Bryan Strawser

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Archives for 2004

Know Thy Enemy

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SMASH writes today of Gillian Russom – high school teacher & anti-war activist – he’ll make you wonder about who is teaching your children:

Much like her fellow socialist Rebecca Anshell had done two months earlier in San Diego, Gillian outlined her organization’s ideas to help “end the occupation” in Iraq.

…The people who are going to bring an end to this occupation are not the politicians of (the Democratic or Republican) parties, but the people just like us here, and around the world, who are fed up and disgusted with this war. I know you can feel powerless sometimes… but remember that not too long ago a peoples’ movement here helped to stop the war in Vietnam, and forced the government to bring the troops home. We can do it again!

The Iraqi people have shown their willingness to resist under great odds. So have soldiers like Camilo Mejia, who was just sentenced to a year of hard labor for refusing to go back to Iraq. Now it’s our turn. We have a huge responsibility – let’s get out there and rebuild this movement, step by step, until Iraqis can determine their own future, and all our troops are home!

Indeed, Gillian and her comrades aren’t simply advocating for peace – they are actively working to bring about an American defeat in Iraq, using the Vietnam War as a template. They believe that by holding demonstrations against the war, encouraging soldiers to refuse to fight, and supporting the Iraqi resistance, they can help “defeat the US war machine.”

So, you might be wondering, what does a young woman like Gillian do for a living?

She’s a high school teacher. In fact, she’s an active member of the United Teachers of Los Angeles, and Progressive Educators for Action.

I’m now even more determined to teach after I retire from my real job.

Andy Rooney: D-Day

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Andy Rooney just did a great commentary about D-Day on 60 Minutes:

On each visit to the Beaches over the years, I’ve wept. It’s impossible to keep back the tears as you look across the rows of markers and think of the boys under them who died that day.

Even if you didn’t know anyone who died, your heart knows something your brain does not – and you weep.

If you think the world is selfish and rotten, go to the cemetery at Colleville-Sur-Mer overlooking Omaha Beach. See what one group of men did for another group on D-Day, June 6, 1944.

Major George E. Preddy Jr.

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Wizbang writes of Major George E. Preddy, Jr.:

In just 12 short months Maj. George E. Preddy, Jr. had 26.83 air victories and 5 ground victories bringing his total to 31.83 kills. Almost certainly, he would also have come out as top American ace in Europe had it not been for that tragic error on Christmas Day in 1944. He would no doubt have been a part of the air battle called Operation Bodenplatte by the Luftwaffe when many of his squadron mates shot down as many as five enemy aircraft on New Years Day 1945. John C. Meyers, CO of the 352nd who upon meeting him said that Preddy “couldn’t punch his way out of a paper bag” later said of him: “He’s just the greatest fighter pilot who ever squinted through a gunsight”.

Maj. Preddy could have not fought at all. He could have gone home on no less than 7 occasions to a hero’s welcome. Instead he continued to fight for his country. Thanks to people like Maj. Preddy and countless others we get to enjoy Memorial Day in freedom. Think of him while you enjoy the day.

Hat Tip: Jay

Blast from the Past

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Just found this letter to the editor to the Commercial News that I wrote back in 1992. Unbelievable.

Editor:

I would like to respond to the letter printed in The Commercial-News last
Thursday by Lille Delva of Westville. Mrs. Delva’s letter was encaptioned
“Atheists seem to be taking over control of our country.”

I will not delve into a discussion of my personal religious beliefs, such
as they are, because I consider them to be an extremely private matter, and
it is not something that I feel is relevant to this particular situation.

