That's Howard Zinn speaking in his new documentary, The People Speak, that's going to air on the History Channel and be released on DVD. I've recently been reading Zinn's A People's History of the United States, which forms a basis for the documentary, and it really has been changing the way I see current events (much more so than the way I see history).

Given the discussion this morning about our collective historical amnesia, these kinds of projects are critical. The challenges we face aren't new. Neither are the solutions (hint: Organize! Organize! Organize!). As the trailer below notes sometimes to know where you're going you have to look back at where you've been.

I think it's important that, as far as I can tell, none of these popular protests were aimed at whipping for a bill or electing a particular party. They were aimed at accomplishing something or resisting something and the politics followed. As I've noted before, Martin Luther King didn't march for democrats.

(h/t Tennessee Guerilla Women)

Unity is its own virtue. It does not matter whether it leads to good things or bad things, just having a Government of National Unity is itself a good thing. How do I know this? NPR just told me so.

I'm driving home and make the mistake of turning on the radio. NPR is interviewing a historian (Robert something or other) to discuss the issue of whether all the Clinton "retreads" are really the change Obama promised.* After all, when John F. Kennedy came in he brought a new generation of advisors and (mostly) did not rely on Truman appointees. The historian does a generally good job of pointing out that the Clinton people are still a change from Bush, but then goes off for a ride on the Unity Pony and rides straight into stupid.