Posted on 06/08/2004 10:01:15 PM PDT by JohnHuang2
The passing of President Reagan brought me back to Jan. 26, 1982. That was the date the "Great Communicator" first inspired me. I was 11 years old.
In his State of the Union address that evening, Reagan spoke of recessions, regulations, entitlements, Soviets and sanctions. My parents nodded vigorously in agreement. I almost nodded off. Toward the end of the televised speech, however, Reagan lifted America's spirits -- and piqued a child's interest -- by talking about something elementary: American heroes.
With his twinkling eyes and unabashed patriotism, Reagan reminded me of my late maternal grandfather. Lolo 'Zario had fought alongside American troops against the Japanese and survived the Bataan Death March during World War II. He had a hearty laugh, but was deadly serious when he held forth on freedom and sacrifice. My grandfather commanded my attention and respect when he spoke of these things. So did the president.
"We don't have to turn to our history books for heroes," Reagan said that night. "They're all around us."
The president looked into the audience and singled out Jeremiah Denton, an American pilot shot down by North Vietnamese troops and imprisoned for eight brutal years. He was beaten, starved and thrown into solitary confinement. In 1966, during a televised propaganda interview with a pro-Commie journalist arranged by his captors, Denton was pressured to condemn American wartime "atrocities."
Instead, Denton stood by his country: "(W)hatever the position of my government is, I believe in it, I support it, and I will support it as long as I live." Denton pretended the camera lighting bothered his eyes. With his clueless jailers surrounding him, Denton looked into the lens, blinked his eyes in Morse Code, and covertly broadcast the truth to the world -- Jane Fonda be damned -- by spelling out "T-O-R-T-U-R-E."
In his speech, Reagan recounted Denton's words upon landing in the Philippines after being freed: "The plane door opened and Jeremiah Denton came slowly down the ramp. He caught sight of our flag, saluted it, said, 'God bless America,' and then thanked us for bringing him home."
Reagan next pointed out Lenny Skutnik, a man whose name and story remain etched in my mind after all these years. "Just two weeks ago," Reagan recounted, "in the midst of a terrible tragedy on the Potomac, we saw again the spirit of American heroism at its finest -- the heroism of dedicated rescue workers saving crash victims from icy waters. We saw the heroism of one of our young government employees, Lenny Skutnik, who, when he saw a woman lose her grip on the helicopter line, dived into the water and dragged her to safety."
Reagan's stirring salute to Skutnik inspired me to research and memorize his story for a seventh-grade English class assignment. Skutnik was a young worker at the Congressional Budget Office. He had been driving home from work when Air Florida Flight 90 fell from the sky just 20 seconds after takeoff from Washington National Airport.
Skutnik jumped out of his car near the Fourteenth Street Bridge, where a crowd watched helplessly as a female passenger screamed for help in the icy waters. A helicopter rescue team had tossed her a line, but she was unable to hold on. Skutnik instinctively ripped off his overcoat, kicked off his shoes, dove into the river, and pulled 22-year-old flight attendant Priscilla Tirado to safety. She and four others survived. (Skutnik, a remarkably humble man who refused to be called a hero, still lives and works in the nation's capital.)
After Reagan's speech, a cynical press referred sneeringly to the "Lenny Skutnik moment." This elitist disdain for recognizing everyday heroes persists. Just last year, linguist Geoffrey Nunberg complained in The New York Times about "bathetic 'Skutnik moments.'"
"Bathetic"? I didn't know that condescending word when I was 11. But I do know that on a chilly night in January 1982, the president ignited a young heart. It was my "Ronald Reagan moment" -- an indelible moment when the exceptional goodness of America, and the boundless capacity of ordinary Americans to do extraordinary things, came alive. The flame endures.
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One survivor, a brown-haired woman in a red blouse who had been clinging to the tail of the jet, lost her grasp on a white life ring suspended from a helicopter and slid back into the ice-choked river. For several minutes she lay belly up on a partially submerged cake of ice, feebly paddling for shore. Helicopter pilots said her eyes apparently were blinded by jet fuel. The helicopter dropped the ring in front of her again. She clutched it but was too weak to hang on.
Her head sank below the surface of the river. Just when she seemed to be drowning, Lenny Skutnik, 28, drawn to the crash after crossing the bridge on his way home from work, flung himself from the bank into the water and towed her in.
"I felt so helpless," said Skutnik, who works for the Congressional Budget Office. "She was screaming 'Would somebody please help me!' It looked like she had passed out. I jerked off my boots and coat and jumped in the water." If not for Skutnik's valor, firemen said later, the woman might have died.
The next day, Howard Stern called the airline and asked how much for a ticket from National Airport to 14th Street. He was fired not long after that.
I knew she'd have something good. Thanks, John.
Welcome, friend.
And we still do not know how many hearts were ignited by the gentle grandfatherly words of Ronaldus Magnus. Truly, the flame endures.
Michelle is as beautiful as she is intelligent.
BUMP
Indeed!
Thank you, President Reagan, rest in peace.
BTTT
bumperooni
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