[Sosfbay-discuss] January 10 -- A day in history

[Bob Alavi]

Just received the following.  Amazing, just amazing; we'll never learn.
   
  Click the link for the original, or read the entire passage as repeated below.
   
  ba
  =======================================
  > http://democracyrising.us/content/view/719/164/ 
> 
> 
> What happened on January 10, 1967.
> 
> The big news story that night? President Lyndon B. Johnson's State of the Union address.  The topic that dominated all others: Vietnam.
> 
> I'm going to guide you to some excerpts of that address -- exactly 40 years ago tonight. See how it compares to some of the excerpts from President Bush's speech that were just released minutes ago:
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: We have chosen to fight a limited war in Vietnam in an attempt to prevent a
> larger war--a war almost certain to follow, I believe, if the Communists succeed in overrunning and
> taking over South Vietnam by aggression and by force. I believe, and I am supported by some
> authority, that if they are not checked now the world can expect to pay a greater price to check them
> later.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: Tonight in Iraq, the Armed Forces of the United States are engaged in a
> struggle that will determine the direction of the global war on terror * and our safety here at home.
> The new strategy I outline tonight will change America's course in Iraq, and help us succeed in the
> fight against terror.
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: I wish I could report to you that the conflict is almost over. This I cannot
> do. We face more cost, more loss, and more agony. For the end is not yet. I cannot promise you that
> it will come this year--or come next year. Our adversary still believes, I think, tonight, that he
> can go on fighting longer than we can, and longer than we and our allies will be prepared to stand
> up and resist.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: Our past efforts to secure Baghdad failed for two principal reasons: There
> were not enough Iraqi and American troops to secure neighborhoods that had been cleared of terrorists
> and insurgents. And there were too many restrictions on the troops we did have.
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: Our South Vietnamese allies are also being tested tonight. Because they must
> provide real security to the people living in the countryside. And this means reducing the
> terrorism and the armed attacks which kidnaped and killed 26,900 civilians in the last 32 months, to
> levels where they can be successfully controlled by the regular South Vietnamese security forces. It
> means bringing to the villagers an effective civilian government that they can respect, and that
> they can rely upon and that they can participate in, and that they can have a personal stake in. We
> hope that government is now beginning to emerge.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: Only the Iraqis can end the sectarian violence and secure their people. And
> their government has put forward an aggressive plan to do it.
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: This forward movement is rooted in the ambitions and the interests of Asian
> nations themselves. It was precisely this movement that we hoped to accelerate when I spoke at Johns
> Hopkins in Baltimore in April 1965, and I pledged "a much more massive effort to improve the life
> of man" in that part of the world, in the hope that we could take some of the funds that we were
> spending on bullets and bombs and spend it on schools and production.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: A successful strategy for Iraq goes beyond military operations. Ordinary Iraqi
> citizens must see that military operations are accompanied by visible improvements in their
> neighborhoods and communities. So America will hold the Iraqi government to the benchmarks it has
> announced.
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: We have chosen to fight a limited war in Vietnam in an attempt to prevent a
> larger war--a war almost certain to follow, I believe, if the Communists succeed in overrunning and
> taking over South Vietnam by aggression and by force. I believe, and I am supported by some
> authority, that if they are not checked now the world can expect to pay a greater price to check them
> later.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: The challenge playing out across the broader Middle East is more than a
> military conflict. It is the decisive ideological struggle of our time*In the long run, the most
> realistic way to protect the American people is to provide a hopeful alternative to the hateful ideology
> of the enemy * by advancing liberty across a troubled region.
> 
> LBJ, Jan. 10, 1967: A time of testing--yes. And a time of transition. The transition is sometimes
> slow; sometimes unpopular; almost always very painful; and often quite dangerous. But we have
> lived with danger for a long time before, and we shall live with it for a long time yet to come. We
> know that "man is born unto trouble." We also know that this Nation was not forged and did not
> survive and grow and prosper without a great deal of sacrifice from a great many men.
> 
> GWB, Jan. 10, 2007: Victory will not look like the ones our fathers and grandfathers achieved.
> There will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship*A democratic Iraq will not be
> perfect. But it will be a country that fights terrorists instead of harboring them * and it will help
> bring a future of peace and security for our children and grandchildren.
> Not much to add here -- the words of Lyndon Johnson and George W. Bush pretty much speak for
> themselves.
> 
> Two things, though. First of all, only 7,917 American troop had died in Vietnam through the end of
> 1966, or ten days before Johnson's speech. From the beginning of 1967 though the end of the war,
> an addition 50,285 -- more than six times as many -- Americans would lose their lives.
> Also, and we're not endorsing this action by any means, then or now, but it is interesting to note
> that in that 1967 SOTU, LBJ also called for a 6 percent surcharge on personal and corporate income
> taxes to pay for the cost of the war. That's a level of responsibility -- and yes, sacrifice --
> for war that our current president is unwilling to take.
> 


 
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