One glaring difference between the time of Eisenhower's speeches and today is the percentage of the population who had experience with the military and war. In 1945, almost 9% of the US population was in serving in the military; today that number is 0.5%. So when Eisenhower spoke of war, those veterans and their families and neighbors knew the costs of which he spoke. They were also cynical enough to know what the differences were between what they were told and what they saw.
Today, most people believe that Top Gun: Maverick (or the next Michael Bay movie) and the propaganda fairy tales of the MSM and entertainment industry both depict the reality of the military and war.
Perhaps if civilians would stop spouting "thank you for your service" to every veteran they meet, and start asking those veterans about their experiences and what they think about them - that would be a start to being to confront the situation we face.
I would note, as I've mentioned before (too many times, probably), that the only openly professed "peace" candidate for President in recent history was Dennis Kucinich. He was immensely popular in the early stages of the 2004 election. Same in 2008. Until his own party---Dems---squelched his candidacy (via, among other tactics, a rumored press black-out).
Then, in 2020, Marianne Williamson announced her candidacy, espousing peace as one of her policies; Kucinich backed her. She, too, was torpedoed by her own party, also the Dems. The same thing will happen to her 2024 candidacy, guaranteed. "Peace" just doesn't square with either party's platform, underwritten by wealthy donors and big corporations.
Congress uses public resources to fund special interests. How much it steals from private economy and how much tax is collected.
"The National Defense Authorization Act is the name for each of a series of United States federal laws specifying the annual budget and expenditures of the U.S. Department of Defense. The first NDAA was passed in 1961. Wikipedia
Originally published: 1961. This is an unconstitutional act that Congress uses to serve the military industrial complex, with intended destruction of the young boy and girls, their sacrifice to the beast of destruction. Also destruction of the people here at home, and their resources.
You have devoted a number of recent postings, Bill, to extoling the “virtue” of Eisenhower for his rants as President about and against America’s so-called “Cross of Iron” and its “Military-Industrial Complex”; lamenting the fact that very few ~ if any ~ Americans paid the slightest bit of attention to what he was saying then. Let alone comprehended and acted upon it then. Or today.
And that Americans today are totally ignorant of what he said then, even tho his words are more applicable to America today than they were at that time, almost 70 years ago.
Eisenhower was inaugurated on 20jan53, seven months before the Korean War ended in the stalemate that exists to this day. He delivered his “Cross of Iron” speech on 16apr54, one month after Dien Bien Phu fell, and America’s bankrolling France’s doomed attempt to reclaim its colonial empire in Southeast Asia ended in total and complete failure. At least for everybody not making all kinds of money from that obscenity started by Truman shortly after Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Japan’s surrender, and dutifully carried on by Ike.
It has been noted a couple of times on recent BV Comments that Ike’s “M-I-C” speech could have only happened in the last 3 or so days of his presidency. That had it happened any sooner, Nixon would have become President long before 1969, much like LBJ assumed the throne in 1963.
In terms of its immediate impact on the Real World, the most important speech Eisenhower gave was neither his “Cross of Iron” nor “M-I-C” orations. Rather, it was his “Domino Theory” speech of 07apr54, nine days before his “CoI” rant.
That was when ~ referring to the spread of Communism specifically in Indochina ~ he declared: “Finally, you have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the ‘falling domino’ principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.”
And within one year of him proclaiming that bullshit, the US had installed Diem in Saigon, totally ignored the Geneva Accords that officially ended what the Vietnamese People term “The French [as opposed to “The American] War,” boycotted the national election on the leadership of a unified Vietnam, and laid the foundation for what ultimately kicked in after the US government’s and its media’s Lies about an incident in the Tonkin Gulf in August of 1964.
And the rest, as one wag put it, “is history.”
Given that America’s M-I-C desperately needed and wanted a War someplace, anyplace after Korea concluded, a valid hypothesis is that had Eisenhower not bought into and then sold his “domino theory” as it related specifically to Southeast Asia, Nixon would have again become President back in the 50s; again just like LBJ after Dallas.
Whatever potential for GOOD Ike’s Cross of Iron and M-I-C speeches might have had back then or still have, the EVIL propagated, perpetrated, and perpetuated by his “Domino Theory” rant renders those other two chats as totally irrelevant and meaningless then and now. Particularly for the Vietnamese People, their Land, Country, and Nation.
I've watched "Uncommon Knowledge" on Youtube quite a bit. This is a fascinating discussion Peter Robinson (the host) has with William Inboden, author of "The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink". Reagan was for military strength but by no means did he think war was a solution to anything. For instance, he pushed for the strategic defense initiative (nicknamed starwars), the ultimate ICBM defense, and mused about sharing it with the Soviets. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JBk7Uvzih0
Yes, I think so. And China's power is based more on trade and its economy rather than the U.S. model of a global military nexus that absorbs vast resources.
What do You find "curious" about all that, Ray? Ever hear of the Project For A New America Century and its musings about a "New Pearl Harbor"?
Or that Zelikow was Condoleezza Rice's designated Errand Boy? What better way to control what the so-called "9/11 Commission" would investigate and conclude?
What better way to ensure that the Official "Conspiracy Theory" ~ that 9/11 was pulled off by a bunch of Ragheads living in a cave in Afghanistan ~ was the "Truth," the whole "Truth," and nothing but the "Truth"?
One glaring difference between the time of Eisenhower's speeches and today is the percentage of the population who had experience with the military and war. In 1945, almost 9% of the US population was in serving in the military; today that number is 0.5%. So when Eisenhower spoke of war, those veterans and their families and neighbors knew the costs of which he spoke. They were also cynical enough to know what the differences were between what they were told and what they saw.
