Come, November, Come

                           Come, November, Come

               Published in Marietta (GA) Journal, 1/5/20

             America’s populist revolution is both similar and dissimilar to those in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, and Canada.  Similar because, whether in the small countries of Europe or in a vast continental nation like America, localism runs deep in the hearts of those who want to be free and un-tethered to distant rule. 

            They are dissimilar in that in the countries named above, secession is the issue.  Scotland wishes to disunite from the U.K.  Catalonia prefers to separate from Spain.  Venice still rejects Italy as her Fatherland, and Quebec, Canada’s French-speaking province, is perennially chanting independence. 

In America, the issue is not secession, or not yet.  Here the issue is the rise of work-based, faith-driven ordinary Americans who seek – let’s say it together one more time – limited government, secure borders, a free market economy, freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, and yes, an end to murderous abortion.  Americans who favor this agenda are called nationalists, racists, bigots, and worse.  These firefighters, masons, plumbers, carpenters, teachers, cops, bakers, tailors, electricians, small business owners, farmers and such are fed up with Al Gore pomposity, Bernie Sanders socialism, CNN smugness, academia’s shift from free speech to controlled speech, the Go to College mantra, and Republican hesitancy.

Those who view these fed-up “commoners” as ignoramuses, namely the old networks, MSNBC and CNN, know little to nothing about what the “commoners” know, or what they cherish or struggle with.  How many television commentators or national (or local) columnists know anything at all about Bill Gaither, NASCAR, Vidalia onions, crop rotation, job lay-offs, a monkey wrench, evangelicals, depleted checking accounts, cows, pick-up trucks, small town life, the Grand Ole Opry, or even Rotary?  What they do know about is Democrat schmoozing, flights from biological reality (choose your gender), and flights from D.C. or New York to L.A. and back.  Never have they heard “America singing,” as poet Walt Whitman put it.  They don’t even know what America sings.

Incidentally, do we ever see “commoners”/ordinary folks protesting in the streets?  Not much if at all.  They’re at work.  It’s college kids who protest, as well as Hollywood’s big names who have time and money on their hands, and college professors who probably egged the students on.  Now we can add a handful of high schoolers who of course know everything and who have been propelled to fame because they were interviewed after a high school shooting.  Everything changes, we’re told, so it’s time to let the pot command the potter.  How stunningly amiss can the country get?

And what does all of this have to do with November?  November, I believe, will show the increased power of the deplorables.  Unlike England’s Peasant Revolt of 1381 which didn’t end well for the peasants, America’s deplorables are stationed to fare better.  Tea Party organizations may have shut down, but their spirit is alive and well. The deplorables’ leader, President Trump, isn’t one to tinker with government (stitch this, tweak that, pour money here, start another bureaucracy there).  He likes the Hippocratic Oath: “Do no harm,” and honors Calvin Coolidge’s adage, “The business of America is business.”  Nothing that has been thrown at the President so far has stuck and the Left is still livid and embarrassed.  They sense they’ve become tiring.

As for those evangelicals, little did the national media or many local columnists know that there has always been a small evangelical left and Christianity Today magazine began tilting toward it over a decade ago.  What’s an evangelical Christian to do if one candidate opposes the murder of innocent, defenseless, unborn babies and the other candidate doesn’t?  Or if one candidate defends your cultural beliefs and economic interests and the other doesn’t?

The leftist media is telling evangelicals how hypocritical they are even though the media certainly knew about but disregarded the sexual behavior of Jefferson, Harding, FDR, JFK, LBJ, and Clinton, particularly JFK, their darling still.

And oh yes, Republican economic orthodoxy.  It too is what the middle class is rejecting.  Republican elites have subscribed to globalism as much as Democrats.  They got nervous hearing Trump’s “America First” slogan, but working folks said, “It’s about time!”  That’s why they hired a bull to enter the china shop.

As with the nations listed above, many American middle class voters feel ignored and disdained by their political leadership and left behind economically by globalization. Ironically,  Democrats are helping re-elect Trump. As Peggy Noonan wrote, “Crazy won’t beat Trump.”

