Citizen Smash has an entry about Gillian Russom, the LA spokesperson of the International Socialist Organization, who works to bring about a defeat for the US in Iraq—when she isn’t teaching history at Roosevelt High in East LA: Do you know who’s teaching your children?

After the march, I found Gillian in front of the ISO booth. “I heard you speak before the march,” I told her. “So you’re a teacher?”

“Yeah! I teach high school history.”

“Oh? I studied history in college. Where do you teach?”

“Roosevelt High — it’s in East LA. The classrooms are so crowded… You know, if you like history, you should definitely come to our meeting this Thursday. We’re going to talk about what the anti-war movement can learn from Vietnam.” She pressed a flyer into my hands.

VIETNAM*
*When the US War Machine Was Beaten

30 years ago, three things defeated the US war machine in Vietnam:
*A determined national liberation struggle in Vietnam
*A historic revolt within the US armed forces
*The anti-war and other political movements at home

…What lessons do we need to draw from the experience of Vietnam for OUR movement today? Join in a discussion hosted by the LA branch of the ISO. What we do now matters for the future course of this war, and for the politician’s never-ending “war on terrorism.”

To underscore the point, the flyer featured a photograph of a helicopter preparing to lift off from the roof of the US Embassy as Saigon fell, in 1975.

(If you’re interested in this sort of thing, you can attend their meeting on Thursday, June 10, 7:00pm at Senor Fish Restaurant on the corner of First and Alameda Streets in Los Angeles; or drop in at any of the regular meetings of the ISO in your local area).

I thanked Gillian for the flyer. “So, do you try to get your students involved in activism?”

“Oh, definitely! I teach the required World History course, but I also teach an elective course on Revolutionary History. Those students are really receptive to new ideas. We cover the Russian Revolution, Chinese Revolution, French Revolution, Mexican Revolution…”