Events
Award-winning Author Brings America's Patriotic Fight to Sarasota
Thursday, January 26, 2006
7:00PM
Sarasota, Florida
Harvey J. Kaye's latest book, "Thomas Paine and the Promise of America" has drawn high praise from reviewers. Bill Moyers writes: "The story of Thomas Paine -- then and now, for the man and his ideas are very much alive today -- stirs the heart, moves the mind, and routs the demon of despair."
The Florida Chapter of Veterans for Common Sense (FCVS), is bringing Kaye to USF's Sudakoff Auditorium Jan. 26 at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10, $5 for students and free for 17 and under, and can be obtained from members of the FCVS or by sending a check to Veterans for Common Sense, 444 Bellini Circle, Nokomis, Fl. 34275. For more information: phone: (941) 966-4704 or (941) -349-5131 or email: FLveterans@aol.com.
Ever since the American Revolution, Thomas Paine has been both celebrated and vilified. Some say there would never have been a revolution without him, others have denied Paine's importance and attacked his memory. Amazingly, his words still have great meaning more than 200 years later, and both the political left and right today claim him as one of their own. George McGovern and John Kerry quoted Paine; but so did President Ronald Reagan and a leader of the Swiftboat group that attacked Kerry in 2004.
Some supporters of the Iraq War question the patriotism of the opposition. A powerful U.S. senator says the Vice President lied us into this war. Who is the patriot? Where does Tom Paine, one of the most important patriots, stand?
Kaye, the Ben and Joyce Rosenberg Professor of Social Change and Development at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, will discuss Paine's contributions to the making of American freedom, equality, and democracy and what Paine has to say to us today. But he will also take your questions, so you have the final say.
Kaye will be introduced by Michael Burns, an attorney in Sarasota, and Charles Sheehan-Miles, executive director of the national Veterans for Common Sense. Burns, a pilot in the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War, was a prisoner of war and spent 56 months in the Hanoi Hilton. Sheehan-Miles served as a tank crewman with the 24th Infantry Division during the 1991 Gulf War, and was decorated for valor for helping rescue fellow tank crewmen from a burning tank.
Professor Kaye will sign books after his talk.