RUTHFULLY YOURS

May 28, 1984, Memorial Day Speech, Arlington National Cemetery.

My fellow Americans Memorial Day, is a day of ceremonies and speeches. Throughout America today, we honor the dead of our wars. We recall their valor and their sacrifices. We remember they gave their lives so that others might live.

We’re also gathered here for a special event—the national funeral for an unknown soldier who will today join the heroes of three other wars.

When he spoke at a ceremony at Gettysburg in 1863, President Lincoln reminded us that through their deeds, the dead had spoken more eloquently for themselves than any of the living ever could, and that we living could only honor them by rededicating ourselves to the cause for which they so willingly gave a last full measure of devotion.

Well, this is especially so today, for in our minds and hearts is the memory of Vietnam and all that that conflict meant for those who sacrificed on the field of battle and for their loved ones who suffered here at home.

Not long ago, when a memorial was dedicated here in Washington to our Vietnam veterans, the events surrounding that dedication were a stirring reminder of America’s resilience, of how our nation could learn and grow and transcend the tragedies of the past.

During the dedication ceremonies, the rolls of those who died and are still missing were read for 3 days in a candlelight ceremony at the National Cathedral. And the veterans of Vietnam who were never welcomed home with speeches and bands, but who were never defeated in battle and were heroes as surely as any who have ever fought in a noble cause, staged their own parade on Constitution Avenue. As America watched them—some in wheelchairs, all of them proud—there was a feeling that this nation—that as a nation we were coming together again and that we had, at long last, welcomed the boys home.

“A lot of healing went on,” said one combat veteran who helped organize support for the memorial. And then there was this newspaper account that appeared after the ceremonies. I’d like to read it to you. “Yesterday, crowds returned to the Memorial. Among them was Herbie Petit, a machinist and former marine from New Orleans. ‘Last night,’ he said, standing near the wall, ‘I went out to dinner with some other ex-marines. There was also a group of college students in the restaurant. We started talking to each other. And before we left, they stood up and cheered us. The whole week,’ Petit said, his eyes red, ‘it was worth it just for that.’”

It has been worth it. We Americans have learned to listen to each other and to trust each other again. We’ve learned that government owes the people an explanation and needs their support for its actions at home and abroad. And we have learned, and I pray this time for good, the most valuable lesson of all—the preciousness of human freedom.

It has been a lesson relearned not just by Americans but by all the people of the world. Yet, while the experience of Vietnam has given us a stark lesson that ultimately must move the conscience of the world, we must remember that we cannot today, as much as some might want to, close this chapter in our history, for the war in Southeast Asia still haunts a small but brave group of Americans—the families of those still missing in the Vietnam conflict.

They live day and night with uncertainty, with an emptiness, with a void that we cannot fathom. Today some sit among you. Their feelings are a mixture of pride and fear. They’re proud of their sons or husbands, fathers or brothers who bravely and nobly answered the call of their country. But some of them fear that this ceremony writes a final chapter, leaving those they love forgotten.

Well, today then, one way to honor those who served or may still be serving in Vietnam is to gather here and rededicate ourselves to securing the answers for the families of those missing in action. I ask the Members of Congress, the leaders of veterans groups, and the citizens of an entire nation present or listening, to give these families your help and your support, for they still sacrifice and suffer.

Vietnam is not over for them. They cannot rest until they know the fate of those they loved and watched march off to serve their country. Our dedication to their cause must be strengthened with these events today. We write no last chapters. We close no books. We put away no final memories. An end to America’s involvement in Vietnam cannot come before we’ve achieved the fullest possible accounting of those missing in action.

This can only happen when their families know with certainty that this nation discharged her duty to those who served nobly and well. Today a united people call upon Hanoi with one voice: Heal the sorest wound of this conflict. Return our sons to America. End the grief of those who are innocent and undeserving of any retribution.

The Unknown Soldier who is returned to us today and whom we lay to rest is symbolic of all our missing sons, and we will present him with the Congressional Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration that we can bestow.

About him we may well wonder, as others have: As a child, did he play on some street in a great American city? Or did he work beside his father on a farm out in America’s heartland? Did he marry? Did he have children? Did he look expectantly to return to a bride?

We’ll never know the answers to these questions about his life. We do know, though, why he died. He saw the horrors of war but bravely faced them, certain his own cause and his country’s cause was a noble one; that he was fighting for human dignity, for free men everywhere. Today we pause to embrace him and all who served us so well in a war whose end offered no parades, no flags, and so little thanks. We can be worthy of the values and ideals for which our sons sacrificed—worthy of their courage in the face of a fear that few of us will ever experience—by honoring their commitment and devotion to duty and country.

Many veterans of Vietnam still serve in the Armed Forces, work in our offices, on our farms, and in our factories. Most have kept their experiences private, but most have been strengthened by their call to duty. A grateful nation opens her heart today in gratitude for their sacrifice, for their courage, and for their noble service. Let us, if we must, debate the lessons learned at some other time. Today, we simply say with pride, “Thank you, dear son. May God cradle you in His loving arms.”

We present to you our nation’s highest award, the Congressional Medal of Honor, for service above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy during the Vietnam era.

