Posted on 06/20/2004 10:17:51 AM PDT by Congressman Billybob
The older we get, the more we go to funerals for friends and family. As Benjamin Franklin observed, “Nothing is certain but death and taxes.” This isn’t about taxes, nor about the state funeral for former President Ronald Reagan.
It’s about Laurie Russell, and about the value of death.
Laurie was the wife of a lifelong friend of mine. She was smart and funny, able and wise. She was a positive influence in the lives of all who knew her. Or, I should say, IS a positive influence, because the benefits of who she was and what she did live on in others.
Four years ago, she was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral scleroris (Lou Gehrig’s disease). She did not “go gently into that good night.” With family and friends, she turned to the Robert Packard Center for ALS Research at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She received the best-known treatment for the disease, and she helped raise large sums of money for research. But last week she lost her long and courageous struggle against ALS.
What is the value of a death like this? There’s only one, and it’s slight. At the end, when the pain and disability were greatest and hope had gone, death came as a relief to Laurie. As with the rest of her life, she had anticipated the end of it. She knew when to give the instruction, “No heroic measures.” But as with most of us, when our time comes, there will be little value in our deaths. Our value will be in the lives we led before that unknown day.
This is the way things are, usually, in the civilian world. There are rare exceptions. Last week six-year-old Donald Houser-Richerme, of Chicago Ridge, Illinois, died in hospital. Two weeks before he had seen a neighboring girl fall into an unused swimming pool partly filled with water and debris. Though Donald could not swim, he jumped in and saved the girl. But then, he became trapped himself, and was fatally injured before he could be recovered.
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) Donald Houser-Richerme, at age six, understood this point better than most of the reporting and editorial staffs of the major American media today.
While we’re on the subject of media, there are multiple reports weekly, especially in large city newspapers, of “senseless” deaths. These usually involve a robbery for maybe $20, or a trivial, verbal fight that turns fatal when someone pulls a weapon. But every time a homicide reporter writes, and an editor publishes, the phrase “senseless death,” that raises an inescapable question. What qualifies a killing as “sensible”?
Suppose a man is married, but he has a mistress and wants rid of the wife. Furthermore, his wife is about to give birth to their child, and he wants to avoid that responsibility. Add that there are insurance benefits payable, and that the husband is having financial trouble. Does all that qualify the murders as “sensible” if the man kills his wife and unborn child?
Or suppose a man is well known, wealthy and successful. He can attract almost any woman he wants. He’s been married, but his wife divorced him because he treated her like a piece of property, not a human being. This man is very jealous of his possessions, including his ex-wife. If he carves up his ex-wife like a side of beef, and also kills a young man who happened by on an errand, and then flees the jurisdiction on a pre-arranged alibi trip, does that qualify as a “sensible” killing?
There is no value in such deaths. And the value of the lives of those killed are diminished to the extent that the law denies, or delays and trivializes, the punishments of those who are responsible. The largest single category of inflicted death (which I deliberately do not call murder) is auto accidents. Consider the decades it took for Mothers Against Drunk Driving and others to change the culture against accepting drunk driving as not so bad, and sort of tolerable.
As a result both of that change and the seatbelt laws, the annual death rate on the highways has dropped from its high of about 55,000 per year to a rate just over 40,000 per year, while the number of drivers and of miles driven have sharply increased. There’s no value in any of these deaths. All are premature; all are tragedies for the families involved. Yet it’s instructive on the apparent value we place on American highway deaths. Such deaths amount to a complete Vietnam War every year, yet they are accepted as normal and commonplace, unremarkable in the national press.
We turn, then, to combat deaths. The deaths of those who fall in war have the greatest value of all, if the purpose of the war is just and the war is won. No one will ever state that better than Abraham Lincoln did in the Gettysburg Address. By definition, war is measured by death. The stronger the opponent, the more Americans will die.
The War on Terror is the least bloody, measured by deaths per month, of any of the eleven major wars the American colonies or the United States has ever fought. I wrote about this on 24 April, 2004, under the title “Is Iraq Becoming Like Vietnam?” I mention this because of the hand-wringing in the national press over the blood cost of the War on Terror. We just memorialized the 60th anniversary of D-Day, the Normandy invasion. More Americans died on the beaches in that one day than in six consecutive Wars on Terror. Or consider the invasions of Iwo Jima, Okinawa and Tarawa in the Pacific. Double or more of the current war’s total fell in less than ten days in each of those battles, among others.
