Tell it to the Marines

I am posting here a column a wrote for a newspaper in Cleveland in 2002. Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps.

Thank You Vets (published November 12, 2002)
I had brunch Sunday with my parents at the Harp, an Irish pub on the West Side near downtown. With living across town from them added to my class and work loads, I haven't seen them very much recently. They are both retired and travel quite a bit to see my siblings who live all over the country. So Sunday was special for us all. My girlfriend and the only other local sibling were there too.

My father has six children, five sons and one daughter. When I was a kid in the 70s my mother would say that with all these boys she worried about war more than usual. She prayed that none of us would have to experience war first hand. My father was just worried about bankruptcy at the cost of putting us through college. Years later, neither horror realized, we are as close as a family can be.

More than just getting together with my family, Sunday was special for another reason. November 10 is the birthday of the United States Marine Corps. The great coincidence of history was that Armistice Day—which we now celebrate as Veterans' Day—was declared on the day following the anniversary of the Marine Corps. Separated by 143 years, the two days honor two different groups of warriors. The US Marine Corps is arguably the toughest military organization in the world, known for its tenacity in combat and its bravery under fire. By the time the World War I Armistice was declared, the USMC was legendary, gaining a new moniker during the struggle.

The German soldiers at Belleau Woods referred to the Marines who first assaulted then defended the five-mile stretch of woods as "Teufel Hunden—(Devil Dogs)." The name comes from a legendary Bavarian breed of wild dog. The Marines unofficially adopted the name as they did most insults directed at them. Five months after the battle, the war ended.
So the first Armistice Day, the cease-fire that ended the First World War fell on the day after the Marine Corps celebrated its 143d birthday.

For me the two days are linked by more than coincidence of calendar because my father was a US Marine. He enlisted in 1951 shortly after the outbreak of war in Korea. He landed at Inchon and spent the rest of the war doing his duty as a Marine. He has spoken of it very little and never directly. One time he admitted to having trouble sleeping after reading a book about a WWII winter battle. Another time he told me about a Captain who lost his legs from a mine explosion. But when asked directly about combat, he would tell a joke or change the subject.

I know at one point he was wounded, but he refused a Purple Heart. He knew that the Defense Department would send a telegram home to his mother announcing his medal. He didn't want to worry her.

Veteran's Day is supposed to honor men like my father. Men who did their duty and thought about the family at home, men who overcame incredible odds and came home.

Sitting in the Harp Sunday, I'm sure no one thought that the old guy having lunch was remarkable in any way. That's what makes veterans so special. They are just regular people even after facing the very real possibility that they would be killed in combat.

The United States is yet again poised to put lives at risk. Whether the mission is appropriate or ill advised, men and women will go into harm's way and some will not return. Those who survive will someday eat a quiet brunch with their children in an unremarkable way.

On behalf of the staff of The Cauldron I'd like to thank all veterans, the ones who saw combat and the ones who served during peace-time. Especially my dad.
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My father is doing well, I spoke with him by telephone today. Retired and age 75, I asked what he planned to do for the Marine Corp's 233d birthday.

"Sleep," he said. "A good Marine never stands when he may sit and never stays awake when he may sleep."

Thanks again to all the Marines past and present who continue to inspire us all. Especially my dad.

My fear of fear politics

The day before the election, I took a break from calling folks in Virginia and Ohio for Sen. Obama to get my haircut. At 42, it takes a really creative barber to make it actually seem like work, but I feel terrible when what little hair I have gets shaggy.

I went to a Hair Cuttery in the suburbs of Chicago wearing an "Obama '08" sweatshirt. I sat down in the chair and listened as my stylist, Kara, told me that Obama was a Muslim, and that she wasn't even sure he was an American citizen because no one has seen his birth certificate.

She told me that she listens to Fox News each morning. "It's like my alarm clock," she said.

Looking for common ground, we both agreed that we would be happy when the election was over because we were tired of all of the smear ads on the radio and TV.

The thing that surprised me was when we started talking about the economy. Now I don't have any independent varification of Kara's story, but this is what she told me:

"We're one of those family's that shouldn't have gotten a loan. My husband's dad died and left us $100,000. So we had $50,000 for a down payment. The mortgage company said, 'Great. Here's a house' and never even looked at whether we could afford the payments.

"We've been doing everything we can to keep up the payments," she told me. "We're behind on all our credit cards and now (DuPage) County is going to take the house if we don't come up with $4,000 for the property taxes. We tried to get the mortgage company to escrow the taxes, but they said, 'We'd need you to give us $4,000 to do that.' If we had the four thousand, we would pay the taxes with it. The county is gonna foreclose for the taxes."

She told me that her husband got hurt and missed two months of work, but since he was new to the job, they let him go rather than pay workers comp. Kara's family doesn't have health care, and she worries that if they lose the house the kids will "have to go to a school near my mom's, (which) is filled with gang bangers and drugs."

I told her about the Mr. Obama's health care proposals. We talked about the bailout and the fallout of the market crisis. I expressed my belief that an Obama presidency would help working folks more than a McCain presidency would, but Kara insisted that she was too scared of Obama's "terrorism" to vote for him.

She's been fed a steady diet of fear and cannot see past it to recognize that it is in her own interest to vote for Democrats because "they hate America." FDR was right about fearing fear. It is the fear of terror that makes it such an affective tool.

For Kara and the millions like her who are afraid, let's hope that tomorrow's dawn brings with it hope for the country and the world.