Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty - Wendell Phillips, 1852

You may wonder what the heck that quote has to do with this thread. I think it connects on a lot of levels. Historically speaking, it means that we have to keep coming back to events like those at Kent State to remind people that they happened and that they had significance then and still have significance now. It also means that you can't settle for pat answers or analyses of what went on - "it was the cops", "it was the protestors", "it was the times". It was a lot of things, all together. It also means that you can't trust the official story, by itself. Or discard it entirely. You have to look a little deeper.

More importantly, to me "eternal vigilance" means that you have to look around you today and ask yourself if you really know what's going on. The oddest thing to me, when I look at today in light of the events in the late 60's, was how certain people were that they were making history, and how seldom you see that these days. It seems today that people are more concerned with making news . . .looking for their ten minutes of fame (or infamy).

Being vigilant, first of all, means being awake. It's easier to govern people when they are asleep. And the professional politicians don't want people interfering in their franchise (at least here in the States). They want us to be lulled into a sense of ease. They want to define us by our jobs, control us through our indebtedness, identify us by our choice of music and clothing. . .And we go along willingly. Because being vigilant is a lot of work. And besides, the battles are all over. The unions got us our right to work, NOW got us gender equality, the counter culture got us free love (and our choice of drugs)and the NAACP got us equality. And Al Gore got us the Internet.

Why am I ranting? Probably because I'm becoming a miserable old fart. . .But it could also be because I don't think we can afford to forget the past or take our eyes off how this stuff resonates in the present. Back in the 60's we thought we were inventing all this stuff - protesting, folk music, angst, bohemianism, long hair. It took a while to realize that these things had deep roots and even longer to realize that they still have consequences. A lot of what seemed new then is coming around again. I see kids once again being marginalized because they don't want to fit into the dominant culture. I see lots of "clothing statements" and drugs. I see disillusion mixed with affluence, next door to poverty, and as much as it reminds me of the 60's, I know that it's different now. And we can't apply yesterday's answers to today's problems. We lost friends in a war. These kids are killing each other and themselves right here, right now.

Come on people now, smile on your brother Everybody get together Try to love one another right now.