November will come quickly. Working class voters will vote for nationalism and against socialism.  Old Adam Smith, Coolidge, and Reagan will be applauding from their graves.

Roger Hines

January 1, 2020

Ah, Christmas!

                                     Ah, Christmas!

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 12/22/19

            Christmas is a bundle of contradictions.  Peace on earth?  Where? Yet all around us and around the world there are many people in dire circumstances who truly do experience peace daily.  They are realists who are well aware of the condition of the world, yet they not only cope.  They thrive and are somehow able to keep the misfortunes of life from getting them down.  Many consider their misfortunes an opportunity to help bring to others the comfort and joy they themselves experience.

Superficially, Christmas is all about beauty and celebration.  Store managers and home dwellers can really do magical things with decorations.  But the draw that all of the superficiality produces is evidence that we all need and seek beauty and joy.   

Who but a Grinch could not find at least some kind of satisfaction in Christmas lights and the happy faces of children?  Who could seriously argue that the overall effect of Christmas is not positive?  Buried beneath the superficiality and commercialism, hope seems always to stir – hope that things will get better, that soured relationships will be restored, that more goodwill will prevail in the year ahead, and that darkness of all stripes will be dispelled.

 Christmas is big stuff.  In fact it’s lots of stuff, probably too much.  I’m persuaded that for those who are sad at Christmas, their sadness is not caused by seeing and envying others who are joyful, but by seeing and bemoaning the obvious void that all the stuff creates.  Trinkets, new clothes, money, and gift cards are all nice, but they typically have a short life span after which many are back in their slump.

That slump can be more easily dealt with if one considers how the Christmas story has affected three continents.  Ironically, the land where Christmas started is not primarily a Christian region.  Europe and the Americas are the lands that have cradled the Christian gospel and given it to the world, not just the babe in a manger account, but the schools, hospitals, and orphanages that have followed it.  Christmas when rightly understood and received has always changed hearts, sprouted legs, and sought out the needs of others.

Yes, Christmas is about a birth and how that birth affected the world.  One of our most popular Christmas carols contains the words, “Long lay the world in sin and error pining / ‘Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.”

Sin we understand.  It’s wrong to murder, to lie, to steal.  Error we sometimes miss.  It was error for ancient men of nobility to sincerely believe that certain people had no worth except to serve the nobility.  Perhaps the human soul began to feel its worth because of the humble origins of the One who claimed He was God come down.   It was error (and sin) for modern man to perpetuate the ancient world’s injustice and political tyranny, error to think that God indwelt idols, error to think that our five senses are the highest reality or to believe that matter and energy are the only realities.

Many psychiatrists have spoken of the loneliness experienced by so many at Christmas.  The good news is that, if the Christmas story is true, nobody is alone.  Christmas – Christmas beneath and beyond the superficialities – says that God put on an earth suit and dwelt among us.  The title Emmanuel means “God with us.”  We had better hope that the Christmas account is true.  The human race is in dire need of it.  We’re not controlling our selfishness too well.  We chase the wind.  We even let prosperity be our undoing.  We need an internal governor of sorts that sublimates our self-centeredness and shows us how to look out for our fellow man.  The Christmas message purports to do just that and has done it for millions.

Reviling the supernatural, an MDJ letter writer recently claimed that Thanksgiving was intended as a day to give thanks to “mothers and fathers, cooks and farmers, and kind relatives.” That’s not exactly what Lincoln and FDR had in mind.  Neither was such broad application what President Grant had in mind when in1870 he instituted Christmas Day as a holiday.  Grant rightly believed Christmas Day would help re-unite our torn nation.  It did help.

Those who will have an empty pantry or an empty chair at their table this year are just the ones that Christmas should drive our minds and legs to.  We still have a few days to seek such people out.  But if granted a New Year, we can ask along with Elvis, “Why can’t every day be like Christmas?”

To millions, every day is.  That’s the Ah! of Christmas.

