In 1941, in the heat of the Second World War, Winston Churchill visited the United States and spoke before Congress. I’ve watched this speech many times to great effect. It’s like something out of Shakespeare. After the worst week in American diplomacy of my lifetime, I watched it again. This time, it evoked something different. I’m sad, furious and humiliated, and I don’t know how any self-respecting American could feel otherwise.
Thanks to the president and his enablers, we’re watching the dangers of reckless nationalism present themselves in real time. I hope that in my lifetime we’ll be making amends with our allies. The full speech is very long, but I’d like to close this piece with just the last couple of paragraphs:
“Here we are together, facing a group of mighty foes who seek our ruin. Here we are together, defending all that to free men is dear. Twice in a single generation the catastrophe of world war has fallen upon us. Do we not owe it to ourselves, to our children, to tormented mankind, to make sure that these catastrophes do not engulf us for the third time?
” … It is not given to us to peer into the mysteries of the future. Still, I avow my hope and faith, sure and inviolate, that in the days to come the British and American peoples will, for their own safety and for the good of all, walk together in majesty, in justice and in peace.”
Michael McCool
Bethel Park
