Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource TomPaine.com Stories Description An account of the resource TomPaine.com -- a liberal advocacy organization -- distributed a public call on August 12, 2002 for 300 word "opinion advertisement" similar to those that the organization had been running regularly in the op-ed page of The New York Times. TomPaine.com received hundreds of submissions from the public, most of which the September 11 Digital Archive has preserved here. TomPaine Story TomPaine Story: Story I dont like the flag. Its not ugly per se -- though its stylistic merits are debatable its just that its imbued with so much unnecessary jingoism that I find it distasteful. If waving a flag in uncritical praise of your country and your leader are the marks of true patriotism, then most Nazis and Soviets were great patriots, indeed. The flag is just a symbol and, since it symbolizes entirely different things to a striking oil worker in Aceh than it does to a barber or a butcher in Peoria, I choose not to wave it at all. For me, that made last September a lonely time. Where I differ from most of my compatriots is that I believe the fault for 9/11 lies not entirely with Al Qaeda or the stars, but that part of it lies with us. It is not that Americans dont have much to be proud Of -- the stoicism with which we faced the anthrax attacks and the way we kept America moving by treating ourselves to SUVs was quite heroic, but we often behave as though our actions dont have consequences. The phenomenon of blowback is a clear demonstration that our actions do have consequences. It seems as though everywhere our troops have been engaged in the last 15 years (Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Panama), they have been engaged against former U.S. allies. The very dictators, thugs and terrorists we fought in the 90 s and the ones we continue to fight today are the ones we ourselves armed. During the cold war, we gave aid and comfort (usually in the form of weapons and money) to anybody who professed to be against communism, no matter how brutal their tactics or how empty their ideology. Since 9/11, we have given a wink and a nod and a check to governments around the globe that are repressing their citizens in the name of anti-terrorism. A glance through any days paper will tell of Russian crimes in Chechnya, of Musharraf consolidating power in Pakistan by undemocratic means, of protestors in various countries around the globe being repressed and beaten in the name of anti-terror all with U.S. consent. John F. Kennedy said it best: Those who make peaceful revolutions impossible, make violent revolutions inevitable. In backing dictatorial thugs around the globe, we are making the same mistakes we made in the cold war. How many violent revolutions are we making inevitable? How much blowback is now in the offing? Since there is a strong link between dictatorial regimes and terrorism, our real self-interest lies in promoting human rights and democracy around the globe, instead of turning a blind eye to crimes committed by undemocratic allies. Perhaps if we started doing that, I could start loving our flag again. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource tp143.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2003-03-03