Roger Hines

12/18/19

Thanksgiving to Whom?

                               Thanksgiving to Whom?

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal,11/24/19

            It’s a bit puzzling that the so-called Christmas wars have gone on for several years while Thanksgiving Day has caused little or no stir.  Actually the Christmas wars have abated since the election of President Trump, probably in part because just before his first Christmas in office he declared, “At the White House we will be saying ‘Merry Christmas’.” 

            Maybe I should pay another visit to Target and find out how they are handling Thanksgiving.  Like all retailers, they are certainly taking advantage of Thanksgiving’s commercial benefits.  Readers might remember that when the bathroom wars were front page I reported that, in order to get first hand information, I visited the local Target (in Acworth) and asked a cashier if I were allowed to use the ladies’ restroom.  As the cashier began to answer, three other nearby female employees, seemingly managerial, rushed toward me as though disturbed by my question.

            Repeating my question, I could only elicit what sounded like a scripted answer: “You may go into the restroom you identify with.”

            “So any man could go inside the ladies’ restroom while my wife was inside it?” I replied.

            “Men may go into the restroom they identify with,” the second of the three female employees repeated.  It would have been silly, though playful and satisfying, to point out that their corporate script had used a preposition to end a sentence with.

            Did I say that this happened in Acworth, Georgia down in the Bible Belt?  I believe I did.  Wonder where Target’s corporate headquarters are.  The way things have changed, they could well be in Cobb County and not far off in, say, the Republic of California, or some other such area where things are getting crazy.

            I suppose the reason many retail stores began requiring their employees to say “Happy Holidays” in the first place is that the word Christmas has Christ in it.  That would make “Merry Christmas” religious and we can’t have that.  Of course “Happy Hanukah” is religious too.  Doggone it, the word “holiday” is religious as well because etymologically it is an embedded form of “holy day.”  Can we not see where our ultra-sensitivities have led us?  Well, not everybody’s sensitivities, but the sensitivities of those who wish to perform a religious lobotomy on America.

            And what about Thanksgiving?  I hate to bring it up for fear of giving ideas to the ACLU, the American Atheists organization, (and probably Target), but has anyone thought about to whom our thankfulness is directed when the nation takes off work and observes Thanksgiving Day?  Have the corporate elites, the secular provocateurs, and the Acworth Target manager ever thought, “Oh no. Thanksgiving is a religious word.  We stock Thanksgiving holiday merchandise, but we’ve gotta be pluralistic.  We can’t offend anyone by saying Happy Thanksgiving.”

            Yes, the forces that deny our religious roots are many.  Consider the faith of Columbus who has been smeared by academia for the last two decades.  Remember who was on the Mayflower and why.  Recount the fervor of John Winthrop who declared the new land would be a “city upon a hill,” meaning a beacon of religious freedom, and Patrick Henry who really did prefer death to tyranny of all stripes, religious tyranny included.

            Consider the position of other founders.  Unlike many of my fellow conservatives, I don’t believe Jefferson was a Christian.  He was a theist, more precisely a deist, and along with Washington, Adams, Madison, and all of the other founders, Jefferson embraced the belief that “rights” (freedom) are derived from God, not from the state or any head of state.

            Surely this foundational Judeo-Christian belief, unlike that of Muslim states, is what led to the famous D-Day radio prayer of FDR in which he sought the help and blessings of God for America.  That ethic is also the root system of the expressions, “In God We Trust,” “One nation under God,” and “So help me God.”

            The secularists who don’t like these expressions or “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Thanksgiving” deny that their position is a religious one.  However, if secular humanism or atheism isn’t a religious position, i.e., a position on theology, what is? Secularists try to get a free ride, declaring their views to be “free of religion”; therefore, their views should prevail.  However, the prayers and expressions of Jews and Christians should be squelched, whether at Rotary, high school ballgames, or the White House.

            This Thanksgiving millions of Americans will be giving thanks.  The receiver of that thanks will be the God Who, incidentally, is the God to Whom all of our presidents have at least paid lip service.

