Day of Mourning
Today is Tuesday, 21 August 2007.
During the night of 20-21 August 1968, Soviet and puppet Warsaw Pact military forces invaded Czechoslovakia and ended the “Prague Spring”.
On 21 August 1972, your author was convicted in Federal court in the Northern District of Oklahoma of draft resistance, for the act of “nonpossession of draft materials”, having torn up his draft cards and mailed them to his local draft board and then-president R.M. Nixon.
The latter action, of course, failed to turn the tides of history by a fraction of an inch. If, however, [perhaps the saddest construction possible in the language], hundreds of thousands of others had so acted … or acted at so many moments in history, surely millions and millions would not have died.
Today is one of my personal Days of Mourning.
BREAK BREAK BREAK
Now, let's just tear your heart out, with Albonni in G Minor:
During the night of 20-21 August 1968, Soviet and puppet Warsaw Pact military forces invaded Czechoslovakia and ended the “Prague Spring”.
On 21 August 1972, your author was convicted in Federal court in the Northern District of Oklahoma of draft resistance, for the act of “nonpossession of draft materials”, having torn up his draft cards and mailed them to his local draft board and then-president R.M. Nixon.
The latter action, of course, failed to turn the tides of history by a fraction of an inch. If, however, [perhaps the saddest construction possible in the language], hundreds of thousands of others had so acted … or acted at so many moments in history, surely millions and millions would not have died.
Today is one of my personal Days of Mourning.
BREAK BREAK BREAK
Now, let's just tear your heart out, with Albonni in G Minor:
posted by HH at 10:19 AM
1 Comments:
I am sorry this is one of your personal days of mourning, because it should also be a day of celebration. This is a date that marks your personal courage and conviction and you should be proud.
Protest and resistance to the Vietnam War did make a difference. There may never be enough, soon enough, to save the lives we wish had been saved; but there are many who do try and sometimes the tide is turned. Your individual actions may be joined by another, and another, and they do matter.
You may not agree with Candide that this is the best of all possible worlds, but I urge you to look up from your sadness and be a little hopeful.
As for 1972: Perry would have been proud to represent you. Too bad we didn't know you then.
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