Many of you will remember that there was once a great NPR show late Sat afternoons(5:00-7:00 PM ET, actually)know as “Prairie Home Companion.” It was hosted by the greatly talented Garrison Keillor who was more or less forced into retirement for a “relationship” with a colleague. Keillor was–is, he still entertains some–one of the great comedic-philosophical minds in US history along with Mark Twain, James Thurber and the like. Part of his show was “The News From Lake Wobegon” which he did unfailingly every week.

I remember one of those on which he recounted the story of a local pastor who had agreed to speak at the town memorial Days services, then forgot about it. He remembered a minute or two before he was supposed to make his speech. Unflappably, he approached the mic and stood there for a minute or two in total silence. Then he said”On Memorial Day, what else is there to say?” According to Keillor, this was well received by the townapeople.

The quick witted MN pastor was fictional, but Keillor had a hold of an idea there that is all too true. What, indeed, is there to say? Men(sometimes women, too)have fought and died for the US since its beginning, or technically since before it’s offical beginning as a country. I once made a list of US wars and then asked myself how many of them were what a sane, worldly person might consider “necessary.” My conclusion was–about half.

When I was a child and your heard speeches about veterans they were about, mostly, vets of the two World Wars. In each case the US had helped allies, mostly European, to resist illiberal and dictatorial government from other European states and in so doing helped to preserve democracy and individual freedoms. This part, though easy to parody and not totally factual, has a large grain of truth in it and it was why these speeches were inspirational. In Europe in the two world wars and, to some extent arguably in Korea in the early 50’s American did indeed defend freedom. But after that it gets more complicated, and now it’s a mess of contradictions and half-truths often twisted by politically oriented people to what they think is their own advantage.

A history of American wars since the Korean War shows the complexities. The good guys and bad guys are harder to distinguish and sometimes one or both types seem to be on both(or all)sides. The politically oriented take certain facts they like and twist a few others for their own advantage. And, curiously, some of the same alignments and mentalities appear today as were there in FDR’s time.

A brief history of US wars since Korea–

From the end of World War II on for about 20 years we slowly, slowly got involved in Vietnam–the involvement picked up through the Eisenhower and Kennedy Administrations, but was likely not irreversible until LBJ’s commitments of the mid-1960’s. After that we were stuck in a no win situation–we couldn’ t win and we dared not lose. But through the Johnson Administration and through the first Nixon one the war remained. We were fighting an evil, aggressive and implacable enemy and for the first time we were up against an enemy that did not care how many men they lost or how long it took. Neither Administration seemed to get this last part. Nor did they seem to get that opinion in Vietnam was divided over whether the war against the North Vietnemese and the Viet Cong should go on.

Henry Kissinger has been blamed, perhaps rightly, for some of this, but he also shared with Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam the Noble Peace Prize for ending this whole mess in 1973. Dan Schorr, the remarkable CBS newman and colleague of the great Walter Cronkite once pointed out that the mess resulting from the Munich Conference led a whole generation of Western Statesmen to live by the motto, “No More Munichs.” Schorr acknowledged that that made sense for awhile but that as the world changed it should have been considered that maybe some of the rules changed. He argued quite persuasively that this type of nobly intended but not well thought out policy making led to Vietnam.

Schorr also pointed out that Vietnam had been such a mess that at the time he was writing (about a half century ago now)the Munich frame of minded tended to disappear and be replaced by a new slogan, “No More Vietnams.” He suggested that that made sense in the current context of the time but suggested that that too might age and become useless or worse. And I guess this happened

iN 1990 Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwai and brought down on himself a large coaltion of Middle Eastern and other Powers led by the first President Bush. Saddam and Iraq were quickly defeated and Kuwait freed, Bush ignored pleas from some(including me, to the extent that I counted) to go ahead and topple Saddam. But he saw this would have been a bad and exploitive action and he refused. Temporary stability was soon returned to the Middle East. This is the last time we really got it right in foreign policy and intervention.

In any event from 1992-until 2001 the US was not directly involved in military action.(The NATO air war on Serbia late in Bill Clinton’s second administration hardly counts. There was no direct American involvement on the ground.)

Then we got the invasion of Afghanistan(late 2001)as a reaction to 9/11 and intended to punish the Taliban; then the seriously misguided invasion of Iraq in 2003, also a result of 9/11 but additionally involved with the question of “weapons of mass destruction” in the hands of a dictator. Afghanistan was obviously a mistake–we can see that now, but it wasn’t clear then. The Taliban, who were in charge, allowed Al-Quaeda to get refuge there and to plan for 9/11 there. It seemed to me a clearcut case of self-defense and I supported President Bush on that (not that any journalists asked me).

Iraq was different. The ambiguous evidence was not convincing either way about Saddam having weapons of mass destruction. Remembering Vietnam in 1964 I decided that Iraq in 2003 was not a place to be for the US or our troops. Once again no one asked me and the President and Congress went for it. We wound up with an 8-year conflict, later somewhat renewed.

In Afghanistan we got a 20-year involvement which didn’t end until the world-wide viewed mess at the Airport in 2001. I quite agreed with what Presient Bush did there at first, but it was obviously a mistake. Fortunately, we are out. though not gracefully. The last chapter on this may be still to be written maybe.

So,we still celebrateMempiral Day and we still should. Those who sacrificed lives, health, loved ones, careers and pride should be celebrated

But it gets harder and less impressive every year, Or so it seems to me. We just attended our hometown parade as we have almost every Memorial Day for 30 years of so. But this year the bands mostly did not play, just marched and kept time. The riders in the parade seemed less than enthusiastic when compared to the past. There seemed to be no organization to it, just a bunch of people riding and marching around with no obvious idea of what it was all about. And finally, there was a notable lack of anything like class or civilization among the spectators. Marlon Brando and his torn tee shirt would have been more accepted than William Powell or Cary Grant. So maybe Eliot was right, and this is the beginning of the whimper for America. I sincerely hope not–but I wonder and I realize maybe most discreditably to me, the greater number the young families were obese or covered in the most revolting tatoos or both. I do not insist that everyone follow my idea of taste and I may be off base here but there it is. I’ll try to be back soon was a review of a terrific movie–one that might suggest the whimper is not universal.