I have been thinking of my dad a lot these past few days and weeks, but never more so than today - Veteran’s Day. My father nearly died on a ship that blew up as it approached Omaha Beach in 1944. He was taken back to England to get his glasses fixed and then he returned to Normandy and endured the Battle of the Bulge. He was 20 years old, a boy who put his life on the line because it was the right thing to do. Dad’s story - the one he barely ever mentioned - was not unique to the families I grew up with. Our fathers all cried out in their sleep, flinched at the sound of sonic booms and fireworks, adjusted to missing limbs, and mourned their friends who didn’t make it home. All of them believed they were defeating an evil presence and making the world safer for their kids.
I was taught in school a little over a decade later that because of our democracy, Nazis could never gain a foothold here. America had rules of law, system guardrails, and a free press that made such moral depravity impossible. We were also taught to understand and forgive the German people because they didn’t see it coming - they had been duped by a callous, lying despot. America, however, would see the warning signs and turn the country back to a brighter path. My father believed that with all his heart. Maybe I did, too.
But here we are. A plurality of the country - shielded somehow, from a wannabe dictator’s own words and indifferent to the implications of his lies, actions and ambitions - has elected a man who has said he admires Hitler, who curries favor with dictators, and boasts that he will prosecute journalists and disassemble the government as we know it. The guardrails may or may not stand.