            Happy Thanksgiving!

Roger Hines

11/20/19

           

The Dangers of Denying the Past

                        The Dangers of Denying the Past

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 10/17/19

            William Faulkner, the Mississippi Nobel and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, was good at one-liners.  Those one-liners, though, were buried in his endless sentences.  Faulkner wrote in  “stream of consciousness,” a technique in which the writer goes on and on with words, creating a natural flow of thought that more often than not slaughters the rules of grammar.  One has to like words to like Faulkner.

Consider the following one-liners.  “Ain’t nothing in the woods gonna hurt you unless you corner it.”  Faulkner should know.  His beloved Oxford in north Mississippi is woodsy and Faulkner knew those woods well.  He also knew about rural life: “A mule will work for you for ten years just for the pleasure of kicking you once.”  Believing that fiction “tells a lie in order to tell the truth,” Faulkner spent most of his literary life writing short stories and novels.

Most writers, they tell us, are not good speakers.  Writers spend too much time with their heads down, mulling words and trying to think up the next sentence.  Unlike the good speaker who is normally engaging and gregarious, the writer is ponderous and arguably actually thinks too much.  Faulkner was in the latter group, but he did make quite a few quotable statements while sitting on the nail kegs in the hardware or general stores of Oxford, talking weather and politics with the locals and the farmers who had come to town to “stock up.”  

Consider this sentence from Faulkner: “The past is not over yet.” Anyone reading (or trying to read) Faulkner’s novels will catch right away his love for and knowledge of the past.  With an eye for the future, Faulkner understood Shakespeare’s line, “The past is prologue.”

But just how strongly do we believe that today?  Why do so many people dislike history?  Why to so many is history a school subject and little more?  Why have we succumbed to what Cicero called “the tyranny of the present”?

These questions are easy to answer.  Let’s approach them backwards, answering them partially with other questions.  We allow the present to tyrannize us because so many of us know nothing else.  We live in the now with little thought of who we are and where we came from.  How far back can the typical 21-year-old “see”?  How much does he or she care to see or know?

As for history being considered a school subject and little else, surely that’s because very little history, if any – immediate history: your grandmother and grandfather and where they came from, child! – is passed on in the home.  Can anyone say “fatherless homes” or “ineffective parenting” or “family meal times”?

But times have changed, many will argue. Homes have changed.  Marriage has changed. So has gender.  History doesn’t matter very much for Digital Man.  Evolution is a sociological as well as a biological reality.  We live under a different paradigm.  Yes, we most certainly do.  And that paradigm hasn’t exactly produced wondrous things.

Beyond ignoring history we are attempting to destroy it.  We dismiss the history we don’t like and topple monuments that remind us of it.  We tailor history books to satisfy the sensibilities of modern day, safety-conscious students.  Universities apologize to students for having invited Jeff Sessions to speak!

Our chief denial is that of who we are as a nation.  As unpopular as the word “nation” has become, I shall still argue that America is a nation and that our nation is decidedly Greek.  Like the Greeks whose art began to depict life and freedom rather than death and tyranny, we are a nation of no single ethnicity.  Like the Greeks we tasted freedom and democracy and liked the taste.  Like them we learned too slowly, but learned still, the value of the individual, no matter his or her race or ancestry.  Americans, of course, are perpetuating Greece’s love of athletics.

Most importantly, like the Greeks we know the difference between the nation and the state.  The nation is the people; the state is the nation’s government.  As out of favor as is the word “nationalism,” Greece was the cradle of nationalism.  We err dangerously to lean toward globalism, believing that all ideas are equal and that the world can be one happy family.

Growing up, I lived down the road from Faulkner – about 195 miles – and studied him diligently. He once wrote, “I observed that my own little postage stamp of native soil was worth writing about.”  On that postage stamp Faulkner showed that he knew history and knew its value.”

Would that we all would.

