The American History Museum
The American History Museum is really amazing... it goes on and on, has hugely significant stuff in it, and is really fun. The most fun was Julia Child's kitchen. They took her real kitchen and moved all its contents into the display. You look into the kitchen through glass doors, and see how the most famous cook in America organized everything.
There was a great presentation on Brown vs. Board of Education. It has a classroom in it. On the left: Linoleum floors, metal desks, blackboards, books... On the right: unfinished wooden plank floors, benches with no writing surfaces... and that's it. It was spooky seeing a real KKK uniform, and you could follow every step in the legal struggle to overcome segregation, city by city.
In another section was a military display titled "Freedom isn't free" which you see on bumper stickers all across America. Of course, for blacks, freedom was won with lawyers and with marches. The bloodshed that happened was less organized than with war. But we should see that throughout history, the real freedom for real Americans mostly came from fighting in the courtroom. And that was only possible because we had a good constitution in the first place.
For American Indians and for other minorities, including blacks, the enemy wasn't "over there." It was right here. For Rosa Parks, there was a noble battle to be fought, but it was fought with words and actions that did not include guns.
Recently we had an option, as a nation, to solve a problem with legal action, backed by enforcement. Instead, we opted for force without legal authority. We opted for pre-emptive war.
The enemies of America mostly are the enemies within. Others can attack, but only sporadically, only effecting a few in our population. But the people running the House, the Senate, and the White House are destroying America from within. It amazes me that 39% of Americans still support Bush, and that those who are criticizing Bush don't all seem to realize that it is the entire party working together to create this nightmare.
There was a great presentation on Brown vs. Board of Education. It has a classroom in it. On the left: Linoleum floors, metal desks, blackboards, books... On the right: unfinished wooden plank floors, benches with no writing surfaces... and that's it. It was spooky seeing a real KKK uniform, and you could follow every step in the legal struggle to overcome segregation, city by city.
In another section was a military display titled "Freedom isn't free" which you see on bumper stickers all across America. Of course, for blacks, freedom was won with lawyers and with marches. The bloodshed that happened was less organized than with war. But we should see that throughout history, the real freedom for real Americans mostly came from fighting in the courtroom. And that was only possible because we had a good constitution in the first place.
For American Indians and for other minorities, including blacks, the enemy wasn't "over there." It was right here. For Rosa Parks, there was a noble battle to be fought, but it was fought with words and actions that did not include guns.
Recently we had an option, as a nation, to solve a problem with legal action, backed by enforcement. Instead, we opted for force without legal authority. We opted for pre-emptive war.
The enemies of America mostly are the enemies within. Others can attack, but only sporadically, only effecting a few in our population. But the people running the House, the Senate, and the White House are destroying America from within. It amazes me that 39% of Americans still support Bush, and that those who are criticizing Bush don't all seem to realize that it is the entire party working together to create this nightmare.
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