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Oh there are differences, sure. The date of infamy, 9/11 was in some ways the "antipode" of "day of infamy" 12/7.

In 1941, the Federal behemoth was small. Sure it was larger under the populist-socialist FDR policies of the decade of the 40's, but it was small in all comparisons to todays bureaucratic behemoth.

The military, especially, was spartan, cut to the bone.

We were all aware of a war, and nearly all agreed who were the bad and who the good, it was pretty clear. Still -- among the blue-blood elite of the day, and among the followers of Father Coughlin, there existed a fondness for the order and "cut of the jib" of the Fascists, of the Germans. Argentina -- then the new world's exemplar Fascist country -- was the place to go, celebrated in magazines and movies.

When we set our jaws and grew our muscles to the fight in 1941, we grafted them onto the federal bones -- that was the open territory at the time, the place where men and women of vigor and purpose could most easily move to the mark, put things in place, shape, mold and fire. The Federal behemoth was nothing then, it was like a wide open country, a free place where a man of action and enterprise could move it to his will.

When it grew, when we grew it, when we grew, we grew muscle and intellect and spirit all together -- because the task was clear and the space to grow in nearly completely unfilled. It was in Freedom and Liberty that that Federal powerhouse of World War II grew. Strangely enough. Strangely enough for what it is now.

Many would weep, greive, moan and lament now -- today and call it good. Do they see that their tears feed the mold that grows on the gangrene, on the dead flesh that once was a great nation? Their grief -- todays "memorials" are to death, not to life.

Dear friend, there is nothing I hold mor dear than life, for what may be made of it. I see not life's desires in this, but longing for death. I will not and never join such a religious festival. Death is not my religion.