I read Dee Brown's stunning book right after I finished high school. Tonight, some 30 some years later, HBO made a movie of the book. Watching the story brought back all the strong feelings, my young heart felt when I first read the book. It made me ashamed of the government, the unfairness of the way the Native Americans were treated, and to some extent, are still treated, in this "great nation".
Perhaps some of my anger tonight is in part, because I saw Michael Moore on a talk show this morning, talking about his new movie "Sicko" about the appalling state of health care in this country. Love him or hate him, he always has something interesting to say. He got me rather fired up.
I do have a point, here, but am having a hard time getting to it. In "The Killer Angels", by Michael Shaara, writing about the Army of the Potomac, he writes ," They have lost faith in their leaders, but not in themselves." I was raised to believe America is the greatest country on Earth, but the way we got there was on the bodies and souls of those gone before us, the true Americans,who believe in fighting for what is right, not the greedy, jealous, violent, win at all costs attitudes that seem to prevail throughout our bloody history. Today, especially, today, I think, shame on us.
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