Apparantly, Mrs. Delva has not studied very much history, nor does she
know her constitutional law very well. Both cases that she has cited were
argued and decided numerous times before The United States Supreme Court.
These men and one woman have all been appointed by the President of the
United States and confirmed by our duly elected Senators. Even our former
President George Bush, and his predecessor Ronald Reagan, both of whom were
devout Christians named Justices to the Supreme Court. For rather obvious
reasons, I cannot imagine President Bush nor President Reagan ever naming an
Atheist to the Supreme Court, I do not see how Mrs. Delva can complain about
the recent Supreme Court decisions, as they were made by Christians, like
herself.
A substantial number of our forefathers fled to the New World from the
Old because they were escaping some sort of persecution, be it political or
religious. Many of these groups came to the New World, established colonies,
and then promptly started doing to others what they had run away from to
begin with. There are many documented cases of cruel and unusual punishment
arising because one group or another would not conform to the religious
beliefs of the majority in a region of the New World. Is this the kind of
religious freedom that Mrs. Delva is referring to?
Mrs. Delva asks, “What has become of that freedom?” Well, Mrs. Delva,
what have you lost?
In the first case, involving prayer in school, there are actually several
examples. One example was when a state legislature mandated a prayer that
MUST be said at the start of every school day. Well, what would happen if we
wrote the prayer as a prayer to Satan? I bet that Mrs. Delva would be one of
the first “concerned citizens” at the door of the schoolhouse to complain.
But to a Muslim, or to someone who does not believe in a God, this is a
violation of their constitutional rights.
The second case, involving prayer at graduation ceremonies, is simply an
extension of the first. How can we go about mandating that we will have a
prayer at our graduation ceremonies for Christians? I would not hestitate to
bet that less than 1/2 of most graduating high school classes even believe in
God, let alone want to be forced to pray to one. My own graduating class was
less than 20% Christian, according to a survey of 160 seniors.
Our Constitution was written by many great men, including George
Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and others. They were NOT the “Religious
leaders” of our country. Jefferson is well know for his opposition to many
organized religions, and was once the target of a church who wished to keep
him from being elected.
Jefferson also authored the Declaration of Independence, another document
that Mrs. Delva claims to have been written by religious leaders. This is
false, as well. Jefferson was a strong beleiver in the separation of church
and state, and he stated so very eloquently in a series of letters to Virgina
churches.
Your right to worship as you wish in your home, and in your church shall
never be impeded in this country. I, even though I do not profess a belief
in your brand of religion, would gladly lay down my life in order to defend
your rights and freedom of religion. However, organized prayer and other
mandated religious activities have no place in public schools, nor anywhere
else where the rights of others may be impeded.
Finally, I for one, do not want this country to become an atheistic
country, but neither do I want it to become a God-fearing country. I want
the United States to become a country of tolerance and acceptance, instead of
a country that breeds contempt for those whom are different, bigotry, hatred,
rascist, and extremely intolerant. We are all Americans, be we Christian or
Atheist, and we need to start loving one another.

Bryan Strawser, Covington, Indiana

President Bush: America Would Do It Again for Our Friends

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President George W. Bush spoke today near Omaha Beach:

That difficult summit was reached, then passed, in 60 years of living. Now has come a time of reflection, with thoughts of another horizon, and the hope of reunion with the boys you knew. I want each of you to understand, you will be honored ever and always by the country you served and by the nations you freed.

When the invasion was finally over and the guns were silent, this coast, we are told, was lined for miles with the belongings of the thousands who fell. There were life belts and canteens and socks and K-rations and helmets and diaries and snapshots. And there were Bibles, many Bibles, mixed with the wreckage of war. Our boys had carried in their pockets the book that brought into the world this message: Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

America honors all the liberators who fought here in the noblest of causes, and America would do it again for our friends.

Coverage courtesy of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

RIP: Ronald Reagan

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Former President Ronald Reagan has passed away, aged 93, at his home in California.

The first of what is sure to be extensive news coverage has begun:

New York Times:

Ronald Reagan, the cheerful crusader who devoted his presidency to winning the Cold War, trying to scale back government and making people believe it was “morning again in America,” died Saturday after a long twilight struggle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 93.

He died at his home in California, according to a family friend, who initially disclosed the death on condition of anonymity. The friend said the family has turned to making funeral arrangements. A formal statement from the family was expected later.

In Paris, White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan said President Bush was notified of Reagan’s death in Paris at about 4:10 p.m., EDT, by White House chief of staff Andy Card.

The United States flag over the White House was lowered to half staff within an hour.

MSNBC:

Derided by his adversaries as glib, doctrinaire and uninformed — a mere actor, they scoffed — Reagan demonstrated throughout his political career the power that comes from being underestimated.

He won power by defeating overconfident Democratic incumbents — Gov. Pat Brown in California in 1966 and President Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election.

“It was said of Dwight Eisenhower (and could have been said of Ronald Reagan) that his smile was his philosophy,” wrote columnist George Will. And many Americans found Reagan’s smiling optimism appealing.

CNN:

Reagan led a conservative revolution that set the economic and cultural tone of the 1980s, hastened the end of the Cold War and revitalized the Republican Party. He suffered from Alzheimer’s disease since at least late 1994.

At least two of his children and his wife, Nancy, were at his bedside, according to the former president’s Los Angeles office.

Ron Reagan Jr. and Patty Davis — children from his current marriage to Nancy Davis Reagan — were with him, the office said.