Thank you.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/05/there_have_been_two_high.html There have been two high profile terrorist attacks in Europe in the past week, both against soldiers, and both with edged weapons. So much for gun bans. The first attack, in Woolwich, UK on, was by far the most notorious (and celebrated, in many circles). British soldier and father Lee Rigby was hit with […]

http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/05/could_a_mayor_weiner_pose_a_threat_to_new_york_city_security.html

Huma Abedin is back in the spotlight again, as her husband Anthony Weiner has announced that he is running for mayor of New York City. The Daily Mail of the United Kingdom claims that “Huma Abedin [is] deemed her husband’s greatest political asset.” Michael M. Grynbaum, et al. of the New York Times claim that “it is Ms. Abedin, a seasoned operative well versed in the politics of redemption, [who] has been a main architect of her husband’s rehabilitative journey[.]”

The word “operative” is a word that needs careful examination. If Weiner were to win the mayoral election in New York, could this bring the Muslim Brotherhood closer to the inner security workings of New York City?

Almost one year ago, Walid Shoebat exposed Huma Abedin’s connections to the Brotherhood. Michele Bachmann and four other Republican congressional representatives requested that “no Muslim Brotherhood-associated entity or individual [be] placed into a position of honor or trust within the programs and operations of the Department of State unless he or she has publicly condemned and disclaimed the previously stated goals of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Yet such condemnation was never forthcoming from Abedin.

The five Republican congressional representatives were lambasted by Senator John McCain and Rep. Keith Ellison for entertaining the notion that someone closely connected to the Muslim Brotherhood, as Ms. Abedin is, might not be the best candidate to hold the job of deputy chief of staff for the State Department.

Couple this with the fact that in 2011 the “Obama administration formalized ties” with the [Muslim Brotherhood], and in 2013 “the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), a group with Muslim Brotherhood origins and an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror-financing trial, toured the White House and met with multiple officials,” thus signaling a major “policy formulation” by the White House.

Such overlapping groups all stem from the Muslim Brotherhood, and the issue of infiltration may now have a new twist as Weiner runs for office. It is critical to recall that the Brotherhood’s objective is to “destroy the Western civilization from within.” As Claire Lopez explains:

… the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) functions as a kind of umbrella organization for many hundreds of offshoot Islamic Societies across North America. Yet, in spite of its DoJ status as a front group for the jihadist Muslim Brotherhood, ISNA still has been granted a coveted advisory role with the National Security Council (NSC) of the Obama White House. ISNA’s president, Muhammed Magid, is not only the Director of the All-Dulles Area Muslim Society Center, but also an A-list invitee to White House iftar dinners and a member of the Department of Homeland Security ‘Countering Violent Extremism’ Advisory Council.

Notwithstanding the New York Times whitewash of the evidence, Huma Abedin was, in fact, an assistant editor for the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs from 1996 to 2008. Her mother works to advance the Brotherhood agenda against Western interests and policies. Her brother has had a “strong working relationship with Abdullah Omar Naseef and Yusuf Qaradawi.” Naseef “ran a charity front for terror,” and Qaradawi has stated that:

A Beheading, Multiculturalism and Videotape — on The Finch Gang
by Frontpagemag.com
Michael Chandler, Morgan Brittany and Ann-Marie Murrell reflect on the terror in London and our willful blindness.
http://frontpagemag.com/2013/frontpagemag-com/a-beheading-multiculturalism-and-videotape-on-the-finch-gang/

http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/progressives-bombs_729026.html?nopager=1

At one point in The Company You Keep, Robert Redford’s new film about the residue of the Weather Underground, a character named Sharon Solarz is captured by the FBI after living under a series of aliases since her involvement in a Michigan bank robbery decades earlier in which a security guard was killed. Ruminating in her cell, she describes for a young journalist the moral dilemma people like her faced back then. They could either sit by and watch as America destroyed the innocent peasant culture of Vietnam or take arms against atrocity. She says decisively of her group’s decision to go all-in against the war in Vietnam, “We made mistakes, but we were right,” and then, after a beat, “I’d do it again.”

At about the same time that The Company You Keep was being previewed, New York University announced that it was appointing Kathy Boudin, real-life model for the Solarz character, as a 2013 scholar-in-residence at the law school. It might have been called a harmonic convergence back when the Weatherpeople first made news with their Days of Rage, but since then the college campus has been well established as a rehab center for members of the sect looking to reenter the mainstream. Before Boudin (who, in addition to the NYU gig, has an assistant professorship at the Columbia University School of Social Work), Mark Rudd, Howie Machtingter, and, of course, Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers, Weatherman’s Bonnie and Clyde, all used university jobs to regain their footing as they resumed their pursuit of the revolution they once thought would be created by propaganda of the deed but concluded, after a few years of paranoid anonymity in the underground, might better be pursued through propaganda of the word.

Kathy Boudin was the hardest case. Still underground after the others had come up, she’d been the getaway driver in the notorious 1981 Brink’s robbery in which one guard was murdered. After her getaway vehicle was stopped, she lured four Nyack policemen who arrived on the scene into an ambush where they were cut down by the other gang members’ automatic weapons; two policemen were killed (including Waverly Brown, first black officer on the force). When she resurfaced after serving part of her murder sentence, she couldn’t very well use the defense of other Weather Underground members that they had, after all, engaged only in victimless crime, or that they were just antiwar protesters, America having fled in ignominy from the Saigon embassy six years before Brink’s. But the universities that brought her aboard not only offered respectability and a paycheck, but also, as writer Michael Moynihan has noted, purged her curriculum vitae of all its pungent factuality. NYU’s press release announcing her appointment merely certifies that Boudin has been “dedicated to community involvement in social change since the 1960’s.”