I am deeply saddened by the news of the death of Howard Zinn. He was
a longtime columnist for The Progressive, and his most recent piece,
"The Nobel's Feeble Gesture," expressed his dismay about President
Obama getting the Nobel Peace Prize.
Here's an excerpt:
"I think some progressives have forgotten the history of the
Democratic Party, to which people have turned again and again in
desperate search for saviors, later to be disappointed. Our political
history shows us that only great popular movements, carrying out bold
actions that awakened the nation and threatened the Establishment, as
in the Thirties and the Sixties, have been able to shake that pyramid
of corporate and military power and at least temporarily changed
course."
It was a "classic" Zinn piece-piercing but playful, saying in no
uncertain terms what needed to be said. It's not surprising he was a
favorite columnist for many of our subscribers. He was my favorite, too.
On matters of war and peace, he was absolute. In our July 2009
issue, he wrote, "We've got to rethink this question of war and come to
the conclusion that war cannot be accepted, no matter what. No matter
what the reasons given, or the excuse: liberty, democracy; this, that.
War is by definition the indiscriminate killing of huge numbers of
people for ends that are uncertain. Think about means and ends, and
apply it to war. The means are horrible, certainly. The ends,
uncertain. That alone should make you hesitate. . . . We are smart in
so many ways. Surely, we should be able to understand that in between
war and passivity, there are a thousand possibilities."
What I loved most about Zinn was his sense of humor, which didn't
always translate onto the page. I didn't know how funny he was until I
heard him speak at our 95th anniversary party six years ago. He was
gracious enough to attend our recent 100th birthday bash, too.
When I was a just becoming politicized, I read A People's History of
the United States
and it blew my mind away. Reading Zinn's book was a
rite of passage in my activist circles, and I hope it still is.
It's been nearly twenty years since I've read A People's History,
and it is no small thrill to be at a magazine that regularly publishes
the work of a peace mongering historian, a World War II soldier who
flew bombing missions over Europe but later staunchly advocated for
peace. That was thing about Zinn-when he spoke of war, he knew what he
was talking about.
Back in 2003 when George W. Bush was gunning for Saddam Hussein,
Zinn wrote a cover story for The Progressive called "A Chorus Against
War."
This is how it ends:
"If Bush starts a war, he will be responsible for the lives lost,
the children crippled, the terrorizing of millions of ordinary people,
the American GIs not returning to their families. And all of use will
be responsible for bringing that to a halt.
Men who have no respect for human life or for freedom or justice
have taken over this beautiful country of ours. It will be up to the
American people to take it back."
I would have loved to read what Zinn thought about the recent
Supreme Court ruling allowing even more money into our political
system. Or what he would have written after hearing Obama's first State
of the Union Address. The President's speech hasn't even started yet
tonight, but this much I do know: Zinn would have reminded us, as he
did over and over, that we need to organize our neighborhoods and
workplaces and schools in order to create change, and not leave it up
to the politicians.
"Historically, government, whether in the hands of Republicans or
democrats, conservatives or liberals, has failed its responsibilities
until forced to by direct action: sit-ins and Freedom Rides for the
rights of black people, strikes and boycotts for the rights of workers,
mutinies and desertions of soldiers in order to stop a war," Zinn wrote
in a piece called, "Election Madness" back in March 2008. "Voting is
easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy,
which requires direct action by concerned citizens."
