I am listening to the Weather and Traffic radio station from Washington, though I am a long ways away form the nation’s capital. Isn’t the internet wonderful?
I am on the road for this Holiday, and it was a good decision. There is not reason as compelling as seeing a grandchild, and besides, there were some odd vibrations in Washington as I headed out. The Navy Yard was locked down due to reports of an active shooter early in the morning, and all the Agencies responsible for our collective safety were nervously covering their butts by saying that while there wasn’t anything specific to which they could draw our attention, it was entirely possible that something bad could happen to somebody out there.
And happy Fourth to them as well.
A friend of mine is singing in the Capitol Fourth concert later this afternoon, the one on the National Mall with some interesting acts and patriotic themes. I told him I was staying away from crowds this holiday, and that might well be my watchword for the duration of this curious struggle with the militants who think nothing of executing dozens of children and women for alleged crimes against their faith.
One of the first things the young Republic had to do was establish a Navy in order to convince the Bey of Algiers to stop capturing American merchant sailors and enslaving them. Doesn’t appear to have changed much, except that our Department of the Navy now has so few ships that they are considering embarking the US Marines of the warships of other nations. I am completely bemused by it all.
There doesn’t appear to be a great deal anyone can do about until late next year, so I am going to try to relax, avoid crowds, and keep my powder dry.
I am also going to fly Old Glory from all the flagpoles I own. Flags have been much in the news of late, and a strong push to eliminate some of the more inconvenient facts about our past. Long before the outrage in Charleston was perpetrated, I wrote about the end of the War Between the States at Appomattox. I mentioned that Robert E. Lee did the right thing in surrendering, and not sending the remnants of his Army of Northern Virginia into the hills to continue a guerrilla war against the Federal Government. I further suggested that Sam Grant did the right thing in being generous in his terms, and allowing the vanquished Rebels to depart the field.
I was surprised that this relatively uncontroversial opinion was a lightning rod for a very angry young man. I assume it is a young man, anyway. He used a picture of famed French crooner Maurice Chevalier as his icon. I am not particularly good with social media, and mostly use Facebook and Twitter to notify the two or three people who actually follow my line of patter that there is a new installment of my continuing delusions posted on the web.
This one let me know that the assault on the past has been a crafted narrative, resting on the shelf, ready to be launched as soon as something awful happened. As you can see, this exchange was in April, long before the abomination in South Carolina.
I didn’t get anything back after that, so perhaps he actually was in his mother’s basement. But it gave me a sense of what was coming the first time an event came up that would galvanize the nation in horror. We have those sorts of events with a sad regularity. Much less likely to actually affect anyone in particular than a lightning strike, just like terrorism, but as Rahm Emanuel used to say, “Never let a crisis go to waste.”
I enjoy our history, which includes the most monstrous mistake this nation ever made, and some truly ugly things that went along with it. But I also figure that if we do not remember all of it, good and bad, it might just happen again.
In any event, this is a day I remember the courage of those who took on the greatest empire in history, and came through it by the skin of their teeth. I honor the social compact they devised between citizen and government, and remember that our rights do not come from some bureaucrat in Washington, but from Divine Prividence.
And I think I am going to raise a glass or two and leave it at that. I hope your 4th of July is as happy as it can be. I will watch a Capital 4th from the safety and comfort of a couch. And for the record, I imagine FilmCriticOne is urging the burning of Gone With the Wind, which was about the burning of Atlanta.
Copyright 2015 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twiiter: @notFilmCriticOne