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Msg. 55428 of 65535 |
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Gas!
Most everyone who follows current events has seen the images coming out of Syria of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of individuals who have just been gassed by, we suppose, the criminal leader of that nation--Assad. We see the film of small children helpless as they are washed off by those trying to do something in a horrible situation for those that they love. The situation in Syria has been horrible for those caught in the middle for a very long time now and we feel that president Obama can no longer stand by and watch as scenes like this gassing continue to pour in. Richard Haas, a foreign policy and moral expert has noted that if we do not do something we are simply giving the signal to others with access to these weapons that it is alright to use them when their turn in the box comes as change and supposed progress sweeps the world. There are a host of bad actors around the world who probably have some form of weapons of mass destruction such as gas stocked up in the anticipation that they might need them to protect their turf from their own rebellious people some day. Saddam gassed the Kurds in the last century in his attempts to keep power and the world condemned that action and it was a part of the case made against him after his apprehension that led to his execution by the new government in Iraq some years later. Most leaders of repressive states have not used these weapons out of fear that the United States and others might retaliate with our robust military, but, there are those such as Assad with the backing of his Iranian brothers and the nodding consent of the regime in Russian who continue to feel the need to spread terror with what these weapons can do. And, perhaps it is an American experience that Americans need to look back on that might persuade us that it is time to act in some meaningful way in Syria. Perhaps it was because of his service during the first world war that Adolf Hitler did not employee gas in any meaningful way during the second world war. Hitler did many horrible things but gassing people, as far as we know, was not one of them if you do not count the gassings that he did to the Jews and others in the concentration camps. He did not use gas on the battlefield, perhaps, such was the experience that so many had during the first world war. It is interesting that we have met several people across our span of life who were gassed during the first world war and my great uncle was one of them. We can recall him sitting around our parents dining room table during some of his visits to our home when he would occasionally mention that he had suffered the residual affects of a gas attack that he had been involved in during the war to end all wars. He was, even though he lived into his eighties, always short of breath over what had been done to him and his fellows during the event that cut his time in the military short. Although soldiers typically do not like to discuss what they have seen in war, my uncle would always look at me when he talked about the gas as if he were passing something on to the next generation that they so desperately needed to hear. He spoke of the chocking feeling and the gasping for air that suddenly came upon all of them when this silent killer and crippler that was the mustard gas of that time engulfed their position as they slept. He spoke of the blisters on his skin from what had happened and the time that he spent in a hospital trying to recuperate from what had befallen him. My mother kept a small souvenir beer stein in our home that he had purchased in Paris, France during this period of time and every time that I saw it I was reminded of what he had suffered through. We met others who had similar experiences to share but most all of them would simply make a statement that “I was gassed!” It was always enough for me and nothing else need be said. It is hard to believe after the experiences of the second world war and Korea and Vietnam that things like this were done to American soldiers almost a century ago but they were none the less. It is hard to believe that we, as a nation, are revisiting things like voting rights suppression here in the beginning of this new century but we are. It is as if all things old are new again and if we do not summon the collective will as a nation to begin to deal with some of them and reclaim the moral high ground that we used to stand on as a nation and a people we are going to reenter another great dark age that we may never reemerge from in ours and several lifetimes beyond our own. There are those who lie buried in graveyards across this nation and across this world who have paid very high prices for the freedoms and the still abundant opportunities that we have. If we care to think about them and their collective experiences, they form a basis for taking actions that those now gone would have taken if only they were still here to do so. The greatest generation is nearing the end of its run and all of the things that they did and that they sponsored and that they fought for are ours for the taking but we must be willing to pay a price to make those things ours because there are those out there and among us who do not believe as we do and are very determined to have a world that even predates the gassings that my uncle and so many others faced. Those from world war one are now all gone and we do not need to lose the benefits that we gained from all that they experienced to help secure them for us or we will face atrocities right here in this nation that we will not be able to comprehend not all that far down the coming road. Lynching’s and the following and murder of young men who are entirely innocent are in our future if we do not seize the present while we have the opportunity to do so. And, like those in Germany who watched the ashes fall from the ovens of the camps, we will have no excuses when our time comes for atonement. Absolutely no excuse at all.
To say that "God exists" is the greatest understatement ever made across space and time. |
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