Oliver Stones Left-Wing Agitprop
December 17, 2012
By Bruce Thornton
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Oliver Stones 10-part documentary on the Cold War airing on the Showtime cable channel, The Untold History of the United States, is merely the latest version of American history presented as left-wing propaganda.
Despite Stones claim that this leftist story of American history has been untold, or, as he told Londons Guardian, that the dirty story of America has been sanitized, it has long been a ubiquitous, tired cliché. Indeed, even before Howard Zinns 1980 masterpiece of agitprop, A Peoples History of the United Stateswhich has sold over 2 million copies and is a staple of university and high school reading liststhe melodrama of American historical crimes and oppression was a staple of progressive received wisdom. Indeed, so entrenched is this narrative in American culture that purveyors of it like Michael Moore, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Oliver Stonewho is worth $50 millionhave become rich peddling it. And contrary to Stones assertion that, though his version of the American story may have been told by cutting edge academic experts, it remains unlearned by students and the larger culture, some version of his view of history can be found in most American history textbooks from grade school to university. Thats why despising America for its historical crimes is an intellectual fashion marker, one of those things that everyone sophisticated and smart just knows, and that sets them apart from the mass of patriotic oafs who believe what Stone and his co-writer Peter Kuznick sneeringly denythat America is the worlds greatest nation.
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So too today, the rationale for those, like Barack Obama and Oliver Stone, who are eager to expand government power and control over society and the economy is found in what during his international apology tour Obama called Americas arrogant, dismissive, derisive behavior and the darker periods in our history. More political power is necessary for correcting and compensating for that oppressive record, and steering the locomotive of history back towards the internationalist leftist utopia.
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Oliver Stone’s Left-Wing Agitprop
December 17, 2012
By Bruce Thornton
---
Oliver Stones 10-part documentary on the Cold War airing on the Showtime cable channel, The Untold History of the United States, is merely the latest version of American history presented as left-wing propaganda.
Despite Stones claim that this leftist story of American history has been untold, or, as he told Londons Guardian, that the dirty story of America has been sanitized, it has long been a ubiquitous, tired cliché. Indeed, even before Howard Zinns 1980 masterpiece of agitprop, A Peoples History of the United Stateswhich has sold over 2 million copies and is a staple of university and high school reading liststhe melodrama of American historical crimes and oppression was a staple of progressive received wisdom. Indeed, so entrenched is this narrative in American culture that purveyors of it like Michael Moore, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Oliver Stonewho is worth $50 millionhave become rich peddling it. And contrary to Stones assertion that, though his version of the American story may have been told by cutting edge academic experts, it remains unlearned by students and the larger culture, some version of his view of history can be found in most American history textbooks from grade school to university. Thats why despising America for its historical crimes is an intellectual fashion marker, one of those things that everyone sophisticated and smart just knows, and that sets them apart from the mass of patriotic oafs who believe what Stone and his co-writer Peter Kuznick sneeringly denythat America is the worlds greatest nation.
---
So too today, the rationale for those, like Barack Obama and Oliver Stone, who are eager to expand government power and control over society and the economy is found in what during his international apology tour Obama called Americas arrogant, dismissive, derisive behavior and the darker periods in our history. More political power is necessary for correcting and compensating for that oppressive record, and steering the locomotive of history back towards the internationalist leftist utopia.
---
Oliver Stone’s Left-Wing Agitprop
