Posted on 09/11/2012 9:54:25 AM PDT by joanie-f
Obama Versus Ryan (Not Paul, but Saving Private)
My husband and I watched 'Saving Private Ryan' on DVD again last night. Of course we had seen it before.
When we first saw the movie on the big screen back in 1998, it goes without saying that we were moved and deeply touched by the portrayal of what has been called America's 'greatest generation.' What American wouldn't be? Yet last night's viewing was entirely different for us. I am not generally a tearful person, but I was brought to tears more than once during the watching. And my husband had a serious lump in his throat more than once as well. Both of those reactions were absent while sitting together in the theater when we were more than a decade younger than we are today.
After the credits rolled, we attempted to understand why we were so much more deeply affected this time than we were during the previous viewing. Is it because we are fourteen years older and somehow more sensitive? Is it because we were watching the movie in the quiet of our own living room? Is it because the portrayal of that particular portion of our American history is somehow now more personal and meaningful to us than it was more than a decade ago?
The answer, we determined, is none of the above.
The answer is twofold. It lies in (1) our knowledge of the proud and noble history of our country, and (2) our understanding of the degradation of America's leadership since we sat in that theater more than a decade ago. On a campaign stint in early 2008, the soon-to-be first lady of the United States declared that 'for the first time in her adult life' she is now proud of her country.
On a trip to France in early 2009, at the beginning of his presidency, Barack Obama declared that America has 'failed to appreciate Europe's leading role in the world' and has 'shown arrogance and been dismissive, even derisive' towards its European allies.
The same France from which Barack Obama spoke those words provides the location of the entire story of 'Saving Private Ryan', the basic plot of which is fiction, but much of the actual footage is not. There is genuine footage of our men landing at Omaha Beach, and genuine footage of some of the land battle as well. Many actual veterans of that campaign were reportedly brought to tears when they saw and heard some of the scenes within the movie, simply because of the realism it portrayed of a portion of their lives that they would prefer to forget. Many World War II veterans are hesitant to voice any memories of the part they played in the war. They simply want to get on with their lives and secure those memories, for as long as they remain living, in a voiceless, yet painfully sacred, corner of their minds.
In the movie, after the D-Day invasion, an army captain leads his squad on a mission to find and bring home Private James Francis Ryan after the death in action of his three brothers. The mission takes them through Nazi occupied territory to make contact with Ryan's unit, an element of the 101st Airborne Division. Once found, Ryan refuses to leave, and the captain in charge of the operation responds, 'Is that what they're supposed to tell your mother when they send her another folded American flag?' To which Ryan responds:
'Tell her that when you found me I was here and I was with the only brothers I have left. And that there was no way I was going to desert them.'
Such was the make-up of most Americans serving during World War II -- a sense of duty that declared 'self' secondary, and God, country and family of primary importance -- with universal, human, God-given liberty always an understood and indispensable factor in the overall equation.
The two statements made by the first lady and the president -- 'first time in my adult life I am proud of America' and America has 'shown arrogance and been dismissive toward its allies' -- were not slips of the tongue. They were not aberrational statements of opinion from the leader of the free world and his spouse. The anti-American sentiment expressed in their words are borne out everyday in their actions which are seeking (and, sadly, succeeding) in bringing the real America to her knees, and replacing it with a socialist utopia where a ruling elite reigns supreme.
The consistency of his words and actions since that trip to France in 2009 indicates that the leader of the free world has either little or no understanding of American heritage and history, or unbridled contempt for it, presumably because it does not combine well with his elitist-rule vision of the future of America. Neither condition renders him qualified to serve as Commander in Chief or to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns.
Obama spoke his derisive words about America and her relationship with our 'allies' fewer than five hundred miles from Normandy, where, sixty-eight years ago, on both Omaha and Utah Beaches, close to seven thousand 'arrogant' Americans willingly offered themselves up as casualties of war.
