[xmca] Hiroshima Nagasaki

It appears that yet another form of amnesia has overtaken xlchc/xmca. No
one has thought to remember, in
public sorrow, the fact that the United States dropped atomic bombs on the
Japanese cities of Hiroshima and
Nasaki on Aug 6-9th of some year or other a long time ago..... probably too
long a time ago to remember, so
many more atrocities have occurred in the interim.

My deepest apologies to my Japanese friends and colleagues for this
desperate, atrocious acts.
They were not the last, and certainly not the most recent mistakes taken by
my government in the
name of democracy and human decency. That such actions taken in my name have
been matched in
horrifying measure by other countries, for whatever reasons, does not lessen
my responsibility, and the
responsibility of all those who read this note.

Hiroshima. Nagasaki.
Those who forget are inviting such treatment on themselves, their children,
and their grandchildren.

In this context I am moved to repeat two messages I read a year ago at the
internment camp in Manzenar, California,
where thousands of Nisei Americans were interned:

Benjamin Franklin: They that can give up essential liberties to obtain a
little temporaray security deserve neither liberty nor safety"
Tom Paine: (one of my founding fathers, at least): He that would make his
own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he
violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.

mike
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Received on Thu Aug 9 19:46 PDT 2007