Being Thankful

[thedrifter]

November 21, 2006, 0:00 a.m.

Being Thankful
2006.

By Rich Lowry

It hasn’t been a banner year. The United States is bogged down in a dispiriting war in Iraq, and North Korea and Iran continue to flout Washington’s warnings and “red lines” with seeming impunity. But here are some things to be grateful for even in the Thanksgiving season of our discontent:


Democracy. We might be having trouble exporting it overseas, but it still works at home. If a political party becomes corrupt and ineffectual, the voters will find a way to force it from office, no matter how many institutional advantages it has stacked in its favor. The GOP just learned this lesson, and as soon as Democrats forget it, they will get a thumping of their own.


Milton Friedman. The late economist was one of the 20th century’s most effective advocates for freedom, helping extend free markets here at home and spread them to places like China. He was a great scourge of inflation and helped provide Ronald Reagan with the intellectual ammunition to slay it in the early 1980s. His life — and his legacy — is an enduring testament to the power of ideas.


The Wounded Warrior Project . More than 20,000 U.S. soldiers have been wounded in Iraq. The Wounded Warrior Project provides services to the most grievously injured and their families to help them return to civilian life.


Muhammad Yunus. He won the Nobel Peace Prize this year, which is not necessarily a recommendation, since the prize often goes to anti-American hucksters. But he deserved it. His idea of microcredits — giving extremely small loans to extremely poor people to help them start businesses — has been a revolutionary tool in fighting poverty.


YouTube. Politicians’ gaffes, late-night comics’ latest bits, inspired and zany clips from amateurs the world over — all a click or two away. Why didn’t someone think of this before?


The anti-race hustlers. Bill Cosby famously has spoken out about the cultural problems that hold African-Americans back more than racism or other structural obstacles. National Public Radio’s Juan Williams has added intellectual heft to Cosby’s argument with his new book, Enough. They are brave men.


Save the Chimps . It and other organizations provide care and spacious homes for chimpanzees that have been used — and often abused — in entertainment and medical research, or as people’s pets. Their work is featured in a new PBS documentary. If chimp advocates seem fanatical, it is only right that someone go out of his way for these intelligent and affecting creatures.


The pope. Whatever your faith or denomination, you have to be grateful that the West has such a figure, concerned with reconciling faith and reason, and operating always in the spirit of charity and love. Given other forms of religious expression the world has witnessed recently, this is a blessing indeed.


Saturday afternoons. Maybe college football has, as the critics say, become a terrible racket, distorting university life and the ideal of amateur athletics. But for the average viewer the only response can be, “Who cares?” It’s just too much fun.


Mukhtaran Bibi. This young Pakistani woman was sentenced to gang-rape by her village elders after her younger brother was accused of having a relationship with a woman of another tribe. She fought back and had — a rarity in Pakistan — her attackers prosecuted. She now is an internationally recognized voice for the rights of Pakistani women, who are often punished for being raped. The country’s lower house has just passed a change in the country’s sick rape laws, a baby step toward civilized norms.


Marine Cpl. Jason Dunham. He was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously for falling on a grenade to save his fellow Marines from the blast. That sort of sacrifice and bravery is typical of U.S. troops in Iraq, but it is too often ignored. The New York Times didn’t mention Dunham’s incredible act, or his medal, even though he was from upstate New York. We should never forget.

[thedrifter]

Not Much Thanksgiving for Episcopalians
By Mark Tooley
Published 11/22/2006 12:07:18 AM

Supposedly, it was Anglicans in Virginia who celebrated the First Thanksgiving rather than Puritan Congregationalists in Massachusetts.

Steadfast Virginians believe that the first celebratory autumn feast was held at Berkeley Plantation in 1619, where 38 men just arrived from England knelt on the banks of the James River. They declared: "Wee ordaine that the day of our ships arrivall at the place assigned for plantacon in the land of Virginia shall be yearly and perpetually keept holy as a day of Thanksgiving to Almighty God."

They probably did not eat as well as the Pilgrims at the Plymouth feast two years later. Instead of turkey, the new Virginians may have only had only bacon and peas, washed down by cinnamon water.

