After a Constitution, Bill of Rights, and assorted amendments, we may be intellectually exhausted. You have to admit, that was a stretch of extraordinary thinking, imagining such lofty thoughts as being worth a go by mere human beings.
Of course, founding this country on genocide and slavery are facts that have kept many of us up, late at night, stark awake, inconsolably saddened.
And, as you can plainly see from modern events here, we all remain clueless how to honestly engage such horrific histories, or even begin to make such things right.
It appears we are doomed to make tragic, irrevocable mistakes -- even while trying to do good, or trying to do something worthwhile. Perhaps our folly is our fate; perhaps we can break free of it in future. It is not for we few to know.
Well, not to be too maudlin here, especially not when you often remind us our finest hour may well have been helping the whole world recover after World War Two. That's always very nice of you to say, but it makes us blush. Some of it was an apology in goods for all the destruction we wreaked.
Plus, there were plenty of capitalists here who realized a vast market of need had been created everywhere bombs fell. Many of these generous heads of industry had ulterior motives in helping you back to your feet, certain they could chain your hands later.
But, to put the best possible shine on it: You're welcome for the hand up. We're happy we could help.
On Monday, August 6, 1945, after six months of intense firebombing of 67 other Japanese cities,...
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