Hostilities Exist

A few days ago, on December 7th, "a date which will live in infamy," very many of my friends posted patriotic salutes to the men, women and children who lost their lives or were injured in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, my great uncle included. He was stationed in the radio shack of the Naval base and lost his hearing in the raid.

After leaving the hospital, he returned to his hometown of Chicago and lived for many years with his blind wife and her sisters in an apartment on the city's north side. Some of my fondest childhood memories were when he would show up at our house early Sunday mornings a couple of times a month. He had a direct line to the freshest smoked fish in the city. He would carry in a big box of plump, juicy, delicious smoked chubs and a bag full of bagels.

We kids learned early-on how to peel away the succulent meat, leaving only the heads, bones, and tails of the fish just like in the cartoons.

But I digress.

I pointed out that although the "sneak" attack was a tragedy, if Japan had not attacked when it did, it would have delayed the United States from entering WWII, possibly allowing Nazi Germany to develop the atomic bomb before we did.

I said further that if the Nazis had won the war we could be living in a state where our communications were monitored, our movements tracked, our civil liberties curtailed, where the police controlled the population with brutality and impunity, where the military-industrial corporate barons pulled the strings of politicians, and used the armed forces to exert its will around the globe.

Then I scratched my head and said, Wait a minute...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0PW1Jhuu2Q (FDR's speech to the nation)