A History Lesson Can Be Beautiful

At the height of the VietNam war, in 1974, Peter Davis made a documentary that was labeled "Un-American" and Communist propaganda. The film, Hearts and Minds, exposed deep divisions in the US and often within individuals over the bloody guerilla war we had been prosecuting for 10 years. At that time, just a year before the last American was airlifted out of Saigon, it was increasingly clear that this "war" could not be "won" despite the promises of three successive US presidents. For any who would refute the similarities between our involvement in VietNam and the mismanagement of the mess in Iraq -- watch the movie.

Kenneth Chisolm provides a synosis on IMDB.com:

This film recounts the history and attitudes of the opposing sides of the Vietnam War using archival news footage as well as their own film and interviews. A key theme is how attitudes of American racism and self-righteousness militarism helped create and prolong this bloody conflict. The film also endeaveors to give voice to the Vietnamese people themselves as to how the war has affected them and their reasons why they fight the United States and other western powers while showing the basic humanity of the people that US propaganda tried to dismiss.

In this era of "truthiness" when even those with access to literally thousands of "news" outlets find it difficult to get to "the truth", Hearts and Minds is What's Beautiful #004.