Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing
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I cannot escape Vietnam… and I was never there.
My first memory was the assassination of JFK and the memories following dealt with adventures in the backyard, a fist fight over a teddy bear (don’t ask) and Cronkite signing off every night with the dead and wounded tallies of the Vietnam War.
We all went “up river” and more than 50,000 dead came down river. This nation is still up river – the Mekong Delta is very much ingrained in our culture and our actions. It is a hinge on which our society swings – served vs. deferment is still a gold standard to many Americans, a standard in which Republicans scoff at.
Al Gore went up river, he went to Vietnam – he VOLUNTEERED to go even when his family reserved him a spot in the National Guard. Others fled service or took spots reserved for them by their families. Gore went up river.
Time is becoming short for Al Gore to run for the Presidency. From Daily Kos:
This is what so many of us have waited so many long – and I mean long! – months for. It is very likely that within three weeks, we will know whether Al Gore will enter the 2008 fold and seek the presidency again. Many of us have been trying to read the tea leaves and keep up enthusiasm and hope. If you’re still waiting and hoping and haven’t given up, thank you. I’m confident that I can speak for everyone within the Draft Gore movement when I say that – we have worked tirelessly for months, some of us years, to get Gore to run; that there are still thousands of people here, and millions of people nationwide that are still receptive and hoping for a Gore run means a lot to us and our work.
We are in another American misadventure in a far-off land and we can’t find our way out. The Republicans want to continue the war in a direction that will not lead to a solution. The current crop of front-runners in the Democratic Party seem unable to commit to an action of quick withdrawal.
We are still under the spell of the Nine Dragons and the claws of the beasts hold us still.
Al Gore met the Dragons head-on and he came back.
This country needs someone who has gone up river. Only they can show us the way out.