These English Anglicans had demographic goals somewhat similar to the Calvinist Pilgrims, though. They were going to settle and populate a whole continent, creating a nation and spreading the Christian faith.

In the mythology of the Religious Left, of course, these earliest of Americans were not only defrauders of the original tribes, they were also despoilers of the environment. Like good "fundamentalists," these hearty Protestants took the Bible too literally about being fruitful and multiplying. They also took too seriously the ostensible divine mandate placing the earth under man's dominion.

The spiritual descendants of those early English/Virginia Anglican pioneers are now correcting the divine record. New Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori recently told the New York Times that her fellow Episcopalians are proudly not procreating so as to spare the environment.

The Presiding Bishop was asked how many Episcopalians there are in the U.S. "About 2.2 million," Schiori responded. "It used to be larger percentagewise, but Episcopalians tend to be better-educated and tend to reproduce at lower rates than some other denominations. Roman Catholics and Mormons both have theological reasons for producing lots of children."

"Aren't Episcopalians interested in replenishing their ranks by having children," the New York Times asked.

"No," Schori replied. "It's probably the opposite. We encourage people to pay attention to the stewardship of the earth and not use more than their portion."

True to Schori's boast, the Episcopalians have done magnificently in reducing their numbers and, purportedly, sparing the earth the ravages of an enlarged Episcopalian presence. Forty years ago, the Episcopal Church was over 50 percent larger than today, even while the U.S. population was 40 percent smaller.

Had the Episcopalians maintained the same ravenous membership pace of Roman Catholics, or Mormons, or Southern Baptists, over the last 40 years, there would now be somewhere between six and 8 million Episcopalians in the U.S., rather than the current 2 million.

Undoubtedly, the 2003 election of the Episcopal Church's first openly homosexual bishop has accelerated that denomination's decline, with increasing numbers of conservative church members giving up and walking out. Perhaps those Episcopalians who become Catholic or Baptist will soon thereafter become more procreative.

But the remnant Episcopalians under the pastorship of Presiding Bishop Schori no doubt will hold fast to their noble environmental stewardship and maintain a steady, and eco-friendly, downward membership spiral. A good model for the Episcopalians might the Shakers, the early American sect that foreswore all procreation. Like Episcopalians, the Shakers lived in tasteful and tidy villages, ate plain food, wore all natural fibers, and had nice furniture. The Shakers also had a female leader, "Mother" Ann Lee. Like Bishop Schori, Mother Lee took a dim view of heterosexual couples marrying and having children.

Unlike the Episcopalians, the Shakers worshipped by shouting, dancing, and shaking in fits of ecstasy for hours. In stark contrast, Episcopalians sit quietly or sleep through 50-minute worship services occasionally interrupted by soft organ music. Also unlike the Episcopalians, the Shakers made converts to their faith and inducted orphans into their communities.

But eventually, the Shakers aversion to procreation caught up with them and they were dying out by the end of the 19th century. Today, most Shaker villages are museums or private homes, just as many venerable old Episcopal churches have become restaurants or condominiums for yuppies. A few eccentric Shakers still survive, making baskets and furniture, and keeping the old ways alive. Some day in future decades, if Bishop Schori is completely successful, the Episcopal Church similarly will have reduced to a dozen or so well-heeled adherents. They too will be objects of pleasant curiosity, attracting tourists to their tidy, ivy-covered tudor homes and well-stocked wine closets.

Like the Episcopalians, the Shakers were great conservationists. They depopulated and left behind only their tracks, along with quaint relics. Both Shakers and Episcopalians must find distasteful the more fecund religious movements around the world, whose members continue to marry, birth multiple children, and take up space.

There are now nearly 80 million Anglicans around the world, for example, and their numbers are increasing exponentially, especially in Africa. Forty years ago, for example, the number of Anglicans in Nigeria was somewhat smaller than the number of Episcopalians in the U.S. Today, there are 20 million Nigerian Anglicans, all of them no doubt polluting and contributing mightily to global warming. Bishop Schori must be aghast.

