“Truth” through omission

The mission is “Truth” through omission. Can you get at the underlying truth of a historical document through blackout poetry?

Blackout poetry has been fairly popular for a while¹ but I haven’t seen any done on historical documents with the intent to get at a deeper, if fairly melodramatic, “truth”. I decided to use The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. It makes for a pretty interesting way to interact with a dry document and requires a pretty close, and repeated, reading. I like the idea of redaction being a way to expose, rather than hide, things the government would rather not have said.

The text from above . . .

The United States of America

in violation of the principles of the of the Charter of the United Nations and of international law, have deliberately and repeatedly attacked the Communist regime in North Vietnam

the United States has territorial, military, political ambitions in that area

desires the Congress approves

the United States regards the Constitution
its obligations
reasonable assured
except that it may be terminated earlier by concurring resolution of the Congress.