Award Nominated Weatherman Underground documentary is VERY heavy. Buck wild and timely. A bunch of sincerely angry, middleclass and wealthy white kids decided they wanted the United States Establishment to FEEL the pain they were inflicting on Blacks and the so-called "Third World". No joke. Wilder than any fiction. Dangerous and powerful. Off DA chain!!
The Weatherman were originally The Students For A Democratic Society (SDS). They were a peaceful national organization for change that grew out of protest of the Vietnam War abroad and Civil Rights (especially the assasination of Black Panther President Fred Hampton by the Oakland Police which decades later would be acknowledged with a multimillion lawsuit award) issues at home. Among other things we owe our knwledge of COINTELPRO to the Weatherman. COINTELPRO was the government program (FBI mostly) to discredit and destroy radicals including AIM (The American Indian Movement), The Black Panther Party and Martin Luther King. Again, the government now acknowledges this but only after they were forced to.
The Weatherman were a small minority which sprang from the SDS and they believed in change "By Any Means Necessary". Their name comes from a lyric in a Bob Dylan song "It don't take a weatheman to know which way the wind blows..." They were furious becuase in 1969 Nixon was elected, 1,000 mostly women and children were being murdered DAILY in Vietnam. Its also interesting that the members of The Weather Underground were mostly Jewish and the holocaust was only 25 years old. They had a slogan that went, "We will not be good, obedient Germans!". The excuse for the Vietnam massacre was communism but it was actually the U.S. wanting to continue colonial control of Vietnam which France could no longer maintain on their own! I feel that is a very good one sentence description of an event most people don't understand even today. No wonder we're doing the same thing today in Iraq:
1) Most people don't understand Vietnam and things repeat themsevles until we understand them and
2) Using his family's international connections G.W. Bush has done what Nixon got impeached for. He has created a government within the government that manipulates the elections, starts wars and answers to no one.
My thanks to author Howard Zinn who wrote the people's history of the United States. That book has the ability to explain U.S. and world history in a manner that has received international praise. I NOW UNDERSTAND WHAT HAPPENED IN VIETNAM FROM READING ONE AMAZING CHAPTER IN A BOOKWHICH COULD BE COMPREHENDED BY AN 6TH GRADER and when I talk to people much more intelligent than myself about Vietnam and Howard Zinn they always say, "Explain it to me please." One of them was a published political writer?! Thats amazing and scary when you think about it.So little understanding about something so important. So here, one more time, is what happened in Vietnam:
the U.S. wanting to continue colonial control of Vietnam which France could no longer maintain on their own!
Vietnam, like Iraq, had/has enormous natural resources and was strategically located. The U.S. public was lied to and a tiny country the size of Florida was bombed more than ALL THE BOMBS IN EUROPE DURING WORLD WAR II. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens protested risking life and freedom (not just radicals and hippies). White elderly women set themselves on fire. Congressman went to jail.The outrage was intense. Martin Luther King was VERY VOCAL about the need to "..end this abominable war....". Finally in 1975 the U.S. pulled out of Vietnam but NOT BECAUSE OF THE PROTESTS. They pulled out because a "Third World Country" the size of Florida WON proving that sincere people fighting for a just cause could defeat an enemy richer, more powerful and SEVERAL TIMES LARGER than themselves. Vietnam lost nearly 4 million citizens most of which were children and women. The United States casualties were several hundreds of thousands.
The DVD commentary by the director is another movie in itself. A third movie is the DVD commentary by the female leader, Bernadine Dorn and her husband Bill Ayers who lived underground as active soldiers for ten years. Like Whirly always says about truth being wilder than fiction that is certainly true here. If you didn't know this story and someone made a movie about it it would seem corny and un-believable. Bernadine came from a big wealthy jewish family who were political but not radical! She turned her back on all of that with a man (Bill Ayers) who was always at her side and always supported her not as a follower but as a dedicated partner.Today they are free, in love and no less committed yet much wiser. They give the term soul mates a new definition. In a "quiet" and unpretentious way Bernadine is a very magnetic and attractive woman on several different levels. She made mistakes and so did Dr. King and Malcolm X yet its hard to imagine our world not being worse if they never lived and did not do what they did.
In 1970 the Weathermen accidentally blew up a townhouse on 11th street in New York City's Greenwich Village. Dustin Hoffman lived right next door and can be seen looking on in the news footage. The bomb that blew up was intended to be used in public to make a political statement. Innocent people would have been killed. When the FBI realized this Bernadine Dorhn became public enemy number one and The Weatherman went UNDERGROUND. That means they completely controlled where they went and how they communicated so that no friends or family knew where they were. Sometimes even other members didn't know where they were. They also became expert bomb makers and strategic planners who attacked government and business targets with 25 bombs in a 12 year period and acknowledging the grave tradgedy of Greenwich Village they NEVER caused a single serious injury to anyone. That is itself is AMAZING!
I highly suggest this documentary which can be rented from Netflix.com and I very strongly suggest the children and adults read The People's History of The United States which can be bought at Amazon.com
tongfist! 1/8/2005