But the growing Anglican communion, like nearly all growing religious groups, view people as gifts from God, not as parasites on an exploited planet earth. And like the hearty Anglicans and Puritans who celebrated America's first Thanksgivings almost four centuries ago, they see the world as still an unexplored adventure, waiting to be unwrapped, enjoyed, and meriting thanks to a God in whose image all people were made.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Giving Thanks
By Lisa Fabrizio
Published 11/22/2006 12:07:01 AM

Before the holiday which dare not speak its name commences, we are visited by one that in some ways has retained its original trappings. Thanksgiving Day, whose celebration predates the formation of the United States government, has somehow managed to survive secular attacks; though the idea of exactly who we are to thank is getting a bit confused.

While President Bush in his Thanksgiving Day proclamation states, "[W]e thank God for His blessings and ask Him to continue to guide and watch over our Nation," the Republican governor of my state of Connecticut, Jodi Rell, proclaimed, "I urge all our citizens to join me in expressing our deepest gratitude to those who touch our lives everyday and in extending a healing hand of hope to those who need it most."

So, as a good and loyal Nutmegger, I will thank a few folks who have touched my life in the past year. But in keeping with the proper religious nature of the holiday, I'll express my gratitude to those who have done so in ways that speak to higher things.

My first bouquet of thanks goes to 6th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Richard Suhrheinrich, who, writing for the majority in the ACLU v. Mercer County -- where a display of the Ten Commandments in a Kentucky courthouse was allowed to remain -- stated what most conservatives have been shouting for years:

The ACLU makes repeated reference to "the separation of church and state." This extra-constitutional construct has grown tiresome. The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state.

In anticipation of an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, and musing on the mess it has made of the 1st Amendment, he went on to deliver the judicial quote of the year: "Thus, we remain in Establishment Clause purgatory." The Wisdom of Solomon it seems, is alive and well, at least in Kentucky.

Although it continues to take some odd political stances, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops scored a bull's-eye earlier this year by fulfilling its most important role, which is to inform the faith of American Catholics. In response to an odious, disingenuous document released by 55 Catholic Democrats -- in which they contended that although their party supports abortion and gay marriage, they are in accord with the Church on issues like the death penalty, immigration, gun control and increasing the minimum wage -- the USCCB released this:

Above all, the common outcry, which is justly made on behalf of human rights -- for example, the right to health, to home, to work, to family, to culture -- is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination.

And while on the subject of the Catholic Church, here's a shout-out to its German shepherd, Pope Benedict XVI. His remarks on the incompatibility of Islam and reason sparked a debate that had heretofore gone unrealized. No less than a French philosophy teacher, Robert Redeker (who remains in hiding for his life), was inspired to write:

In the opening up to others, specific to the West, a secularization of Christianity appears, whose bottom line is summarized as follows: the other person must always pass in front of me. The Westerner, the heir to Christianity, is to be the one to make his soul exposed. He runs the risk of passing himself off as weak.

With the same ardor as Communism, Islam treats generosity, broadmindedness, tolerance, gentleness, freedom of women and of manners, democratic values, as signs of decadence. These are the weaknesses that it seeks to exploit, by means of "useful idiots," those of good consciences imbued with fine sentiments, in order to impose the Koranic order on the Western world itself.

And so we must always give thanks to the guardians of our Western values, those who stand between us and the tyrannies that confront us; our valiant troops serving around the globe. They are truly a gift from God to the nation they serve and living proof that, "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."

On a personal note, I'd like to add my thanks to God for his many blessings on me this year, which included traveling a bit of our great country by steamboat to see his handiwork up close and meditate on its beauty. And more importantly, after a trip to Calcutta, India, a reaffirmation of the feelings of immense gratitude to him and my grandparents for making me an American.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Ten things to be thankful for this time of year
From freedom's march abroad to brave US soldiers, there is much to appreciate.

By John Hughes
SALT LAKE CITY

For years now, I've made it a practice in this column at Thanksgiving time to list some of the things for which Americans should be grateful. Here's my 10-point list for this year:

1. National elections at midterm which, though they were beset by vocally sharp and caustic language at times, brought about a power change in Washington peacefully and in orderly fashion. That is not always the case in lands elsewhere where democracy does not rule.

2. A strong American economy that has survived recession, 9/11 terrorist attacks, and a war in Iraq. A rising stock market and low unemployment are testimony to the economy's buoyancy.