Two of our current president's most trailblazing accomplishments have been (1) abandoning the time-honored tradition of respecting the legacy of his predecessors and (2) consistently showing irreverence for those duty-bound, courageous patriots who sacrificed -- sometimes with their lives -- to create the most moral and prosperous nation in the history of mankind, and to stand in the crosshairs of tyrants when the liberties of others were threatened.
Years ago I came upon a picture of a section of the Meuse-Argonne American cemetery in France. The cemetery covers more than 130 acres, and beneath each of those little white specks/crosses in the photo lies the body of an 'arrogant' American -- husbands, fathers, sweethearts, sons, brothers who left home and loved ones to travel to foreign soil in the name of freedom. More than fourteen thousand American World War I dead are buried at Meuse-Argonne. I looked intently at the picture and thought about that. I focused on those little white specks -- each one of which represents an 'arrogant, dismissive' American to Barack Obama.
France is home to eleven large American military cemeteries. Meuse-Argonne is only one of them. There are also hundreds of thousands of American bodies lying beneath headstones at Arlington National Cemetery, Gettysburg, Vicksburg, Flanders Field, Ardennes, Normandy, Florence, Lorraine, Aisne Marne -- in cemeteries throughout Europe (the allies that we 'dismiss' and treat with 'derision') and in countless unmarked graves in unknown places. All of those bodies embraced the vision of freedom, law and justice that defines the real America -- a vision that they wanted the rest of the world to have the freedom to choose as well.
The current American president spent more than twenty years sitting in a pew listening to sermons delivered by a man who believes that God should 'damn America'. He spent his youth being mentored by men who revile individual liberty and worship the theories of global governance and subjugation of the masses. He has appointed apostles of that creed to most of the major positions in his administration, and his policies have sought to destroy the kind of freedom that hundreds of thousands of Americans fought and died to defend. The men lying beneath those tiny white specks at Meuse-Argonne, and all over Europe, are being declared irrelevant by none other than the president of the country for which they died.
Remember our heroes, in spite of your president's agenda-driven desire that you forget them. They are watching us now from afar, quietly but insistently reminding us of the source and precious value of our liberties, and challenging us to hold those hard-won liberties dear, standing firm against all who would remove them from our grasp.
Remember them, both those who have left us and those who are now serving on battlefields far from home, facing the prospect of death with each new dawn. And when you cast your ballot on November 6th, see to it that you are voting for two men who share your reverence for those who have gone before, those who have sacrificed, sometimes beyond our ability to comprehend, to preserve the vision of their Founding Fathers.
One small nit to pick ... the basic plot of which is fiction ... You probably are aware of this ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niland_brothers
The Niland brothers were four American brothers from Tonawanda, New York, serving in the military during World War II. Of the four, two survived the war, but for a time it was believed that only one, Frederick "Fritz" Niland, had survived. After the reported deaths of his three brothers, Fritz was sent back to the United States to complete his service and only later learned that his brother Edward, missing and presumed dead, was actually captive in a Japanese POW camp in Burma. Steven Spielberg's film "Saving Private Ryan" is loosely based on the brothers' story. ...
Back around 1986 we took our Boy Scout troop for a weekend trip to Charleston, SC, and lodged on board the U.S.S. Yorktown at Patriots' Point. I was 31 and freely admit I just didn't know enough about WWII history (that has certainly changed since). That trip shook me to my core. Upon learning the average age of the sailors serving on board the Yorktown during WWII was 19, all I had to do was look around at my troop of 11-16 year-olds and their beaming faces. The story of the fate of VT-8 onboard the U.S.S. Hornet at Midway was well presented onboard the Yorktown and only added to the sense of indebtedness overwhelming me. I do wonder what those former Scouts, now middle-aged men, must think of current events.
Thank you, always, to our citizens serving in uniform and may the Almighty watch over those overseas who go in harm's way on our behalf.
Probably the best, most insightful, description of 'late middle age' perceptions that I have ever come across.
I am sixty-five years old, and my husband is sixty-six. We have been together forty-five years, and are experiencing precisely what you described.
