INFAMY

President Roosevelt said that December 7^th, 1941 was the “The day that will live in infamy.”  Up until September 11, 2001, that was true. 

When you stop and think about it, the attack on Pearl Harbor was “over there.”  It wasn’t here, on the mainland.  Hawaii wasn’t even a state yet.  Certainly it was an attack on the United States and the nation was in shock, but it was still abstract to some extent.  All of those ships got sunk, those lives lost… over there.  It took time for the news to spread around the country in those of days of radio and newspapers.  And, when we dropped the bombs on Japan, that was the end of that threat.     

When you turned on the TV on the morning of September 11, 2001, you saw the horror of war right here under our noses.  The sense of security in our lives in the midst of a world full of turmoil was suddenly and urgently interrupted.  The networks were all over the story and we became aware of every intimate detail of that horror almost as soon as it occurred.  For those of us watched it all happen, reruns today are a vivid reminder that the threat continues.   

What I am saying here is not to diminish the memory of Pearl Harbor.  But, the descriptive terms “A day that will live in infamy,” have evolved over the last decade to relate more, I think, to 9/11.  As we go about our ways today, remembering 9/11, Pearl Harbor is a more distant and fading memory. 

Both tragic attacks were the result of American arrogance and complacency.  Roosevelt had been warned that an attack might occur and he dismissed it.  Bush had also been warned and he, too, dismissed it.  In retrospect, both Presidents should have been tossed out on their ears, because it is their job to protect and defend us, to ensure us of our security; they both failed. 

The real lesson here, of course, is that we are not living in a secure world.  Mankind has not yet evolved to the point that there can be peaceful coexistence.  And so it is that we must be constantly alert to the dangers that our enemies pose to us.  We must not arbitrarily dismiss warnings of impending attack.  In this day and age, we can no longer trust our neighbors, either.  They may be radical Muslims getting ready to do a dirty deed or they may be radical Americans getting ready to do the same dirty deed. 

September 11, 2001 may well be the new “day of infamy.”  Let’s not set ourselves up for another one. 

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9/11

NEVER FORGET