Category: Lost History

Whitewashing History in Arizona

The dispute over Arizona’s shutting down of ethnic studies programs that cite white exploitation of Chicano and Indian communities has focused on the impact on Mexican-American children, but the new policy also affects Native American students, as Bill Means explains…

Arizona Shuts Mexican Studies Classes

Amid Arizona’s crackdown on people of Mexican descent, state officials are closing down Mexican-American studies programs and banning history books that tell of white oppression against Native Americans and Chicanos, a topic that Dennis J. Bernstein discussed with author Rodolfo Acuña.

What Kind of Christianity Is This?

Though founded by a pacifist, Christianity has justified some of the most brutal slaughters in human history, from the wars of the late Roman Empire to the Crusades to the Inquisition to world wars to genocides against “heathens,” Muslims and…

The Fiscally Reckless Mitch Daniels

Exclusive: Delivering the GOP rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels is hailed as a “fiscal conservative,” but his actual record as George W. Bush’s budget director was one of fiscal recklessness, taking America from…

Reagan’s Hand in Guatemala’s Genocide

Exclusive: Guatemala has begun a politically difficult process to make human rights violators of the 1980s accountable for their crimes, including genocide inflicted on Indian villages, but the United States still heaps praise on the killers’ chief American accomplice, Ronald…

Spanish Front in War on Truth

Those who want true democracy favor a well-informed public, but those who simply want power understand that a smart electorate is a dangerous thing, so they seek out and destroy truth-tellers, as is now happening to a crusading judge in…

Getting Rid of ‘Anti-Israel’ Presidents

Exclusive: Some staunch supporters of Israel believe that its interests are so compelling that they trump American self-governance, with one extremist suggesting the murder of President Obama. Others, however, appear to have joined in an earlier subversion of U.S. democracy,…

Banning Books in Tucson

Right-wing white politicians in Arizona have struck back at ethnic-studies programs in Tucson public schools by banning books that teach children about white oppression of Native Americans and Chicanos, a decision that Dennis J. Bernstein discussed with Carlos Muñoz, a…

How Not to Celebrate Liberty

American history can be described as an endless tension between the nation’s ideals and its practices, with hypocrisy often winning out over principle — and those contradictions are most obvious when the nation celebrates its liberties while betraying them, both today and in the…

Turning America into Pottersville

Exclusive: The Republican presidential race has taken a detour into the “class warfare” that the party supposedly despises, with Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry tagging Mitt Romney as an elitist who got rich by laying off workers. But this spat misses…