Will anyone who knows anything on this please respond. What became of
response to the June 22 New York Times op-ed by David Frum? Did anyone try
to get an opposing op ed or a letter published? As I posted here, I sent a
letter which has never been published. NOthing has been published. It's as
though they stonewalled it. Here's my letter and additional comments. I'd
like to know if anyone has done anything on this besides me.
New York Times
via fax
To the editor:
David Frum has no credibility on "How we got here" when he accuses (op-ed,
June 22) 1960's radicals of being "wrong about practically everything." The
opposite has proven true.
Then Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara admits that the government knew
by 1968, (the year Frum cites in defense of George W. Bush's
noninvolvement), that the U.S. could not win the Vietnam War. How was the
later U.S. Congress "radical" and wrong about cutting off aid to a South
Vietnamese regime whose people would have voted for Ho Chi Minh-- the reason
the U.S. reneged on elections when the French withdrew after seeing the
facts.
Those, such as Bill Clinton, should be awarded for arguing for the truth
then, rather than denigrated by those who won't even see it now. Those
1968 "radical" insights would have saved 58,000 American and 2,000,000
Vietnamese lives.
Elmer Brunsman
Montgomery, NY June 22, 2000
With more space it would be worth pointing out that it was the Reagan
administration that was wrong about how to confront the Soviets (another
"60's radicals were wrong about" Frum statement) . The CIA managed to not
tell them that the Soviet system was on it's way out. Could it have lasted
another ten years as it was going economically, etc? Instead the Reagan
U.S. government took the country into debt and onto the brink of destruction
with it's enforcement of it's ideology.
Think of this contradiction: the right always railed about how the "evil
Soviets" would start a world war if their system was in danger. So they
went and put it in danger with a massive nuclear build up. And,
fortunately, the right was wrong again. Rather than fight, the Soviets
switched.
Of course Frum's throw away attacks regarding drugs (it was marijuania not
all drugs that people saw was harmless compared to the established drugs,
alcohol and cigarettes) and Freshman composition (does anyone know what
he's talking about?) are no less equally erroneous.
Is someone going to jawbone the NYT editors into publishing a decent
rebuttal?
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