Political Forums  

Go Back   Political Forums > Current events

We appreciate your help

in keeping this site going.
Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 09-21-2017, 07:34 AM
Ike Bana Ike Bana is offline
Banned
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 8,310
Ken Burns' Vietnam

Here's my review so far.

After Episode 1...

Excellent technical achievement, as is typical for Burns. The people of this country continue to be remarkably ignorant of the actual history and events. Americans don't know who the fucking vice president is, who their Senators are, who their US House rep is. I would be astonished if more than 5% of lazy-ass Americans know what the Gulf of Tonkin Incident is. Even fewer what the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution meant to draft age Americans in 1964. What percentage of them, including the current oval office occupant, will declare that this whole piece of work is fake news? I'm going with around 40% of those who take the time to watch it. Stupid fucking country.

That said...I'm always somewhat cautious with Ken Burns. IMO he was hideously forgiving of the people of the South in his "masterpiece." Comments by historian Barbara J. Fields were the primary moments in the piece where it dug really deep into some of the realities of the history. Far too few of those.

After Episode 2...

After sitting through episode 2...I don't know if I can watch this anymore. I'm not learning anything I didnt already know...and I don't need the distress.

And my fears of Burns' "balanced" approach are showing up already. What's required is a no bullshit evaluation of the whole fucking dishonorable endeavour...and the utter waste of who knows how any millions of lives. And I don't see it coming out of Burns.

Maybe by the end of it we will see something from Burns about the basic question of why the fuck we got involved in the first place, and who were the people in control of this country who thought it was necessary, much less a good idea.

Maybe...maybe not. I suspect Ken Burns was trying to avoid the negative feedback from the American right that was directed at "Vietnam - A Television History." The excellent 13 part 1983 PBS series based on war correspondent Stanley Karnow's equally excellent book, which pulled few punches when it came to the anti-communist nonsense behind this country's involvement.

I watched part of Episode 3...

Long before the Gulf of Tonkin incident which was the lying-ass excuse LBJ used for escalation...Truman made a choice. The choice was for the French and not for some pack of commie zipperhead guerillas. Ho Chi Mihn had been almost pleading with US officials not to let the French just walk back in and take over what the Vichy French had abandoned to the Japanese in 1940. What Truman could have done is go retrieve his balls from his other pants and tell de Gaulle to stuff his implied threat of allowing France to "come under the influence of the Soviet Union" if the US supported Vietnamese independence. But no...Ho Chi Mihn was a Marxist and McCarthy was already on the road.

We have nobody to blame but ourselves for this. And at the beginning of episode 1, Ken Burns has already decided for us that the war was started by "decent people with good intentions acting in good faith." WTF, Ken...really?
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 09-21-2017, 07:41 AM
finnbow's Avatar
finnbow finnbow is online now
Reformed Know-Nothing
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: MoCo, MD
Posts: 25,857
I'm recording it, but haven't watched any of it yet.
__________________
As long as the roots are not severed, all will be well in the garden.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 09-21-2017, 08:26 AM
BlueStreak's Avatar
BlueStreak BlueStreak is offline
Area Man
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: The Swamp
Posts: 27,407
Yeah, I've never paid much attention to Burns.

Speaking of Vietnam (and Cambodia, apparently), for whatever reason my brother has finally started talking about his experiences there. He gave me an ear full of some very depressing shit while I was in Ohio the last time. Kids with grenades in their pants, fields full of thousands of dead Hmong, our military spraying Agent Orange on it's own people.................

Lovely.
__________________
"When the lie is so big and the fog so thick, the Republican trick can play out again....."-------Frank Zappa
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 09-21-2017, 08:35 AM
Ike Bana Ike Bana is offline
Banned
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 8,310
Quote:
Originally Posted by BlueStreak View Post
Yeah, I've never paid much attention to Burns.

Speaking of Vietnam (and Cambodia, apparently), for whatever reason my brother has finally started talking about his experiences there. He gave me an ear full of some very depressing shit while I was in Ohio the last time. Kids with grenades in their pants, fields full of thousands of dead Hmong, our military spraying Agent Orange on it's own people.................

Lovely.
Don't get me wrong...Ken Burns has done some spectacular stuff. I'm thinking of "Unforgivable Blackness", his profiles of Frank Lloyd Wright, Mark Twain and other historical figures, Baseball...where he pulled no punches about the racism and scumbags like Cobb.

But so far...this one is troubling...and at once miraculous in other ways.

Last edited by Ike Bana; 09-21-2017 at 04:51 PM.
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 10:29 AM.



Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.6
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.