Roger Hines

11/14/19

Time to Curb the Cussin’

                               Time to Curb the Cussin’

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal,11/10/19

            It’s past time for people in the media, Congress, and the White House to check their tongues.  Filthy language has become widespread and ordinary folks who oppose it need to start saying so.

            Particularly, the filthy-mouthed ones seem to be stuck on “damn” and “Who the Hell.”  Guests on the news talk shows are the chief culprits, along with Judge Jeanine Pirro and President Trump.  I hate to report that the ones whose language is worst are those with whom I agree most on politics and policy. This past week I stopped counting Judge Jeanine’s “damns” and “Who the Hells.”  Talk about gratuitous.  A beautiful and smart woman, the Judge, sadly, is obviously on the bad language air waves bandwagon.

 I’m glad that conservatives don’t take their bad language to the streets in protest as the progressive groups do (Antifa, # MeToo, Planned Parenthood, and others). Conservatives don’t protest in streets too much, probably because they’re at work.  But on television a good-sized bunch of conservatives have forgotten what their mamas taught them. Before I forget, let’s place Senator Lindsey Graham in that group as well.

            Don’t tell me this is a trivial matter.  Most of us have children and grandchildren to think about.  But forget children and grandchildren for a moment.  Adults don’t need to hear bad language either.  Anyone who chuckles at such a thought (or who considers my musings here squeamish or “puritanical”) understands little if anything about the power of language, and its lingering quality.

            Language is the dress of our thoughts.  Words are the vehicles upon which our thoughts ride.  Those who use filthy language are spilling a portion of their character, revealing a dark side.  Anything that comes out of us was in us. This is not to say that filthy talking folks are all bad.  You can talk ugly and still have a heart as big as Texas, or talk ugly and be selfless.  But you can’t talk ugly without painting pictures that diminish beauty, grace, and civility.

            A picture is worth a thousand words, we’re told.  No doubt, but a word is also worth a thousand pictures.  Ugly words make ugly pictures which instantly distract a listener or reader from what is being communicated.

            Any way you cut it, “damn” is simply ugly and sad.  “Hell,” whether a literal or a figurative place (I’m camping on literal, partly because I don’t believe my precious, believing mother can share the same eternity as Adolf Hitler) conjures the worst that can be conjured.  Its casual use trivializes its seriousness.  And back to children, who wants their children to be using the word loosely?  As with drinking, so with cussin’.  If we don’t want our kids to do it, we had better not do it ourselves.

            Words can exalt and they can debase.  I wish that some of the President’s evangelical Christian supporters who have his ear would tell him that his bad language needs to cease.  Can’t the vice-President do this?  Maybe Pastor Robert Jeffress should, or Rev. Jerry Falwell, Jr. or Sen. David Purdue, or somebody!  Maybe somebody has tried. 

            Evangelical Christians are faulted for supporting President Trump, given his ugly language.  Those who do so are pushing a spurious argument.  Here’s why.  Our children and teens are far less influenced by the President than they are by pop culture.  How many children and teens watch his rallies where he really cuts loose?  Probably not many.  But they do watch movies, videos, potty-mouth comedians, and who knows what on their cell phones. Let’s not fault the President while giving our crude culture a pass.

            The first president I ever voted for at age 20 was Barry Goldwater who cursed profusely in front of cameras.  LBJ, who defeated Goldwater soundly, cursed even more.  Richard Nixon showed us his soul on the Watergate tapes, but that wouldn’t have led me to vote for George McGovern.  My father’s favorite president (after FDR) was Mr. Salty Tongue himself, Harry Truman, but my father would not have voted Republican so Salty Tongue it was. I could not have voted for Hillary Clinton, nor could I ever support any of the socialists, one of whom will be President Trump’s opponent in 2020.  Sometimes we have to make decisions.

            Sometimes our choices don’t offer us the more excellent way in every area of life.  President Trump has ignited good, hardworking, common sense Americans like never before. Thankfully he’s putting pompous elitism and arid intellectualism in their place.  I just wish he would take advantage of the fact that English has more synonyms than any other language known to man.