Or consider the extended coverage of the apparent fact that Pat Tillman was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan. Every war has instances of “friendly fire.” Odds are, the reporters writing the Tillman stories were unaware that in the breakout from the Normandy landing in WW II, American bombers were given the wrong coordinates. Instead of bombing Germans, they bombed Americans. One hundred and eleven Americans, including one General, were killed, and more than four hundred were wounded.
People sometimes die in war while “drinking a cup of coffee,” like the title character in the movie Mr. Roberts. Does that fact mean such deaths are without value? For all its individual horrors, war is a collective enterprise. The men who fought “on a darkling plain” in Europe were unaware at the time of the outcome of their own battle, much less of the fate of campaigns in the Pacific. Yet the war’s outcome depended on all of those.
We’re now in World War III. It’s a very low-grade war, as wars go, but it is worldwide. Americans, and America’s many allies, are targeted for death in most nations on Earth, from Iraq, to the Philippines and Indonesia, opposite points on the globe. I say “many” allies, because at the end of WW II we had seven allies; today we have 33.
Regular readers have noted that I often use the New York Times as a bad example. I’m not picking on that newspaper; I’m only reflecting that it pompously refers to itself as the “newspaper of record.” As such, it sets for itself a higher standard of honesty and accuracy – which it often fails to meet. To wit:
The New York Times was founded in 1851, and took its present name in 1857. Therefore, the paper was around to cover eight of America’s eleven major wars, beginning with the Civil War. It would be a simple matter for any reporter to cover the following war story without leaving the building: “Compare and contrast the Times coverage of this war with the other seven major wars since 1851.” How often did the Times dwell on errors and setbacks to the American forces in those other wars? How often did it publish information that could have gotten American civilians or soldiers killed in those other wars?
I’ve done some rough research on this comparison. I’ll bet a steak dinner, your choice of place, with any editor of the Times, on the outcome of honest coverage of that comparative war story. I believe it would be that the Times has printed far more stories denigrating the American war efforts and offering information potentially helpful to America’s enemies in the War on Terror than during any other war the Times has covered. Yet the Times hasn’t dared to research and print such an obvious story, because of the consequences.
If the coverage has changed so greatly, what explains the difference? Has America changed, so it and its citizens are less worthy of defense today than they were then? Has the nature of war changed – or is it still that we kill our enemies until the surviving ones decide to stop killing Americans? Or has the Times itself changed? Has it decided editorially that it takes no position on the outcome of the War on Terror, and isn’t interested in whether the printing of a particular story can cause Americans, in uniform and civilians, to be killed as a result?
War is hell. War is also waste. It wastes mostly young lives at their prime. It wastes the material well-being of the nation. That’s why wars should not be entered into lightly. But paradoxically, once a war is begun, the lives lost have the greatest value – because it’s the hundreds of thousands who die, or tens of thousands, or in this war, less than a thousand, who protect millions of Americans. The irony of the coverage of by the Times is they are playing to the fear of death of everyone but the soldiers themselves, to cripple the nation’s ability to use its military for national defense.
It has the same effect, though not necessarily the intent, as if the Times has for the first time decided to support the other side to win the war. A fair reading of the coverage of this war is that the Times is denigrating the value of the Americans, who have all volunteered for this duty by the way, who die in this cause.
And if the Times is unable or unwilling to examine its own coverage of this war compared to other wars, I hope that some rival news organization will do the task for it. Since the pages of the Times are a “matter of record,” the results of the story shouldn’t depend on who does the research.
Most of us will die deaths of no particular value. The difficulties of old age, or one of the big three – cancer, heart attack, and stroke – will bring us down. But in time of war, when young and healthy Americans full of promise are putting their lives on the line for us, the value of death becomes important. The nature of what they are doing for us demands that respect be paid.
Especially early this month, when the WW II Memorial was dedicated, the American press became positively schizophrenic. They were praising the sacrifices of a generation of men now elderly and dying, in the same pages that undercut and decried the smaller sacrifices of grandsons and granddaughters of those men.
When anyone places his own life on the line, deliberately and for others, that’s worthy of respect. As the 9/11 Commission staggers to reach its questionable conclusions, it should be recalled that most of the civilians in the Twin Towers got out. The greatest losses were suffered by men and women in civilian uniforms – police and firefighters, who went into those buildings to save the lives of others.