We may occasionally need a new hip, and we may not remember what we had for breakfast, :) but we are so much better able than ever before to view the whole, to integrate and arrange our life's experience into a wide-ranging, yet concrete, view of the world around us -- be it in the workplace, or on a global scale. We appreciate and value beauty, suffer injustice (ours and others'), comprehend the complexities, and understand the depths, of everything so much more than we used to.
I gratefully return your kind words. You appear to have not only uncanny insights, but the ability to express them beautifully.
Best to you and yours --
~ joanie
Would love to see that awesome (if sad in its truth) cartoon.
Hearing stories like your story of taking your Boy Scout troop to see the U.S.S. Yorktown, the stories you heard there, and the effect they had on you (and on presumably at least some of the scouts you had brought) always makes me very sad.
I believe one of the reasons our citizenry, especially the younger adults, is so ignorant about its roots and so apathetic about the usurpation of our liberties, is that those stories of heroism exhibited, and sacrifice made, by those who went before are no longer being taught to our youth, at least not to the degree, and with the truthfulness, that they used to be.
I recently received an e-mail from a friend that really serves as a microcosm of what is wrong with much of our public education system today. Here is an excerpt:
____________
The reason we are in this dilemma, in my opinion, is that the American people are so confused. They do not recognize who they are and what their heritage is. I blame the teachers and their unions. They don't teach the Constitution, the Founding Fathers, or American History.
As you know, I am regent of the local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. One of our members left our chapter a considerable amount of money. She wanted us to buy books about the Revolutionary War for the local high school. So with a committee we shopped around for primary sources. Then we went to the history chair at our local high school and told her what we'd like to do. She said we could put the books in the school library, but she doubted that any of the students would read them because the school 'no longer teaches the Revolutionary War'.
________________
If American History were once more taught correctly, and American school children once again learned to respect and admire, and want to emulate, the courage and determination of their ancestors, we would be well on our way to recalaiming our republic from the scourdrels who are currently in charge.
~ joanie
And be sure to stop by the Texas state board, and collect the posies someone else tossed at your feet. You are known over there. :)
And they sneer at those of us who want justice from those frauds and cynical users.
There's a way to accomplish this, by testing. Mandatory, universal testing.
Score wrong values or show deception and/or collaboration and cheating in the test scores, and boom! You're on a freighter bound for Uruguay, with about 40 other losers.
My wife and I watched it the other night and my wife asked “How can Hanks and Damon make movies like this and be so liberal?” I responded by pointing out that many WWII vets supported obama.
Spielberg is a leftist, too. It is indeed hard to figure how the Hollywood types can be so immersed in a movie that depicts so much of what conservative America admires ... and their leftist views still emerge unscathed on the other side.
“How can Hanks and Damon make movies like this and be so liberal?”
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$...
Spot on! I feel Zer0 has prolonged the recession to drag more people kicking and squealing to the government trough. The recession is is like a huge hurricane that has left millions stripped of all their possessions and looking for a government solution. It has turned independent men into dependents who will vote Obama for their own self interest. This is the strategy of the Obamas.
As I sat watching the Democrat National Convention last week, a constant thought kept coming to mind:
The Bill of Rights was explicitly designed to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority.
But what protects the majority from the tyranny of a highly ideological, determined, vocal (and rather tiny, populationwise) minority — who shred and reject the Constitution because it's "inconvenient" to the implementation of their goals?
Will the majority stand up to them, and vote the people who literally hate America and everything she stands for out of the Oval Office and Congress on November 6th?
I wish I felt confident that they will; but I don't.
Thanks so much, joanie!
Very well said, as always, betty.
And I sadly share your lack of confidence that we will enjoy some peace of mind and optimism when November 7th dawns.
~ joanie
Indeed. Thank you for sharing your insights, dearest sister in Christ!
Indeed, we shall remember them. Thank you so much for the beautiful essay, dear joanie-f!
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