Roger Hines

11/6/19

             

A Typical Day at Positive High, 1966-2003

                  A Typical Day at Positive High, 1966-2003

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 11/3/19

            8:20 AM. OK, let’s take our seats. / May I run to my locker? / No, ma’m, it’s time for the announcements. / But I don’t have my book. / Then you best get in the habit of bringing it, especially since there are only three weeks left in the semester. (Goodhearted laughter from the class; moans from the young lady.)

            From the public address system: Please stand for the pledge to the flag. “I pledge allegiance to the flag … with liberty and justice for all.” Thank you. The French Club will meet today after school in Mrs. Boudet’s room. Pictures for rising senior class officers will be made Friday in front of the trophy case.  Officers, please wear a goofy hat. Pictures for next year’s yearbook staff will be made Friday during first period. Decide in advance which picture packet plan you will purchase.

            Still from the PA system: Now a word from the Math Team cheerleaders. “We are the Math Team, rah, rah, rah. / We love calculus, ha, ha, ha.  / Logarithms, logarithms, yo, yo, yo. / We are the Math Team, go Math, go!”

Whispers back in the classroom: “THAT was stupid.” / “Yeah, the next time they do that in assembly, I ain’t going!”

From the PA system: Now Mrs. Horton has an announcement. “Students, the faculty wants to tell you how special you are. Positive High School has collected over 500 cans of food for the needy. We thank the Key Club for spearheading this. They are the greatest.  Now a word from our Key Club officers. First voice: “I can.” Second voice: “You can.” Third voice: “We all can bring cans.” All voices: “Yes, we can!”

Whispers in the classroom: “Now that was REAL stupid.” / “Yeah, I’ve got ‘ole Lady Horton for government. That woman’s CRAZY!” 

From the PA system: Here’s our principal, Mr. Wordsmith. “Students, as we close out the year at Positive High, I want to tell you what a grand bunch you are. I want to congratulate Coach Smiley and the Kittens for their baseball victory last Friday.”

“But on to something negative here at Positive High. Many of you know that 3 young men broke into the library Saturday night and turned over all the book shelves. I hasten to remind you they were all freshmen.  Freshmen need a little time to learn the rules, and I know all of you believe in forgiveness. Teachers who have these young men in your classes, please send their work to the In-School Suspension Teacher. I know you’ll be willing to give them all the time they need to complete their work.”

“Vandalism is serious and sad, and any students who need to talk about it may come to the library conference room during first period to discuss how you feel.  Everyone have a good day.”

8:45 AM. Back in the classroom: “OK, Tennyson’s Ulysses! I believe that last Friday we … / Mr. Hines, I hate to interrupt but are you going to let us go to the library to talk about the vandalism? / Look, Tennyson’s not the easiest author in the book. The test on Tennyson is Thursday. / Yes sir, I know, but Mr. Wordsmith said … / Mr. Wordsmith would understand why I’m asking you to do your therapy session some other time. Did you know any of the freshmen who trashed the library? / No sir, but I’d still like to talk to someone. / Would it help if you asked your questions here? Maybe I or someone in the class could answer them. / I don’t have specific questions, but Mr. Wordsmith indicated that …”

(Rinnnnnnnnnng!) Well, we’ll get to Tennyson tomorrow.  Look back over Ulysses tonight. You’re dismissed.

9:25 AM (Teacher’s Journal): Dear Lord Tennyson, You’ve so much wisdom to give us. Forgive us for displacing learning for therapy when your writings are therapeutic enough. Don’t blame the young man who stole your time. He was only accepting what the school offered him.

Dear Parents, Are you aware of the triumph of the therapeutic or do you favor the enabling culture our schools are becoming?

Dear Students, If I’m going to help you, you must ironically resist many distractions the school throws at you.  Please don’t believe that 14-year-old vandals are necessarily sick. They probably have flawed character and derelict parents.

Dear Reader, Do you see why colleges are now filled with students who clamor for “safe space” and who weep upon hearing things with which they disagree? It didn’t start at college. And not totally at high school. Guess where else.