It’s always been true that some Americans have more courage than others. Especially in wartime, shouldn’t it be incumbent on the press to respect those who make sacrifices and pay the ultimate price, rather than to tear the whole nation down to the lesser standard of Americans who lack such courage?
Becoming a hero in wartime may involve but a single act of bravery at a time of great danger. To be fair, years of training and development of character precede that critical moment. But to be a hero in civil life requires hundreds of acts of courage and commitment, spread throughout many years and usually unknown to anyone but the few people present. So, in some ways, it’s easier to die for an ideal in a single moment than to live for an ideal over the course of decades.
I’ve been blessed with many heroes in my life. Many were teachers, some were soldiers, some were friends, a few were colleagues in the law, and a scant handful were relatives. Laurie Russell is – not was – one of my heroes.
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
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About the Author: John Armor is an author and civil rights lawyer who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains. CongressmanBillybob@earthlink.net
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John / Billybob
John / Billybob
Good work, and thank you.
She must have been a rare and valued friend to have prompted such an insightful tribute. Thank you for this. It's full of thoughts I can share -- something I'm sure Laurie knew a lot about.
Very good, thoughtful, article putting things in perspective.
The New York Times was founded in 1851, and took its present name in 1857. Therefore, the paper was around to cover eight of America’s eleven major wars, beginning with the Civil War. It would be a simple matter for any reporter to cover the following war story without leaving the building: “Compare and contrast the Times coverage of this war with the other seven major wars since 1851.” How often did the Times dwell on errors and setbacks to the American forces in those other wars? How often did it publish information that could have gotten American civilians or soldiers killed in those other wars?I’ve done some rough research on this comparison. I’ll bet a steak dinner, your choice of place, with any editor of the Times, on the outcome of honest coverage of that comparative war story. I believe it would be that the Times has printed far more stories denigrating the American war efforts and offering information potentially helpful to America’s enemies in the War on Terror than during any other war the Times has covered. Yet the Times hasn’t dared to research and print such an obvious story, because of the consequences.
If the coverage has changed so greatly, what explains the difference? Has America changed, so it and its citizens are less worthy of defense today than they were then? Has the nature of war changed – or is it still that we kill our enemies until the surviving ones decide to stop killing Americans? Or has the Times itself changed? Has it decided editorially that it takes no position on the outcome of the War on Terror, and isn’t interested in whether the printing of a particular story can cause Americans, in uniform and civilians, to be killed as a result?
Bump!
Well said Sir , well said indeed
Best Regards
alfa6 ;>}
Interesting read - but for the quoted remark. No particular value? By whom is the measure of "value" made? Psalms Ch.116 V.15 says, "Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints."
Regards,
Az
John / Billybob
In my life I have noticed that the "best" people, meaning the ones who have given or shared so much of their life to others in need, of a friend, or some good advice in tough times, or a pat on the back, or even a days labor are themselves without any fear of dying.
What lays beyond is not seen as a threat but perhaps a challenge or a needed rest. These are the people that make you litteraly ache when you hear they are gone. We could use a few million more of them right now.
It's not the value of death but the value of life that matters to me. When we're gone we will only be remembered, generally for what we didn't do, not what we did.
Now that we are here is when we have the greatest chance of doing something worthwhile for our country and fellow man.
To be welcomed where we go, because of our current reputation, is a far more satisfying feeling than thinking about what people will say when we are gone.
I'm reading the memoirs ("autobiography is for great men" he said) of legendary Marine General Archer Vandergrift. (The guy the Navy rather infamously bugged out on, at Guadalcanal). His book includes an acknowledgement to, a lot of praise for, and a photograph of NYT military affairs correspondent Hanson Baldwin (Baldwin also wrote some great military histories, too).
I'll bet a bottle of Chateau Lafitte (I can't offer the Times eds. what they'd really prefer: cocaine) against a bottle of root beer that no Times reporter will be so remembered by a general in the current conflict -- maybe by Osama or Zawahiri, but no American. And they ain't gonna live to write their memoirs either; the Times, institutionally, is "deeply saddened."
In the fifty years since Hanson Baldwin, the Times has changed sides. Away from the US, and towards anything that opposes it. (Look at their reporting on the controversy over Hiroshima revisionism. They have Tojo enshrined as a good guy there on 42nd St. now).
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
B4, you're welcome at my humble quarters anytime. I'll cook.
I applaud you, pard.
Rib please and cold, cold Peterbilt beer.
LOL
BTTT
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