3. A trial in Baghdad which, despite rotating judges and assassinated participating attorneys, has with reasonable fairness under Iraqi law, pronounced Saddam Hussein guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced him for them. Whether he dies or lives, Mr. Hussein will not again commit murder against his own people, or his perceived enemies elsewhere.

4. Although jihadist violence remains a major, and perhaps growing, threat, the influence and leadership of Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda organization appear to be fading.

5. A volunteer US Army that has performed bravely in Afghanistan and Iraq and deserves the support and thanks of its nation. In a few instances where individual soldiers have behaved badly, they have borne the full brunt of military justice.

6. A shift from unilateral to multilateral diplomacy on the part of the Bush administration. This is particularly evident in the case of North Korea, where the administration has opted for six-party diplomacy and enlisted China as the leading participant to bring pressure to bear on Pyongyang. Though North Korea may not, in the end, give up its pursuit of nuclear weapons, no US military action against North Korea is on the horizon.

7. Though some snicker at President Bush's conviction that all men deserve to be free (for being unsophisticated), the desire to be free is a powerful motivation for mankind. Though people in some lands, particularly in the Islamic crescent of the Middle East, remain in bondage, democracy of one kind or another continues to make strides. Freedom House, the nonprofit monitoring agency, says the picture remains "distinctly positive," citing broad scope for open political competition, respect for civil liberties, independent civic life, and independent media.

8. The amazing advance of technology. Years ago, this column would have been written on a typewriter. Today, it is written on a computer which moves it in nanoseconds from anywhere in the world to its editing destination.

For journalists, businessmen, and students, the laptop and cellphone in this age are no more than omnipresent extensions of arms and fingers. To be sure, there are negatives: Bloggers without credibility spread misinformation to the unwary.

But overall, the ben- efits of this new technology are immense. We can only guess at the marvelous innovations to come.

9. New leaders ahead: America's political system may seem unwieldy, but the length of a presi- dential campaign and the extraordinary pressures it imposes upon candidates have a way of letting the voters discard the fragile and move the worthy along. Already for 2008 we have an array of Republicans and Democrats, many with impressive credentials, who seek the presidency and could be president. More will emerge to submit themselves to the scrutiny of inquiring journalists, doubting opponents, and finally the electorate. The system works - and usually spawns the best.

10. Tackling the energy crisis. Gasoline prices may have fallen, but their recent highs have awakened many to the need to tackle the problem of increasing oil consumption around the world in the long-term face of declining supply. China's extraordinary economic development has made it a voracious consumer, cutting deals with oil producers in Latin America, and Africa, and wherever else oil can be acquired. Talk of making the US independent of foreign oil is fanciful. The answer is to reduce the consumption of foreign oil as much as possible, but to discover and harness alternatives to oil. Thus the emphasis must be on cars that use less gasoline, while finding alternatives such as ethanol, and at the same developing solar power, wind power, and other power as alternatives to oil for heating and other domestic purposes.

Experts are divided about the time when natural sources of oil will dry up. But we should be thankful that at last Americans are beginning to focus on this issue that may bring serious problems for generations to come.

In the meantime, happy Thanksgiving.

• John Hughes, a former editor of the Monitor, is editor and chief operating officer of the Deseret Morning News.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

November 22, 2006, 0:00 a.m.

Special Thanks
A military tradition.

By W. Thomas Smith Jr.

Civilians making their way past American military bases and checkpoints in Iraq this Thanksgiving may be surprised to find senior American non-commissioned officers and commissioned officers guarding the gates and manning the wire — duties normally reserved for young enlisted soldiers. If the Iraqis were to venture inside the compounds, they might see the regular rank-and-file American G.I. feasting on everything from roast turkey to roast-beef to sweet-potato pie and every kind of cake and confectionary treat imaginable, all served by the officers.

It’s part of a long-standing Thanksgiving tradition in the U.S. Army where senior leaders serve junior soldiers.

Before and after the meal, there will be special religious services. There will be downtime to watch DVDs and e-mail family members back home. And there will be at least two big in-country competitions. “Thanksgiving is the ‘Super Bowl’ for our cooks,” Major Jay Adams, an Army spokesman based at Camp Anaconda (in the Iraqi city of Balad), tells National Review Online. “There will be patriotic ice sculptures and other displays, and the commanding general will recognize the top dining facility and individual cooks in various categories.”