Today, most people believe that Top Gun: Maverick (or the next Michael Bay movie) and the propaganda fairy tales of the MSM and entertainment industry both depict the reality of the military and war.
Perhaps if civilians would stop spouting "thank you for your service" to every veteran they meet, and start asking those veterans about their experiences and what they think about them - that would be a start to being to confront the situation we face.
Well put. Thanks.
I would note, as I've mentioned before (too many times, probably), that the only openly professed "peace" candidate for President in recent history was Dennis Kucinich. He was immensely popular in the early stages of the 2004 election. Same in 2008. Until his own party---Dems---squelched his candidacy (via, among other tactics, a rumored press black-out).
Then, in 2020, Marianne Williamson announced her candidacy, espousing peace as one of her policies; Kucinich backed her. She, too, was torpedoed by her own party, also the Dems. The same thing will happen to her 2024 candidacy, guaranteed. "Peace" just doesn't square with either party's platform, underwritten by wealthy donors and big corporations.
Keep reminding us, Denise.
Yes, DK is a person of integrity, and we can't have that in the Democratic Party.
Or anywhere else in politics, evidently.
Here's another article I just read that addresses the subject of your post:
https://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2023/03/21/staying-alive-in-a-country-of-death-by-brad-wolf/
In Eisenhower's own words: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on3KFBXQI2E
Congress uses public resources to fund special interests. How much it steals from private economy and how much tax is collected.
"The National Defense Authorization Act is the name for each of a series of United States federal laws specifying the annual budget and expenditures of the U.S. Department of Defense. The first NDAA was passed in 1961. Wikipedia
Originally published: 1961. This is an unconstitutional act that Congress uses to serve the military industrial complex, with intended destruction of the young boy and girls, their sacrifice to the beast of destruction. Also destruction of the people here at home, and their resources.
You have devoted a number of recent postings, Bill, to extoling the “virtue” of Eisenhower for his rants as President about and against America’s so-called “Cross of Iron” and its “Military-Industrial Complex”; lamenting the fact that very few ~ if any ~ Americans paid the slightest bit of attention to what he was saying then. Let alone comprehended and acted upon it then. Or today.
And that Americans today are totally ignorant of what he said then, even tho his words are more applicable to America today than they were at that time, almost 70 years ago.
Eisenhower was inaugurated on 20jan53, seven months before the Korean War ended in the stalemate that exists to this day. He delivered his “Cross of Iron” speech on 16apr54, one month after Dien Bien Phu fell, and America’s bankrolling France’s doomed attempt to reclaim its colonial empire in Southeast Asia ended in total and complete failure. At least for everybody not making all kinds of money from that obscenity started by Truman shortly after Hiroshima and Nagasaki and Japan’s surrender, and dutifully carried on by Ike.
It has been noted a couple of times on recent BV Comments that Ike’s “M-I-C” speech could have only happened in the last 3 or so days of his presidency. That had it happened any sooner, Nixon would have become President long before 1969, much like LBJ assumed the throne in 1963.
In terms of its immediate impact on the Real World, the most important speech Eisenhower gave was neither his “Cross of Iron” nor “M-I-C” orations. Rather, it was his “Domino Theory” speech of 07apr54, nine days before his “CoI” rant.
That was when ~ referring to the spread of Communism specifically in Indochina ~ he declared: “Finally, you have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the ‘falling domino’ principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.”
[ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domino_theory ]
And within one year of him proclaiming that bullshit, the US had installed Diem in Saigon, totally ignored the Geneva Accords that officially ended what the Vietnamese People term “The French [as opposed to “The American] War,” boycotted the national election on the leadership of a unified Vietnam, and laid the foundation for what ultimately kicked in after the US government’s and its media’s Lies about an incident in the Tonkin Gulf in August of 1964.
And the rest, as one wag put it, “is history.”
Given that America’s M-I-C desperately needed and wanted a War someplace, anyplace after Korea concluded, a valid hypothesis is that had Eisenhower not bought into and then sold his “domino theory” as it related specifically to Southeast Asia, Nixon would have again become President back in the 50s; again just like LBJ after Dallas.
Whatever potential for GOOD Ike’s Cross of Iron and M-I-C speeches might have had back then or still have, the EVIL propagated, perpetrated, and perpetuated by his “Domino Theory” rant renders those other two chats as totally irrelevant and meaningless then and now. Particularly for the Vietnamese People, their Land, Country, and Nation.
I've watched "Uncommon Knowledge" on Youtube quite a bit. This is a fascinating discussion Peter Robinson (the host) has with William Inboden, author of "The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink". Reagan was for military strength but by no means did he think war was a solution to anything. For instance, he pushed for the strategic defense initiative (nicknamed starwars), the ultimate ICBM defense, and mused about sharing it with the Soviets. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JBk7Uvzih0
Yes, I think so. And China's power is based more on trade and its economy rather than the U.S. model of a global military nexus that absorbs vast resources.
What do You find "curious" about all that, Ray? Ever hear of the Project For A New America Century and its musings about a "New Pearl Harbor"?
Or that Zelikow was Condoleezza Rice's designated Errand Boy? What better way to control what the so-called "9/11 Commission" would investigate and conclude?
What better way to ensure that the Official "Conspiracy Theory" ~ that 9/11 was pulled off by a bunch of Ragheads living in a cave in Afghanistan ~ was the "Truth," the whole "Truth," and nothing but the "Truth"?
Ahh. i thought You were using the term "curious" to mean odd or unusual.