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Sometimes good guys finish first. Sometimes good guys finish last. A waltz back through history reveals many times when good guys win, and win amazing, historic victories. It also reveals many times when good guys lose, as we well know.
History is circular in a lot of ways. Or perhaps saying History is "seasonal" describes it even better. I recently bought Sarah Vowell's new book "Assassination Vacation" which is very funny. But as I was reading the section on McKinley I found it to be amazing how much it parallels exactly that is happening today.
I'm not sure whether this is sad or if it is cause for hope, but almost nothing that has happened during this clown's administration is really new to our American history.
How quickly we forget things like the Sedition Act, or people who were imprisoned simply for exercising their free speech. We forget that Gitmo is not the first time we've rounded people up and put them in internment camps without due process. We forget how workers standing up and organizing for their rights use to get shot to death by their employers, who walked scott free.
This is not the first time our nation has moved toward more authoritarian trends. It is not the first time that we have assaulted civil rights. It is not the first time we've pushed an agenda of aggressive imperialism - and done so with intense ruthlessness.
But you know what? The sedition act didn't last, ultimately defense of free speech was made even stronger, internment camps came down, workers won rights, authoritarian trends were met with backlash. Good people fought fights against tyranny -- and won.
History is circular, or seasonal. But it is important to remember that what is happening now is nothing new under the sun. We have the same potential to overcome this current trend and direction and turn the tide once again back toward a coarse of greater freedom and democracy.
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