The Convenient Past

It has taken the U.S. 65 years to honor a group of women fliers during WWII for their help in the war effort. I find it just a bit strange that this has happened now, a couple of days before the premiere of The Pacific, the TV miniseries that is part of the latest Spielberg-Hanks propaganda to glorify the American military in the days of Afghanistan and Irak. Their previous effort, Band of Brothers, is being rerun on cable.

So, as was the case during the Vietnam War, the propaganda machine is in full force, trying to obscure the unpleasant facts of the present with the "glorious" tales of the past. Patriotism - or what passes for it - like sex, sells.

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