3 results for tag: History


Build it and they will use it

The New York Times reported that in 1958, U.S. military leaders had plans to use nuclear weapons against China. Daniel Ellsberg (who leaked the Pentagon Papers about the Vietnam War in 1971) recently posted online a secret document showing Pentagon leaders were willing to use nuclear weapons to stop China from attacking the Republic of China on Taiwan.

Black history in Wisconsin

The writing of the the state constitution involves Black suffrage. In 1846, a first draft of the constitution allowed black men to vote. This draft was not adopted. The successful 1848 State Constitution explicitly barred Black men from voting while it allowed all white men, even immigrants who were not citizens, to vote. After statehood, three referendums were held on suffrage for Black men (1849, 1857, and 1865). All were defeated. Citizenship was defined as being white and male.

Remember the Past but Work for the Future

August 6, 1945 we dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. The world changed forever. We came under the shadow of a nuclear mushroom cloud that is still with us 69 years later. We should remember the dead and wounded from the horrific events of that time. At Hiroshima we killed an estimated 166,000 and, three days later, 80,000 in Nagasaki. Most of these dead were non-combatant civilians of all ages. We should remember that war has always been destructive. But with the atomic age we reached a new level of destructiveness. During the arms race of the cold war we built arsenals with the power to literally destroy the world. When you ...