Boston Globe:

Ronald Reagan, an infectiously optimistic president who forged an enduring relationship with the American people, dedicated his presidency to two goals — the destruction of Soviet communism abroad and the reduction of government at home. He lived to see the first achieved, if not the second.

[…]

Five years after he left office, he revealed, on Nov. 5, 1994, in a note in his own handwriting, that he was a victim of Alzheimer’s, a mind-crippling disease, and had begun the journey “into the sunset of my life.”

Through a lifetime in the public eye, Reagan demonstrated an uncommon ability to give voice to the innate patriotism of the American people. And, more than any other politician of his time, he had an affectionate, long-lasting relationship with his countrymen.

Personally, Reagan was the first President that I was really aware of. He was sworn into office when I was but seven years old – but I remember that day. I also remember the hostages from the Iranian Embassy returning home in the days that followed. I remember my mother coming to me in early 1981 to tell me that the President had been shot. And I remember watching the political conventions with my grandparents to see Reagan and others speak.

It’s a coincidence that Reagan’s speech at Pointe du Hoc twenty years ago today that ranks as one of his best:

We’re here to mark that day in history when the Allied peoples joined in battle to reclaim this continent to liberty. For four long years, much of Europe had been under a terrible shadow. Free nations had fallen, Jews cried out in the camps, millions cried out for liberation. Europe was enslaved, and the world prayed for its rescue. Here in Normandy the rescue began. Here the Allies stood and fought against tyranny in a giant undertaking unparalleled in human history.

We stand on a lonely, windswept point on the northern shore of France. The air is soft, but forty years ago at this moment, the air was dense with smoke and the cries of men, and the air was filled with the crack of rifle fire and the roar of cannon. At dawn, on the morning of the 6th of June 1944, 225 Rangers jumped off the British landing craft and ran to the bottom of these cliffs. Their mission was one of the most difficult and daring of the invasion: to climb these sheer and desolate cliffs and take out the enemy guns. The Allies had been told that some of the mightiest of these guns were here and they would be trained on the beaches to stop the Allied advance.

The Rangers looked up and saw the enemy soldiers — at the edge of the cliffs shooting down at them with machine-guns and throwing grenades. And the American Rangers began to climb. They shot rope ladders over the face of these cliffs and began to pull themselves up. When one Ranger fell, another would take his place. When one rope was cut, a Ranger would grab another and begin his climb again. They climbed, shot back, and held their footing. Soon, one by one, the Rangers pulled themselves over the top, and in seizing the firm land at the top of these cliffs, they began to seize back the continent of Europe. Two hundred and twenty-five came here. After two days of fighting only ninety could still bear arms.

Behind me is a memorial that symbolizes the Ranger daggers that were thrust into the top of these cliffs. And before me are the men who put them there.

These are the boys of Pointe du Hoc. These are the men who took the cliffs. These are the champions who helped free a continent. These are the heroes who helped end a war.

Gentlemen, I look at you and I think of the words of Stephen Spender’s poem. You are men who in your ‘lives fought for life…and left the vivid air signed with your honor’…

Forty summers have passed since the battle that you fought here. You were young the day you took these cliffs; some of you were hardly more than boys, with the deepest joys of life before you. Yet you risked everything here. Why? Why did you do it? What impelled you to put aside the instinct for self-preservation and risk your lives to take these cliffs? What inspired all the men of the armies that met here? We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith, and belief; it was loyalty and love.

The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or on the next. It was the deep knowledge — and pray God we have not lost it — that there is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.

You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One’s country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it’s the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty. All of you were willing to fight tyranny, and you knew the people of your countries were behind you.

RIP, President Reagan. Rest in Peace.

Marine Service in Al Asad, Iraq

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Blackfive writes today of a Marine Corps Memorial Service held in Al Asad, Iraq for those from Regimental Combat Team 7 of the First Marine Division where Colonel Craig A. Tucker, USMC spoke from his heart:

We can pay them no greater honor than to paint each of them into our memory and to promise, each in our own way and each to our own thoughts, that we will never forget them. And for as long as any here live, their memorial day will not be the last Monday in May; their memorial is their lives sculpted into the hearts of their friends, a memorial enduring for the generations all of you have left to live, a memorial that comes to life when we speak of them, laugh over their antics, cry over them, talk to our family and friends about them, or sit quietly and feel the pain of their loss to our fellowship.

As for me, I knew few of them personally, but I remember all of their names; I remember the hour and date of their death, I remember how and where they died, I know the names of those they left behind. And for the remainder of my days their memorial will be that remembering: that these young men I counted as my sons have far exceeded the honors of their fathers.

Semper Fi, Marines.