Guess who

Guess who said this:

"Today, I believe our country is in greater danger than at any other time in its existence. Our ruthless disregard for the rights of other nations . . . is earning us animosity throughout the world. And all of us will continue to be partly responsible until we can bring this madnes to an end. If each of us will voice his displeasure now . . . we will eventually make an impression on the officials who are leading us step by step to destruction."

Michael Moore announcing his latest Bush Bash? Russ Feingold positioning himself to the left of Hillary in anticipation of the '08 primaries? Some Republican weasel trying to deflect attention from the Abramoff scandals?

Good guesses all, but the quote actually comes from a 1966 essay called "A Psychiatric View of the Cold War" (I don't think it's online) written by the famous pediatrician Benjamin Spock, M.D. The essay appeared in the May-June 1966 issue of controversial publisher Ralph Ginzburg's magazine called FACT.

The same issue includes an interview, "According to Spock," in which the late baby doctor says of LBJ's Vietnam policy:

"The Johnson Administration is acting like a 1-year old child having a prolonged temper tantrum. It can't have what it wants. But instead of asking itself why, it lashes out at a small country that has never done us any harm, and kills our own men in the process."

Spock's quotes help us to see that as bad as American foreign policy has become under George W. Bush, we shouldn't fall into the trap of believing in some kind of mythical, nostalgic past in the which the US was admired all over the globe. (Although I am quite certain that if Dr. Spock were alive today he would say that if the Johnson Administration was like a 1-year old with a bad temper, the Bush Administration is like an abusive parent.).

One final note about Ginzburg's FACT magazine. The publication long ago went out of print; I stumbled across some 3 or 4 old copies two summers ago in a downtown LaCrosse antique shop where they were literally buried under an old lamp shade. To perplexed looks from the cashier I bought all of them for 2 bucks each and, since my reading list is longer than the list of scandals facing the Doyle Administration, FACT has only recently made it to bathroom reading status.

The magazine had a great subtitle: "An antidote to the timidity and corruption of the American press." We sure need that antidote today.