Just As None Of Us Is Outside

All Knowledge That Is About Human Society, And Not About The Natural World, Is Historical Knowledge, And Therefore Rests Upon Judgment And Interpretation. This Is Not To Say That Facts Or Data Are Nonexistent, But That Facts Get Their Importance From What Is Made Of Them In Interpretation… For Interpretations Depend Very Much On Who The Interpreter Is, Who He Or She Is Addressing, What His Or Her Purpose Is, At What Historical Moment The Interpretation Takes Place.

... The Connection Between Imperial Politics And Culture Is Astonishingly Direct. American Attitudes To American "greatness", To Hierarchies Of Race, To The Perils Of "other" Revolutions (the American Revolution Being Considered Unique And Somehow Unrepeatable Anywhere Else In The World) Have Remained Constant, Have Dictated, Have Obscured, The Realities Of Empire, While Apologists For Overseas American Interests Have Insisted On American Innocence, Doing Good, Fighting For Freedom.

To Say That We're Going To End Countries Or Eradicate Terrorism, And That It's A Long War Over Many Years, With Many Different Instruments, Suggests A Much More Complex And Drawn-out Conflict For Which, I Think, Most Americans Aren't Prepared.

In The Islamic World, The U.s. Is Seen In Two Quite Different Ways. One View Recognizes What An Extraordinary Country The U.s. Is. Every Arab Or Muslim That I Know Is Tremendously Interested In The United States. Many Of Them Send Their Children Here For Education. Many Of Them Come Here For Vacations. They Do Business Here Or Get Their Training Here. The Other View Is Of The Official United States, The United States Of Armies And Interventions.

Since When Does A Militarily Occupied People Have The Responsibility For A Peace Movement?