Happy Birthday, Dad.

[dbt]

You'd have been 96 today and I wish you were around for me to ask you what you think of the way your country has turned out.

Yeah, that would be the country that you nearly got killed on Saipan for. Lord, it was like pulling teeth to get you to talk about that! Your eyes were colder than I ever saw them when you told me that the Marines went in first and "just got chewed up." Then, it was the Army's turn--and there were only five of you in your outfit that didn't get mowed down. But the thing that has puzzled me ever since was that part where you said "the other fella" (meaning the Japanese soldier) "was there 'cause he didn't get to vote." Were you that wise, Old Man?

You were all about the voting, though. You'd sooner have taken a beating than not go to the polls on election day. Even in your long, sad decline you'd insist that Mom roll you out to the truck and drive you to the town hall when it was time to vote.

Now it's necessary to tell you that I'm glad you didn't live to see what happened to voting in the supposed election of 2000. You'd have had a hell of a time believing that the Supreme Court got to elect the president, but that's just what happened. And they picked about a sorry bastard for the job!

On the day you'd have turned 88, he sat on his ass while hijackers crashed jet airplanes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon to boot. Three thousand people were killed and Manhattan looked like Saipan. Yes, I'm saying the President of the United States was either too clueless to stop this (after he was warned about if from multiple sources) or just didn't care what happened. He ran like a rabbit all day long and didn't have word one to say to this country until way late that night.

I won't go on with the rest of what has taken place since that birthday, except to say we're in the exact sort of mess that you always said happened when Republicans got in the White House--about a hundred times over.

The only little bit of good news I have is that I can begin to think about you again when September 11 comes around, instead of being eaten up with hatred for the people who let this crap happen the the country you fought for.

One more thing that I think would interest you greatly: a Black man was elected President back in November. And the Supreme Court didn't do it this time.

Thanks, Pop. You were the best!

:loveya:

[lamp_shade]

1. So beautiful.

[dbt]

2. Yes he was.

Thank you!

dbt