Iwo Jima Statue, U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery
Looking east towards
The National Mall.
No matter how often you've been there, the view and the monument's significance always takes your breath away. The east-facing slope is especially awesome for photos and snow rides in the winter, whether on snowboards, or going 'old-style' on cardboard.
My sister Linda, a 1986
IU SPEA grad, chose as her first marathon to run in, the 2006 Marine Corps Marathon, and raised $4,000 for Marines injured in Iraq & Afghanistan.
2003 Photo by Werner J. Bertsch, www.wernerjbertsch.com
I thought the chattering class had
already decided that using war metaphors to describe public policy -
War on Poverty, War on Drugs, et al- was verboten? That was what the memo I got said. I actually found this recent cover more off-putting than the
'Dark O.J.' cover of 14 years ago.
Above:
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage ; Best
500 coverage at:
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=SPORTS0107
Just wanted to share some random thoughts on what's shaping up to be yet another steamy, miserably hot day in South Florida.
Fortunately, it's race day in Indianapolis, so I'll be in the house most of the afternoon, and needn't concern myself with the weather outside for awhile. http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage
At 1:11 p.m. Friday afternoon, after showing dueling taped comments by Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain regarding military service and religion, with McCain pointing out for the record that he'd never been to Rev. Hagee's church -and to the church of another very conservative religious supporter whose name I forgot- much less, been a regular attendee for 20 years, highlighting the contrastwith Obama and Rev. Wright in Southside Chicago.
MSNBC's Chuck Todd once again showed that despite being a smart and pretty well-informed guy, the former Roll Call-er has, for my mind, a disquieting propensity for conveniently forgetting facts that would undermine his on air talking points.
Todd told Andrea Mitchell that McCain had often defended those who had never served in the military, including "Cheney and Bush..." an obvious reference to the whole Chicken Hawk syndrome, which was written about to death in just about every magazine, popular and otherwise, that you could ever hope to find at Borders or Barnes & Noble.
While it's true that over the years McCain has done that for people like former Sen. Trent Lott, it's equally true that McCain has just as frequently said that he doesn't support the notion that not serving in the military should disqualify someone to run for president.
But he never had to do that for President Bush.
While you can argue whether G.W. Bush flying planes over Texas and Louisiana during the Vietnam War was much of a deterrent to the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese, or whether he should've just enlisted, clearly Todd is wrong, since why have so many liberal groups rather quixotically spent so much time and money trying to figure out where Bush was for months at a time, when he apparently wasn't with his Texas Air Reserve group???
(Campaigning for Republicans.)
You remember, back when liberal activist groups didn't blanch at saying that the Reserves were really little more than the cozy redoubt of White "weekend warriors."
But once we invaded Iraq, in large part due to the important role of Reservists, and they saw lots of action -too much?- it became a case of "Oh, well, never mind."
Suddenly, it wasn't such an easy uncontested lay-up for these groups to parrot their old nostrums and knock the contributions of Reservists, and expect the TV/radio/print reporters to just let it slide and not call them on it.
Oops!
Just to give some point of reference for my remarks here, I'm the son of someone who was Air Force active duty and Reserve for over 25 years, before Hurricane Andrew blew away Homestead AFB, and someone who shares Sen. McCain's belief that not serving does not disqualify someone for running for president.
My thoughts are also informed by the fact that my mother was the secretary for the Base Commander at Kelly AFB in San Antonio (where I was born), Col. Howard J. Bechtel, and my father was in the Medical Corps there.
Both of my parents saw President and Mrs. Kennedy in person the day before he was assassinated in Dallas, when Air Force One landed in San Antonio at Kelly AFB and they did the inevitable one hour meet-and-greet tour.
Later, once LBJ became president, Air Force One always stayed at Kelly whenever he and Lady Bird flew home to the Johnson Ranch.
Speaking of lack of military service and letting others make the sacrifices on this Memorial Day weekend, do you know how many female Members of Congress have actually served in the military?
Almost ten years ago next month, Republican Heather Wilson of New Mexico was elected thru a special election and became the first female veteran in the U.S. Congress.
I was still living in D.C. then, of course, and recall how Wilson's unique story was one that many publications covered with great interest, if for no other reason than to highlight the shrinking percentage of Congressional Members who had any ties to the U.S. military, compared to earlier eras.
Nearly everyone in the Beltway punditocracy at the time agreed that it was only a matter of time before there'd be Persian Gulf War vets serving in Congress at some point, adding their own unique perspective to congressional discussion of military and foreign policy, and that the Congress would be better for it.
That some of them would turn out to be be DLC Dems, maybe even women, seemed like a foregone conclusion.
Certainly many of my friends and I hoped that'd be the case, so as to keep the party more reflective of the country as a whole, and not its élites.
One particular hyper-active DLC Dem friend of mine even went so far as to say that, given the demographics of who actually serves in the military, she was convinced that the first female Dem vet in Congress would likely be an African-American military officer from the Detroit area, where she herself was from.
Someone who got fed-up with the same old familiar faces representing Michigan in DC -decade after decade! (The Dingell family has held one Michigan congressional seat continuously since 1932, when FDR was elected President.)
Someone who could articulately argue that there was a crying need for some new blood in Washington that more accurately reflected changing times and persepctives.
Based on our own knowledge and first hand experience in dealing with the various Members from Michigan, my friends and I were quite convinced that these points would have great resonance in a place like Detroit, but, of course, first you need an actual candidate.
Which brings us back to Heather Wilson, a bright, able and personable woman, an Air Force Academy grad, a Rhodes Scholar, the Ranking Member of the important House Energy and Commerce Committee -a committee that I followed very closely for many years while in D.C.-
AND a U.S. Senate candidate for the seat of longtime and retiring Sen. Pete Domenici.
Ten years later, she is STILL the only one.
So, on Memorial Day Weekend 2008, I ask you two questions:
1. How is it that in the year 2008, an accomplished woman like Rep. Wilson is never on the Sunday morning network TV chat shows, while the usual and oh-so predictable political suspects continue to mouth the same ol', same ol' platitudes?
2.) Where are all the Private Benjamins and Sergeant Yorks in Congress, and the Democratic Party in particular?
Meanwhile, as if to prove my point, here's your diversity-laden roster of talking heads on the Sunday morning chat shows for Memorial Day Weekend 2008:
Sunday news show lineup
By The Associated Press
May 24, 2008; 2:25 PM
Guest lineup for the Sunday TV news shows:
ABC's "This Week" - Karl Rove, former White House deputy chief of staff; David Axelrod, campaign adviser for Sen. Barack Obama.
CBS' "Face the Nation" - Howard Wolfson, campaign adviser for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton; Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
NBC's "Meet the Press" - Panel discussion of 2008 presidential election.
CNN's "Late Edition" - Maj. Gen. Mark Hertling, the commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq;
Reps. Jane Harman, D-Calif., and David Dreier, R-Calif.; former Labor Secretary Robert Reich; Gene Sperling, Clinton campaign adviser; Douglas Holtz-Eakin, campaign adviser for Sen. John McCain; Mary Tillman, mother of deceased Army Ranger Pat Tillman.
"Fox News Sunday" _ Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe; Reps, Tom Cole, R-Okla., and Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.
Yeah, that very reflective of the country as a whole.
