George W Bush was a progressive too!

Read Liberal Fascism.

Andrea, it sounds like you know "revisionist" history. From Woodrow Wilson (the first progressive president) forward it has been the progressives who have sought speech and expression limitations. To this day, progressives are feverishly seeking a legal means to silence talk radio. Are the "conservatives" seeking to silence dailykos and msnbc? Of course not.

Wilson and FDR threw people in prison for years for critical speech (not actions) against government policies. If Pelosi or Obama could throw Glenn Beck in jail for speaking against Obama's policies, they would not hesitate to do so. They would believe they are "forced" to do it "for the Common Good."

You really should read Liberal Fascism.

Right. And Goldberg discusses how these terms (liberal, progressive, fascist, etc) have evolved over the years. The left uses the ambiguity of these terms to their advantage, so they HOPE that people never really understand what the term "progressive" truly means.

Too many people (especially kids) mistakingly believe that "progressivism" stands for equality before the law, freedom of expression, and equal opportunity regardless of race, creed, etc. Nothing could be more false! Those values are the traditional liberal values, and in the US today they are supported by the people mislabled "conservatives."

Progressives (and most people mislabled "liberals") do not want a free press, free speech, or equality before the law. They want to use the law as a club to create their Perfect Society. This means supression of speech and the prosecution of political enemies - always "for the Common Good," of course.

You should read Jonah Goldberg's book Liberal Fascism. He offers a detailed, comprehensive history of "Progressivism" in America, from Teddy Rosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, FDR, JFK, Bill Clinton, G W Bush, and Hilary Clinton (the book came out just before Obama's national rise). Goldberg examines the philosophy of progressives and shows (with historical facts and the writings of the progressives themselves) that it is not what you may think it is.

Progressivism is the American version of fascism. It is tyranical and anti-liberty. In effect it subjugates individual freedom to the "good of society," as dictated by an intellectual and cultural elite in possession of government power. Progressives (like all fascists) seek to "remake" humanity into a better form, using deceit when possible and force when necessary. Anyone standing in their way must be detroyed - for "the good of humanity."

This same type of fanatics who view Obama as a god created the European Holocaust decades ago.

Well said, mm232.

For Christine: You've demonstrated the old trial lawyers adage(and de facto operating procedure for the left): "When the law is on your side, argue the law. When the facts are on your side, argue the facts. When neither the facts nor the law are on your side, call your opponent names."

My brother and I were born poor. We grew up in East Orange, NJ, a predominately black neighborhood, and attended predominately black public schools. After mom split, we lived in an efficiency dump (NO bedrooms) with dad, who blew any extra money on loose women. We shared the place with cockroaches and occasional rats, and the heat usually did not work. My father had plans for my future. As he often said to me, "Day you turn 18, you get your ass out." None of our relatives offered any help.

There were NO SPECIAL PROGRAMS or SPECIAL ADVANTAGES waiting for my brother and I, because our skin was the wrong color: white.

We succeeded through study, hard work, discipline, sobriety, and faith in the future.

Socialists brainwash poor black and latino kids with the lie that they CANNOT make it in America because of the "racisim and discrimination." Then they sabotage inner-city schools (with the help of the DNC and the NEA) to guarantee that 95-percent of black kids lack the basic skills to succeed.

And what gets blamed? Capitalism.

As I said, communists are the masters of deceit.

"Vile leftist cancer" - Jack you are a poet.

Excellent question. When I was a teenager (1970's) I had read all the standard socialist tomes (The Other America, Lies My Teacher Taught Me, America's Concentration Camps, etc) and I considered myself a proud socialist. In other words, I was ignorant and arrogant.

What changed is that I grew up. I learned how the real world worked. I learned how my own country is different from other countries, and the value of freedom and opportunity. My father never graduated from high school. He spent most of his life on welfare or doing "odd jobs." He gave my brother and I zero help. Our dear mother disapeared with her boyfriend in 1972, when I was 12 and my brother 10.

Today, my brother and I are stable, successful citizens. My brother owns his own company and employs over 20 people. We are both financially secure - I've owned airplanes and large boats, purchased with cash.

How did this happen? It's called LIBERTY. Freedom. Opportunity. CAPITALISM. We were lucky enough to be born Americans, with the freedom to imagine our own destiny and make it real through hard work.

God bless liberty, and God bless America.

The problem, Andrea, is not that "Zinn's viewpoints" are left out of schoolbook history - the problem is that "Zinn's viewpoint" has become THE ENTIRE history. The many GOOD aspects of America and Western Civilization have been systematically stripped from the curriculum. We're left with little more than slavery, genocide, Jim Crow, slavery, internment camps, robber barons, slavery, injustice, and Harriet Tubman.

The "viewpoint" we are talking about is an intellectual fraud. The sole purpose of teaching it is to create a population that is ashamed of their history, their culture, their race (if they're white), and (most importantly) will never see any reason to defend their society against those who wish to destroy it.

Zinn was a communist - anti-freedom, anti-religion, and anti-American - and like most professional Marxists he was a master of deceit. It's going to take a long time and a lot of dedication from patriots and other freedom-lovers to undo the damage he inflicted.

I found that both students and instructors at UCLA screenwriting classes currently believe that STORY and even CHARACTERIZATION are not important for . . . movies. They CAN be important for television, especially cable productions like HBO and AMC (Example: Breaking Bad). Everyone, especially the industry veterans, felt that it is a tragic error to expect that an original MOVIE script would be producted on the strength of story or characters.

Instead, the consensus was that movie success must be based on either FX-CGI wizardry (which often goes hand-in-hand with pre-sold franchises) or specific genries such as horror, raunchy comedy, or thriller-caper flicks (which should have as much CGI as possible). To write drama for movies (OUTSIDE of cable) was considered the path to starvation.

I mentioned Gran Torino, Pursuit of Happyness, and Hurt Locker, drew blank stares.