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| Who in 'right' mind wants to bring this back? |
For
officials with the Sunset Hill Cemetery found headstones vandalized Saturday morning,
and they wanted to be sure the mess was cleaned up prior to Monday.
THE
LAST THING that anybody wanted was the symbol of Nazi-era Germany defacing the
grave markers – particularly those of people who might have served in the
military back in the World War II era.
On
the day we pay tribute to those soldiers, sailors, air corps and marines who
fought in the many wars our nation has taken part in, it is sad that we have
some nincompoop out there who thinks it’s funny to deface graves with the symbol
of the “enemy” whom we fought against.
Either
that, or perhaps we have an idiot who thinks we fought a war against the “wrong”
enemy! Believe it or not, there are those with enough screws loose that their
vision of what “America” is all about would have had us aligned with the Axis
Powers of old.
And
the odd thing is, many of them have enough of a militaristic attitude that
would have them believe such a viewpoint is what this country ought to be
about.
SOMETHING
I’D THINK the people who actually fought in that particular war would find
particularly repulsive. But then again, the surviving veterans of World War II
are such that they’ve reached their 90s in age – if they’re even still alive.
Meaning
many of us don’t have a direct memory of what that conflict was about. Which is
why we get those endless studies showing young people of today don’t comprehend
Hitler or the Holocaust. Maybe they think such stories are more examples of “fake
news,” because, after all, nobody could have been that delusional or vicious in
their behavior.
So
yes, I’m bothered by the stories that came out of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
about the vandalized cemetery – although it also seems some houses near the cemetery
also got tagged with the swastika. Which almost reminds me of that old “All in
the Family” episode where someone tagged the front door of Archie Bunker’s bungalow
with a swastika – and he tried to cover it up with a U.S. flag, only to be
found out because he hung the flag on the door backwards!
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| Happening in real-life now as it happened on TV then |
Some
1,300 military veterans are buried in that particular cemetery, and officials
plan a noon-hour ceremony on Monday to pay tribute to those individuals.
SO
IT WOULD seem that somebody was hoping to make a visual statement – one about
what they think would “Make America Great Again” perhaps? And if you think I’m
exaggerating such a viewpoint, consider the anonymous rants to be found on the
Internet.
I
literally found one person who thinks that such vandalism is to be expected
because of the disrespect being shown by, “governments taking down and
destroying monuments and history.”
As
though not considering someone like Jefferson Davis or Robert E. Lee to be
heroic is the same thing. The actual comparison would be someone lighting
crosses ablaze at the remains of old “colored” cemeteries.
On
the positive side, police in Edwardsville actually came up with security camera
video that captured grainy images of the suspected vandal in the area at the alleged
time of the incident.
THERE
EVEN HAS been an arrest. Although just what kinds of criminal charges that
individual will face remains to be determined. I’m pretty sure, though, that
there will be some people willing to make a martyr out of the individual –
whose idea of a political “statement” involved running around in the dark with
an aerosol spray can of black paint.
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| Don't see where swastika fits in |
Personally,
I’d rather remember on this Memorial Day the individuals who fought against such
ideals that these nitwits are superficially supporting.
It’s
like some people want to keep refighting the old wars – and they’re counting on
our apathy as a society to permit them to have a chance at victory.
Without
it, our “American” ideals (which are nowhere as narrow as they want to make
them out to be) are what will continue to prevail!
-30-
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