Happy Thanksgiving! Long Live Fryer and Flier (a pair of pardoned turkeys who still failed to make Bill Schneider's CNN List of Political Turkeys)

This nice look back into time from George Will at the Washington Post begins here,

"Twas founded be th' Puritans to give thanks f'r bein' presarved fr'm th' Indyans, an' . . . we keep it to give thanks we are presarved fr'm th' Puritans."

-- Finley Peter Dunne

and ends with this,

Thanksgiving is, Hodgson thinks, a counterpoint to Americans' other great civic festival, the Fourth of July:

"It is good to celebrate the public glories and the promise of American life with fireworks and speeches, better still to celebrate the mysterious cycle of life, the parade of the generations, and the fragile miracle of plenty, in the small warm circle of family, the building brick of which all prouder towers have always been constructed."

An Englishman (Samuel Johnson) said that people more often need to be reminded than informed. Sometimes Americans need a sympathetic foreigner, such as Hodgson, to remind them of the dignity of what they are doing, on this day and all others.

For us, here and now, its all about football, food and for those of us who have them, family. There was a time once, a long, long time ago, when it meant something different: Overcoming hardship, making new cultural connections, and above all, peace. At a minimum we can think about this as we munch chips and drink beer. A lot has happened between then, and now.

Happy Turkey Day!

Thanksgiving

Pride slays thanksgiving, but an humble mind is the soil out of which thanks naturally grow. A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.

Henry Ward Beecher


Wapo has this on Georgia's newly enacted law on residency restriction, summarizing legal, empirical and ethical issues.


In a new development in the terrorism cases, Al Marri is the only civilian currently being subjected to military authority who was not arresed on a battlefield [ref. MCA, Milligan, Reid, Duncan.] says former Attorney General of the United States, Janet Reno. Reno signed on to a brief by prominent former Justice Department officials that closes with these memorable words,

"We would do well to remember Benjamin Franklin's admonition that "[t]hose who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." An Historical Review of the Constitution and Government of Pennsylvania, title page, (1759) (Arno Press reprint, 1972).

Related on the topic of security in my web travels this morning I was troubled to see this quote by Henry L. Stimson, former Secretary of War. I am still troubled at the way in which the Pacific war was closed, even though it may have saved many, many American lives (I have no problem with that aspect). The nuclear option has created a precedent from which the world is still seeking to recover:

On Tuesday, August 14th, when the news arrived of the final surrender of the Japanese we had a little thanksgiving meeting in the Casino after dinner. Henry L. Stimson