No. of Recommendations: 19
Player, please. You people can’t argue your way out of a paper bag with both ends open.
More trash talking
And yes, FDr did sign the orders that locked up thousands of Japanese-Americans, just as Andrew Jackson defied the Supreme Court to send thousands of Cherokee, Choctaw and Creek from their ancestral lands on a trail of tears to Oklahoma. Our history contains dark chaptors.
Still, in spite of FDR’s violation, he still saved democracy in this country with his New Deal policies that kept workers and the unemployed engaged in the political life of this country- by giving them a stake in it.
He also helped to save democracy in the world, through his Lend Lease program that kept Great Britain afloat until American public opinion swung toward support of US entrance in the war. Of course, Pearl Harbor ended that debate, soon followed by Japanese and German declarations of war against the US. By then, Roosevelt’s Day that will live in Infamy” speech declaring war on Japan was merely an afterthought, because Japan and Germany had already declared war on us.
Views on Roosevelt today are polarized. I side with those who see him as one of this country’s great presidents. Interestingly, my former in-laws, both Republicans, hated Roosevelt, but one policy of his they supported, back in the early 80’s when we had such discussions….. was Roosevelt’s detention of the Japanese. Back then, that was not an uncommon position for Republicans to hold- for many of the same reasons Republicans wore “Mass Deportations Now!” Buttons at their summer convention this year. There’s acertain symmetry between the fears of Japanese Americans spying and committing a ts of sabotAge….. with the fear of migrant vermin carrying diseases, committing unspeakable crimes and eating the dogs and cats of the people who live here.
Same fear. Different target.
And of course, as you know, the Japanese American 442nd Regimental Combat Team which fought in Italy and France, was the most decorated military unit for its size that fought in the war. Former Senator from Hawaii, Daniel Inoue, was a member of that unit, suffered grievous combat wounds, and served this country admirably, both as a soldier and as a senator.
I can’t put words in the mouth of a dead man, but I feel confident that he would agree with me when I say that America has made some horrible mistakes, but it’s a country that forever holds in front of itself he vision of “a more perfect union.”
An interesting account of the combat that led to Inoue’s loss of his right arm:
Ignoring his wound, he proceeded to attack and destroy the first machine gun nest with hand grenades and his Thompson submachine gun. When informed of the severity of his wound, he refused treatment and rallied his men for an attack on the second machine gun position, which he successfully destroyed before collapsing from blood loss. As his squad distracted the third machine gunner, Inouye crawled toward the final bunker, coming within 10 yards. As he raised himself up and cocked his arm to throw his last grenade, a German soldier inside the bunker fired a rifle grenade, which struck his right elbow, nearly severing most of his arm and leaving his primed grenade reflexively "clenched in a fist that suddenly didn't belong to me anymore". Inouye's horrified soldiers moved to his aid, but he shouted for them to keep back out of fear his severed fist would involuntarily relax and drop the grenade. While the German inside the bunker reloaded his rifle, Inouye pried the live grenade from his useless right hand and transferred it to his left. As the enemy soldier aimed his rifle at him, Inouye tossed the grenade into the bunker and destroyed it. He stumbled to his feet and continued forward, silencing the last German resistance with a one-handed burst from his Thompson before being wounded in the leg and tumbling unconscious to the bottom of the ridge. He awoke to see the worried men of his platoon hovering over him. His only comment before being carried away was to order them back to their positions, saying "nobody called off the war!"
For these actions, Inoue was awarden The Congressional Medal of Honor.
Later in life, he became a Democratic Senator- as a member of the same party that Roosevelt had led.
And that is exactly the spirit that all of us should emulate.
