Pee-wee: I don’t remember.
Texan: Where are you from?
Pee-wee: I don’t remember.
Texan: Do you remember anything?
Pee-wee: I remember… the Alamo.
[Texans cheer]
Pearl Harbor can be placed in the same line as the Alamo and Custer’s Last Stand. They are stories of surprise defeat and a military response. Sept. 11 fits there as well.
Pearl Harbor is part of another line, though, Mansoor said. That one includes “the shot heard round the world” that began the American Revolution and the firing on Fort Sumter that ignited the Civil War. Those wars helped create and define the United States.
Sept. 11 doesn’t seem to belong there, Mansoor said. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan haven’t attained the same stature, but it’s difficult to predict how the future will interpret them.
“The tides of history wash in strange directions,” he said.
For those who lived through both Pearl Harbor and Sept. 11, the events might feel different. Pearl Harbor was a nationwide call to action, Mansoor said; after Sept. 11, President George W. Bush told people to go shopping.
That’s how it feels to Norman Lambert, 77, of the Far West Side, who was a boy on Dec. 7, 1941.
He collected rubber and paper and everything else he could think of for the war effort as a kid. “Remember Pearl Harbor!” was the cry then, he said. Sept. 11 doesn’t have the same resonance.
“We don’t have the same dedication today,” he said. “It’s a shame.”
It’s not possible to be sure but I’ll bet Pete Mansoor didn’t say anything at all about the “go shopping” quip. Writing trash like this people like this Jeb Phillips fellow give journalism its bad name.
The Columbus Dispatch cocksucker people put that with the news pages? They is confuzzled I think.
I wonder if anybody in the Chattering Classes will ever figure out that the purpose of that was didactic?
Yes, Virginia, it was done on purpose. Saddam was widely known to have the biggest, baddest Army in the Middle East. The U.S. whacked it using whatever was on hand after a major military drawdown, did so in days after the initial buildup, and did it out of walking-around money. People noticed, too.
Regards,
Ric
Pour encourager les autres.
Yes, damn that George W. Bush for not whipping Americans into a blood frenzy after 9/11. Damn him for not instituting a draft. Damn him for not instituting rationing. Damn him for not creating loyalty pledges. Damn him…just don’t damn him to hell, because we can’t have a public endorsement of a religious concept like that.
Christ, leftists are impossible to please.
Not only impossible to please, but in a hurry to get there Seth.
Having been there, I’m not in a hurry to get back. Unless it’s on a vacation and the exchange rate is good.
Keep in mind they whined and mewled for all that government intervention in the economy while simultaneously screeching about the government’s “abuse” of folks who, in previous generations, would have been shot on capture.
You’d almost think they value the liberty of people shooting at American soldiers and plotting to murder American citizens more than the liberty of American soldiers and citizens.
Is it evident to anyone that there is a vast difference between WWII and today in the scale of the enemy’s conventional military strength? The Kingdom of Italy had more conventional military strength than the people we face now – we don’t need to have the scrap drives and the ration cards. Is anyone arguing that we need – militarily – to have the five services expand to the levels (as percent of population and share of GDP) they had during WWII? Getting to late Cold War levels would provide more military force than we have now.
It isn’t needed – no more than the USA needed to expand the Army to Civil War levels after Little Big Horn.
If one of their “messiah” figures, aka Democrat party leaders, starts a war they will fall over themselves supporting everything connected with it. It’s always about who runs things not what and how it is being run.
I was six years old when Pearl Harbor was attacked, even children knew we were at war. I was listening to NPR in Yellowstone National Park when I heard the happenings in New York on 9/11. I had the same feeling. We were attacked and we were at war. I find it almost criminal that many used politics to negate that feeling in others. I am of the opinion many of our people died in the Iraq war because the enemy knew the leftists and those who wanted political power in this country were against the war. It was prolonged considerably by the anti-war movement here. I read the Iraqi blogs and I think if everyone had, they would know the truth as I see it.
The left says that evil Bush/Cheney used 9/11 (or caused it if you count the troofers) to whip Americans into a Muslim killing rage so they could seize power and kill brown* people.
They also say that Bush should have whipped Americans into a Muslim killing rage instead of telling us to go shopping.
I don’t think they actually know what they want, as evidenced by their overwhelming enthusiasm for a presidential candidate that refused to commit himself to what he planned to give them. The perfect gift for the voter that doesn’t want anything, but still wants everything. Check Amazon for great discounts on , just in time for the Midwinter Paid Days Off Unrelated To Any Particular Religious Holidays Or Beliefs gift giving and have a Merry Day Just Like Any Other!
Forgot my asterisk.
*Does the brown part count if it came from a tanning booth? I’d like to have at those bitches on The Real Housewives of Orange County. Or do they count as orange?
I may have been unclear:
It isn’t needed – no more than the USA needed to expand the Army to Civil War levels after Little Big Horn.
Expanding to WWII levels is not needed. To Cold War levels? I’m open to that.
“We don’t have the same dedication today,†he said. “It’s a shame.â€Â
That’s because, with all due respect for Mr. Lambert, a member of the so-called ‘greatest generation,’ you, sir, failed to inspire the same values in your Baby Boomer children, who proceeded to raise their own children (many many of them, but not all) without any values at all.
Don’t worry–the many active military families will supply the near future with another generation who will understand the kind of sacrifice and dedication the Mr. Lambert still remembers. He may not live to see it, but many of us will.