Roger Hines

10/30/19

Paul, Pete, and the Kurds

                                Paul, Pete, and the Kurds

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 10/27/19

There’s little doubt that two of my older brothers, Paul and Pete, joined the army to escape the cotton field.  Not that they were lazy or averse to hard work.  They weren’t.  It’s just that they both had been in the cotton fields since they were twelve.  They weren’t the only Southern boys who took refuge in the military.

            Interestingly – and fortunately – both of them enjoyed the military life.  Not the horrors of battle, but seeing the world after World War II ended.  Paul had served in Italy; Pete wound up in Belgium, specifically at the Battle of the Bulge.  Both made a career of the military.

            Like my father, Paul and Pete were avid readers. They never saw a newspaper or magazine they wouldn’t absorb.  By the time I was 15, Paul and Pete were 40 and 38; my father, 65.  At our house a 15-year-old would not inject himself too much into an adult conversation, but he would ask questions, listen, and learn.

            Learn I did.  Because of the intense labor these brothers and their father shared and endured in the fields, they developed what must be called a brotherhood.  By the time I was old enough to work, my father had downsized from fields to “patches,” much smaller areas of crops rather than vast, endless acres.  Many times he reminded me that I didn’t have as rough a life as Paul and Pete.

            After retiring from the military Paul landed in Alabama, Pete in Texas.  The most stimulating times of my youth were when they managed to come home at the same time, thus enabling me to eaves-drop as they and my father discussed their days in` the big fields, the war, Churchill, Truman and McArthur, Eisenhower, and the new young President Kennedy.

            I’m 17.  Paul and Pete are at our house. Paul, the biggest talker, always speaks first. “We proved what the United States has.  There’s not an army anywhere that can whip the United States.”

            “Be careful, now,” my father retorts. “I wouldn’t say that.  You never know.”  Pete, a quiet man who didn’t like to talk about the war experience, adds, “All I know is I must have shot and killed more boys my age than I could count.”

            That comment quelled the topic of superiority and turned the conversation to another topic in which we are engulfed today, that of the role of our military.  A few months earlier in his farewell address in January of 1961 President Eisenhower had warned, “We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought by the military/industrial complex.”

            The beloved “Ike,” a WWII hero, went further.  After introducing the expression “military/industrial complex” to America’s political lexicon he added, “Great and sustained spending for defense and war creates power groups that could disastrously harm the nation’s future.”

            Power groups?  Created by war?  Yes. War is profitable for many and always has been.  But why have so many politicians in America encouraged war?  Was novelist Taylor Caldwell right in claiming that wars are always promoted by rich industrialists and their political friends?  With Korea, the Cold War, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syrian “conflicts,” the U.S. has been in a permanent state of undeclared war since the last declared one ended.  But dead is dead and most of the deaths in the undeclared wars have not been the sons of the industrialists or politicians, but the Pauls and Petes of America’s heartland.

            Long before Eisenhower’s warning about the “military/industrial complex,” James Madison stated, “No nation can maintain its freedom in the midst of continuous war.”  Was the esteemed Founder foreshadowing an unofficial alliance between the nation’s military and the defense industry that supplies it?  Did he foresee a powerful vested interest, a relationship between the government (politicians) and defense corporations?  I don’t know, but the question is not far-fetched.

            President Trump, as he promised while campaigning, is pulling back from America’s role as policeman of the world.  The brave Kurds, who will be most immediately affected, were not an issue when Paul and Pete were alive, but the role of the U.S. military was.  And believe it or not, when Paul, Pete, and my father’s conversation turned to Eisenhower’s farewell address, Paul the military hawk (Pete was almost a dove), agreed with Eisenhower.

            Perhaps he, like Eisenhower, knew what war was like and believed that you should fight a war to win or come home.  Declared wars typically end.  “Conflicts” don’t.  Have we noticed?  And there are indeed profiteers of war.  Have we noticed that?

Roger Hines

10/23/19