Insurgents, killers and traitors (aka heroes)

This column by Ted Rall raises some interesting points. To sum up the way I read it, he's asking why we don't have more sympathy for the Iraqi 'insurgents' (in his ficitional scenario, he uses the term patriot. I like that, and think I'll adopt that rather than the derogatory and highly-biased 'insurgent'.)

Why don't we? Anyone who's studied American history - not sat through the ethnocentric and mindless indoctrination that passes for history in most American schools, but really studied it - knows that our 'founding fathers', the men who we so often look up to as larger-than-life, noble and brave, were insurgents. They were traitors, they were disloyal, and no doubt if today's terminology was used then, they'd be terrorists. We idolize them.

For example: Here at home, Philadelphia. City of Brotherly Love and home of the Declaration. We have the Ben Franklin Parkway, the Ben Franklin Bridge, and the Franklin Institute (note: the Franklin Institute does rock in so many ways - no hating there.) We have the Betsy Ross house, Congress Hall, Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, and my personal favorite solely because of the name, the Man Full of Trouble Tavern. We've got a ton of history here, much of it connected to the Revolutionary War, and we're damn proud of it.

The Revolutionary war was illegal. Sure, Britain then signed the Treaty of Paris and declared no hard feelings, but still. It was an illegal revolution, based mostly on the fact that we didn't want to pay taxes and didn't really want to listen to the government anymore. "Leave us alone and don't make us pay taxes," they said. Britain sort of glanced at us, and said in a tone of utmost contempt, "No, that's not very likely." So then the Americans went out to a pub in Boston, got completely wasted, painted themselves up like Indians, snuck onto a ship, and threw a bunch of tea into the water. A bunch of also-drunk dock workers starting throwing ice and rocks at some soldiers who were on guard and everyone was stunned - stunned, I tell you! - when the soldiers reacted violently. (Note to revolutionaries everywhere: Guns usually win over rocks. Seriously.) These noble and honorable men dragged loyalists out of their house in the dead of the night and set the house on fire with the family still inside. They tarred and feathered people (cruel and unusual, perhaps? Due process, perhaps?). In essence, they invented dirty tactic and urban warfare. They fought hard and dirty, both politically and in combat, rules of engagement in both arenas be damned. They wanted these 'occupiers' out of their hair. They wanted their independence, and they wanted to be able to determine what would happen to them. "Hey, Georgie-boy: take your troops out of our houses, and get lost!"

In Iraq right now, there's a group of people who are pretty sick of being ruled by another nations' soldiers. They want sovriegnity and they want it now. They don't want to have to answer to a government that's not theirs anymore. They want to live by their own constitution, make their own laws and judicial system and society. Some of them are getting frustrated, so they might take up arms. Throw a few rocks at a few guards outside a base, 'engage' some soldiers at a checkpoint on their way home.

Can't imagine how anyone could sink to such a dispicable level. Nothing good has ever come of rebellion like that, has it?