Zinn 22-25

No More Nukes!

Movement against nuclear weapons was is the late 1970's when Jimmy Carter was President.

Christian activities were pioneers of the movement, but more people joined as a protest against Ronald Reagan's huge military budget.

Doctors started teaching the public about the medical harm that nuclear war would bring. Physicians for Social Responsibility was formed.

Social Issues

People Reacted angrily to Reagan's cuts in social services. People protested the loss of government moey to pay for teachers, police, and firefighters in their community.

Money was being spent on guns instead of children.

In the south there was no great movement like the civil rights movement of the 1960's.

Mexican American farmworkers had taken action against unfair and oppressive working conditions. they urged customers not to buy califormia grapes until the workers recieved better treatment.

Copper miners went on strike. They were attacked by state troopers but they held out for 3 years.

War and Antiwar

The vietnam war had ended in 1975 and AMericans felt that Vietnam had been a terrible tragedy that should not have been fought.

People would not automatically support a new war, which is why Bush launched the air war against Iraq in 1991 with overwhelming force.

He wanted the war to be over before a national anti-war movement could form. But protests started in the months leading up to the war.

9 days after the war had started, more than 150,000 opeople marched through the streets of Washington D.C..

The war lasted just 6 weeks and when bush ran for reelection in 1992, he lost.

Remembering Columbus

The five-hundredth anniversary of Columbus arrival in the US was in 1992.

In 1990, indians from all over the Americas met to organize against the celebrations that were being planned.

Two years later other Americans joined them in speaking out against columbus and for the first time there were nationwide protests against columbus events.

Educators were encouraged to tell their students the truths about Columbus.

A Close Election

Bush was known for his close ties to the oil industry.

Gore Recieved hundreds of thousands more votes the Bush.

It was not clear who had more votes in Florida.

But Bush had an advantage, his borhter was governor of FLorida, and Florida's secretary of state.

Gore wanted a recount but it was confirmed.

The Terrorist Attack and the Response

September 11, 2001

Bush had immediately declared a "war on terrorism"

The administration believed that the attack was ordered by Osama Bin Laden

The president set out to capture or kill him to destroy his organization called Al-Qaeda.

Bush should have known that terrorism could not be defeated by force because the result is more terrorism.

The bombing of Afghanistan was devastating to the country.

The Patriot Act gave the department of justice the power to hold noncitiznes on nothing more than suspicion.

Although Bush cautioned AMerican's not to take out their anger on Arab Americans, the government rounded up people for questioning.

Family members of people who had died on Sep. 11, urged BUsh not to match violence with violence.

For 10 years the US kept Iraq from trading with other countries.

Moving Toward the Middle

Clinton was President in 1992 and failed to live up to his promise of change. He seemed to be more interested in getting votes than in bringing about social change.

To win votes he decided to make the democratic party less liberal and more conservative. He had to do just enough for the blacks, women, and working people to keep their support.

He tried to win over white conservatives voters by coming out in favor or welfare cuts and a strong military.

Clinton approved an attack by the CIA on a group of religious extremeists killing at least 86 men, women, and children.

"Crime Bill" made more crimes punishable by death and set aside 8 billion dollars to build new prisons.

Throughout his presidency, clinton chose more conservative judges.

Choices

The US was the Richest country in the world but the cost of living rose faster than the average wage of ordinary working people.

40 million people had no health insurance. Babies and yound children dies of sickness and malnutrition.

Many people couldn't afford housing, health care, or even enough food.

One expert suggested lowering the country's military mudget would save 60 million dollars for the country's needs and adding a wealth tax to the nation's wealthiest could have added 100 billion to that amount. But nothing was done.

Cities kept falling into despair. Farmers were forced off their land, young people were without jobs and turned to drugs and crime.

By the end of the Clinton years, the US had more than 2 million people in prison.

Visions of Change

Throughout the Clinton years, many americans did protest government policy and demanded a more fair and peaceful society.

Activists for peace, women's rights, and racial equality continued their struggle.

The labor movement was alive too. Groups were showing how people would work together to acheive a goal.

The WTO (World Trade Organization) had a goal to bring the principles of capitalism to work everywhere through free-trade agreements between nations.

Protestors started showing up wherever meetings of the rich and powerful took place.

Afghanistan After the U.S. Invasion

The US forces had bombed and invaded Afghanistan and killed thousands of civilians and forced hundreds of thousands away from their homes.

US leaders justified this on the grounds that the invasion had removed the Taliban from power but it hadn't.

Taliban insisted on strict interpretations of Islam that denied righs to women.

The defeat of the Taliban brought a group called the Northern Alliance into power. They had committed many acts of violence against the people of Kabul and other Afghan cities.

Weapons of Mass Destruction?

Richard Clarke (advisor to the president on terrorism) later said that immediately after the 9/11 attacks, the White House looked for reasons to attack Iraq even though no evidence linked Iraq to the attacks.

Bush wanted the American public to think that Iraq and its dictator Saddam Hussein, threatened the United States and the world.

A united nations team made hundreds of inspections all over iraq and it found no weapons of mass destruction or any evidence that Iraq was working on a nuclear weapon.

The Vice President insisted that the weapons were real and Condoleessa Rice, the secretary of state, spoke menicingly of a "mushroom cloud"

in 2002, The Bush Administration said that it would take military action on Iraq on it's own and protests took place all over.

The Iraq War Begins

"Operation Iraqi Freedom" dropped thousands of bobs on Iraq and sent more than a hundred thousand soldiers into the country.

President Bush stood triumphantly on an aircraft carrier in front of a huge banner that said "Mission Accomplished"

But it wasn't accomplished.

The capture of Saddam Hussein in december 2003 did nothing to stop the attacks.

A vast majority of the Iraqi's wanted US troops out of Iraq.

By the middle of 2006, more than 2,500 Americans had died.

Operation Iraqi Freedom had brought neither democracy, nor freedom, nor security, to Iraq.

The Government created "unlawful enemy combatants" to not have to give prisoners their rights.

They were locked up in Guantanamo bay and rumors came out of torture.

The fall of 2006, the US congress passed a bill that allowed the CIA to continue the harsh interrogation of suspected terrorists in secret prisons. The bill also did away with the right of habeas corpus for an "unlawful enemy combatant" and even a US citizen.

The Anti-War Movement

Protests against the war in Iraq took place all over the United States.

5,500 soldiers deserted.

So the military stepped up it's recruiting efforts and they targeted teenagers.

By 2006 a majority of Americans were against the war and lacked confidence in the President.

Two Storms

The Bush administration tried to keep the country fiercely nationalistic.

One result was a wave of resentment against millions of immigrants, especially mexicans.

Congress approved plans to build a 750-mile fence along the southern borders of California and Arizona.

In August of 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast states of Mississippi and Louisana. The federal government was slow and inefficient in helping the survivors.