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George McGovern, speaking on the Senate floor in opposition to the Vietnam War, 1970.  

It was recently reported that McGovern has succumbed to old age.  Like most American politicians, he was flawed and at times seemed to contradict himself.  But on the Senate floor in 1970, he told the truth to a room full of men who didn’t want to hear it.  

As PPG noted earlier, McGovern was a fearless advocate for progressive policies.  By the time he was running against Nixon, his opposition to the War in Vietnam had reached fever pitch; and despite his so-called radical stance, history proved McGovern right with respect to the folly that was our involvement in Vietnam.  He represents a progressive politics of a different age: when the American Left was unafraid to point out that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, and didn’t feel the need to apologize for criticizing American institutions.  With McGovern, we lose a courageous voice in a time when real courage on the political stage typically loses votes; but if ever there was a profile in courage, George McGovern’s decision to throw his political career to the wolves in order to tell the truth about Vietnam ranks among the better of them.

(via letterstomycountry)

(via truth-has-a-liberal-bias)