Rough Draft of History...Whose?

Instapundit links to an interesting meditation on contemporary American history and how it has been shamefully and falsely re-written over the last few decades. I.e., how, again and again, the positive American virtues of optimism, perseverance, and and plain old common sense are ritually trashed by the so-called intelligentsia. They have created instead the enduring myth that America is an evil, bumbling colonial power that always gets it wrong and destroys tens of thousands of lives in the process. You know them. They're the same ones who mythologized the Tet Offensive as an American shellacking and the Vietnam War as a stunning American defeat—both of which memes, objectively speaking, are lies.

Now they're in the midst of trying to play the same game with the current situation in Iraq. Completely ignoring the increasingly optimistic truth on the ground in Iraq, the increasing success of "the surge," our leftist brainiacs, cheered on by their friends in the MSM, are laying the groundwork for yet another enduring myth of American defeat. But the right wing blogosphere is onto their tricks. After recounting the heroism of American soldiers like Jeremiah Denton, Cassandra concludes with this ringing valedictory:

Contrary to the countless media stories of crazed vets returning with PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder], these men are not broken. They endured horrors vastly worse than the average soldier or Marine in today's conflict. Jeremiah Denton survived nearly eight years in a North Vietnamese prison camp and went on to become a United States Senator for his home state, Alabama. How many people know that?

There is hope. Beliefs matter, but what is more important, standing up for your beliefs matters. The support and respect of your peers matters. But even if you are spat upon when you come home, even if your heroism is never recognized, even if your service is forgotten by a biased press that distorts history, you are not defeated, you are not shamed, you are not broken unless and until you decide to be.

The sad thing is that the past is about to repeat itself. What will future generations know about Iraq and Afghanistan?

The first rough draft of history is getting it all wrong again. Somebody get me rewrite.

The Gramscians (or perhaps more appropriately, the neo-Gramscians) who rewrote the history of the 1970s and 1980s—during which mostly conservative administrations actually destroyed Communism as we knew it—would have us believe that the U.S. is sliding toward oblivion, all the better to institute some kind of failed World Socialist Order dominated by, of course, them. This is classic counter-hegemonism as currently espoused by Theodore H. Cohen.

HazZzMat is not as pessimistic as Cassandra, although getting rewrite is certainly the first order of business. We are certainly taking a hit from the Gramscians at the moment and need to rectify the situation. Interestingly, the 'Nam vets, by and large, have been among the first to recognize the essence of this problem. They have become the first to mount the barricades against these Benedict Arnolds, as witnessed during a recent Marxist demonstration in the nation's capital. They're not about to let their sons and daughters in the military receive the same kind of homecoming they received in the 1960s and 1079s. The rest of us need to follow their lead. Sooner rather than later.