Memorial Day

-
On Memorial Day, the nation does well both to remember those who have died fighting the nation's wars and the importance of the citizen-warrior for preserving democracy.

Perhaps the greatest threat the nation faces is internal rather than external. In a New York Times commentary, retired U.S. Army Lt. General Karl Eikenberry and Stanford history professor emeritus David M. Kennedy expressed concern about the gap developing between Americans and their military(Americans and Their Military, Drifting Apart, May 26, 2013). They identified three components of the gap:
  1. The post-Vietnam War decision to replace the citizen-soldier Army with an all-volunteer force substantially diminished the tie between citizens and the military. Only 0.5% of the population now serves in the military, compared with 12% during WWII. Conversely, many military families view the military as the "family business," perhaps signaling the emergence of a military caste, something that history suggests will end poorly.
  2. Technology helps to insulate civilians from the military by reducing military manpower and fiscal requirements. Illustratively, technologies such as remotely piloted drones accelerate isolating civilians from the military and its activities.
  3. Expansion of the military's role from warfighting to nation building further blurs distinctions about the military's proper role.
Eikenberry and Kennedy propose restoring a draft, conducted by lottery, to meet military manpower requirements, Congress taking back from the President its Constitutionally mandated war making powers, paying for wars with taxes instead of off-budget special appropriations, and decreased reliance on contractors. All of these are good changes, ones that will reduce militarism and help to preserve, if not strengthen, democracy.

My fellow Bowdoin College graduate, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (a few years ahead of me, I hasten to add!), wrote the following poem, the first well known poem for Memorial Day (or Decoration Day, as the holiday was known in the Civil War era), which The Atlantic published in June 1882:

Decoration Day

Sleep, comrades, sleep and rest
On this Field of the Grounded Arms,
Where foes no more molest,
Nor sentry's shot alarms!

Ye have slept on the ground before,
And started to your feet
At the cannon's sudden roar,
Or the drum's redoubling beat.

But in this camp of Death
No sound your slumber breaks;
Here is no fevered breath,
No wound that bleeds and aches.

All is repose and peace,
Untrampled lies the sod;
The shouts of battle cease,
It is the Truce of God!

Rest, comrades, rest and sleep!
The thoughts of men shall be
As sentinels to keep
Your rest from danger free.

Your silent tents of green
We deck with fragrant flowers
Yours has the suffering been,

The memory shall be ours.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Jesus, Lamb of God

-
The image of Jesus as the Lamb of God pervades Christianity. The lamb is a familiar symbol for Jesus, found not only in today's gospel[1] but also throughout the New Testament as well as in art and literature. The image of Jesus as the Lamb of God reinterprets the Jewish Passover narrative, which describes the angel of death in Egypt passing over Israelite houses marked with the blood of a lamb, killing only the Egyptian first born. Thus, we have the Agnus Dei, “O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy upon us,”[2] a part of Christian liturgies since the early fourth century.[3]

Biblical images and metaphors are often complex and confusing. For example, Biblical authors describe Christians as God's sheep, although they sometimes refer to Jews as sheep, even in the New Testament.[4] New Testament authors similarly describe Jesus as both the Lamb of God and the shepherd, two conflicting images actually found in a single verse in the Revelation of John.[5]…
Read more

Mass murder in Orlando

-
The recent mass murder at a gay nightclub in Orlando has prompted four musings. First, the shooters in both the Orlando and the San Bernardino attacks apparently fully complied with Federal firearms laws when the attackers purchased the weapons used in those attacks. This is not an argument against background checks and other requirements. Instead, this observation points to the inadequacy of present laws to keep people safe. Second, the shooter in Orlando, like the shooters in San Bernardino, appears to have had no links to any terror group, domestic or foreign. As I have previously argued in Ethical Musings, considering all mass murder as terrorism unhelpfully conflates two different types of crime. Tightening immigration policies would not have prevented the Orlando attack. Third, the ultimate path to a safer society consists of promoting respect for the dignity and worth of all persons. Laws that encourage divisiveness (e.g., laws in North Carolina about who can use which public …
Read more

Why won't Trump release his tax returns?

-
President Trump’s refusal to make his tax returns public is intriguing and troubling. The IRS routinely audits Presidential and Congressional tax returns. Yet former Presidents and most members of Congress have made their tax returns public. Possible explanations for Trump’s refusal include: His tax returns may reveal that he is not as wealthy as he would like for people to believe. Many real estate investments are heavily leveraged (i.e., mortgaged), so perhaps his substantial real estate holdings represent a relatively small net worth totaling in the hundreds of millions instead of billions.His tax returns may reveal that he derives a disproportionate share of his income from licensing his name instead of the successful real estate deals about which he boasts.His tax returns may reveal aggressive interpretations of the tax code that trigger repeated audits that are not always resolved in his favor.
If Trump’s tax returns would enhance his public image by showing that he possesses gr…
Read more