City will turn out to be his Gulf War, a badly timed campaignrnstunt that tugged at the heartstrings until thev broke. When allrnthe ellow ribbons have been bleached by the summer sun, BillrnClinton w ill still be Bill Clinton, and the onlv chance he has forrna second term lies in the hands of the Republican Party. If thernGOP cannot find a better candidate than Robert Dole (manyrnAmericans suspect that Ronald Reagan was already senile yhenrnhe was ounger than Mr. Dole is now), Phil Gramm (whateverrncharisma is. Senator Gramm has the antidote), or Colin Powellrn(kiss off the angry white male vote), then the President has arnfighting chance for another four years in which he can continuernto protect himself from prosecution. Under similar circumstancesrnJulius Caesar first invaded Gaul and then used his armvrnto wage a ciil war and subjugate his people. Fortunately, if Mr.rnClinton has no more scruples than Julius, he has neither the geniusrnnor the courage of a world conqueror. Arkansas was justrnabout his size.rnTo realize how good a chance Clinton really has, you onlyrnhae to consider the Republican response to the bombing: arnsomew hat muted echo of the President’s outrage against militiasrn(which have not been connected in any plausible way withrnthe explosion) and “hate” groups. It is, apparently, a thoughtcrimernto dislike the rich or resent strangers; and, if the Presidentrnhas his wa’, it will soon be lese majeste to believe that the governmentrnis infringing our liberties. The Democrats are demandingrn(not asking) that Congress restore the FBI’s Gestapornpowers, and the Republicans will only go three-fourths of thernway with them. In the Republican ersion the FBI will be ablernto snoop and spy only on realK dangerous subversives, likernmembers of the National Rifle /ssociation or fans of G.rnGordon I .idd.rnHere we go again. A new round of right-baiting to answerrnan eariier round of red-baiting. Lincoln jailed his criticsrnon the charge they were Southern sympathizers; Wilson lockedrnup the Wbbblies as traitors because they had printed antiwarrntracts—before American entrance into World War I; FranklinrnRooscclt went after German-Americans, did eservthing herncould to dcstro’ the careers and reputations of such critics asrnCharles Lindbergh and John Flynn, and in a great tra-est ofrnjustice 1 .awrence Dennis, the mulatto reactionary, was tried forrntreason because lie had accused FDR of fighting fascismrnabroad in order to impose it at home. As Phil Jenkins indicatesrnelsewhere in this issue, what is usually called McCarthyism isrnjust a fine old American custom of repressing dissent that goesrnback, at least, to the Alien and Sedition Acts. The FederalistrnPart, knowing it was losing ground against Jefferson, wantedrnthe power to deport critics and shut down opposition presses asrnthe- smeared the Republicans as bloodthirst Jacobins. (ThernRepublicans gave as good as they got and accused plain JohnrnAdams of monarchical ambitions.)rn7 he Federalists pretended to believe that Jefferson was anotherrnRobespierre plotting a Reign of Terror against the rich.rnTlie o]) ious connection between the Jacobin Terror and modernrnterrorism seems lost on political commentators who arernlooking for Muslim extremists and white supremacists in everyrncar parked within a mile of a public building. But terrorism isrnprimarih, preeminenth’ practiced by goxcrnments and not byrnindividuals or dedicated bands of fanatics. I do not want tornminimize the evils done b- the Brigate Rosse in Italy or thernBaader-Mcinhof gang in Germany, but in many cases the worstrnterrorist groups are encouraged or even sponsored by governments.rnThe Soviet L^nion, for example, has backed Muslim terroristsrnin the Middle East and communist guerrillas in LatinrnAmerica, just as the Lhiited States has given support, not alwaysrncoert, to Central American death squads.rnTerrorist groups are, for the most part, little surrogate armiesrnused as unwitting mercenaries by national governments. Israelisrnscream bloody murder when Arab terrorists attack them,rnbut they are silent, even defensive about their own terrorists.rnMy father alw’a s used to sav that organized crime could be shutrndown, if its friends in business and politics (Barry Goldwaterrnand the Kennedys, for example) would quit protecting thernMafia. Perhaps he was wrong, but there would be no internationalrnterrorism without the support of national governmentsrnwho find their services convenient.rnWe have all been corruptedrnby government, but therernremains a militant minority thatrnis convinced that we couldrnsolve our problems, if thernfederal government would onlyrnstay in Washington.rnThe record of death and destruction racked up b’ the worstrnterrorist groups is a mere grain of sand compared with the vastrnSahara of government terrorism practiced both by revolutionaryrnregimes, such as the Jacobins, communists, and Nazis, b-rnconstitutional monarchies like England (the extermination ofrnthe Tismanians. the Irish potato famine, the terror-bombingsrnof Dresden, Hanover), and by such democracies as the UnitedrnStates (the Sand Creek Massacre against the Cheenne, Sherman’srnmarch to the sea, the nuclear terrorism at Hiroshima andrnNagasaki). Americans say they are terrified lest some lunatic inrnChina or North Korea get hold of atomic weapons. Why? Thernonly lunatic who ever used them was an American President,rnand the stupid controversy over the Smithsonian’s Enola Gayrnexhibit reveals that if liberals hate their country, the conservativesrnare still in the phase that pop psychologists describe asrndenial.rnA people that will not admit its mistakes is condemned tornjustify them. From time to time, we and our parents and theirrnparents hae acquiesced in the slaughter of innocent people,rnthe waging of unjustified wars, and the suppression of every libertyrnguaranteed in the Bill of Rights. PeriodiealK we go on arnbinge of self-recrimination over some no longer relevantrnepisode—the internment of Japanese during Worid War II orrnthe Cherokee Trail of Tears—and in pointing the finger at otherrnpeople we can feel good about our own moral superiority,rnbut to acknowledge the crimes on which our regime is based—rnAUGUST 1995/11rnrnrn