The highlight of the day will be the big “Turkey Bowl” football game played between the Army and the Air Force at Camp Anaconda.

Stateside bases are planning their own feasts.

At Fort Jackson, S.C. — the largest Army basic-training base in the nation — nearly 7,000 pounds of turkey; 4,600 pounds of ham; 4,200 pounds of beef; 2,600 pounds of shrimp; more than 900 pounds of duck; 2,100 pies of every variety; and over 300 gallons of eggnog will be served to 14,000 soldiers and civilian guests. And like the expeditionary camps overseas, Thanksgiving dinner at stateside bases will be served by officers. And, when practicable, the officers will be wearing their dress-blue uniforms.

“This is done around the world,” Fort Jackson spokesman Jim Hinnant, a retired Army Lt. Col. tells NRO. “Soldiers get a kick out of it, as do the officers.”

ALL SERVICES CELEBRATE
The Marine Corps, also big on tradition, has a different approach for recruits on Thanksgiving Day. At the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, S.C., it will be business as usual. “The recruits will have the traditional turkey dinner, but that’ll be about it,” Cpl. Brian Kester, Parris Island’s media chief, tells NRO.

The reason, according to Kester’s boss, 1st Lieutenant Scott Miller, the public-affairs officer at Parris Island, “We want recruits to stay focused on one thing, and that is becoming a United States Marine.”

That doesn’t mean there won’t be special Thanksgiving meals and services for other stateside-based and deployed Marines. The past two years in Iraq for instance, Marines who were not out on combat patrols were given time to attend Thanksgiving worship services, e-mail the folks back home, and have dinner in chow halls festooned with cardboard pilgrims, turkeys, and autumn oak leaves. And the food included everything from prime rib to pumpkin pie.

It’s the same for all branches of service.

“The military does its very best to provide the same sort of Thanksgiving Day meal that soldiers would be getting back home, within the limits of what can be done on deployments in combat,” says Hinnant.

But Thanksgiving has not always been celebrated with the abundance and festive air it is in today’s military.

EVOLUTION OF A TRADITION
A day of “Thanksgiving” has been recognized in America since the colonial era: The first Thanksgiving said to be a three-day harvest-celebration in 1621.

During the American Revolution, Gen. George Washington proclaimed a day of thanksgiving to coincide with a victory celebration after the British defeat at Saratoga in 1777.

But it wasn’t until President Abraham Lincoln’s proclamation in 1863 — during the American Civil War — that Thanksgiving Day became an annual federal holiday. In his official proclamation, Lincoln called on all Americans “to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next [later changed to the fourth Thursday in November], as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”

The following year, a few U.S. military units celebrated with prayers to God, toasts to the nation and to their families, and a special dinner; but the U.S. Commissary was stretched far too thin to provide a special meal for the entire wartime army.

The Union League Club of New York City did, however, launch a campaign aimed at providing special Thanksgiving Day meals for all Union soldiers, sailors, and Marines in 1864. But it would be another 50-plus years, during America’s 1917-1918 involvement in World War I, that Thanksgiving became a special day for the military celebrated with a traditional dinner, and a reflection upon — according to President Woodrow Wilson — “the great blessings God has bestowed upon us.”

IN PEACE AND WAR
During the period between the world wars, Thanksgiving dinners in the military became increasingly special. The military services being smaller in those peacetime years were more conducive to closer bonding. Officers’ families were very involved. Food preparation and presentation became more elaborate, and dinners included printed menus with holiday artwork featuring harvest scenes with turkeys and pumpkins combined with eagles, banners, and military crests.

During World War II (1941-1945), near Herculean efforts were made to transport hot Thanksgiving dinners to troops on the frontlines or in the most remote areas. Meal convoys were often under fire as they made their way toward even the most heavily engaged troops on the most dangerous roads and in the worst weather conditions. Those soldiers who could be rotated off the frontlines were ordered to the rear for Thanksgiving dinner and much needed rest.

On Thanksgiving Day in Korea, 1950, U.S. troops (just days before being attacked en masse along the bitter-cold Chosin Reservoir) remember cooks driving out to the forward-most positions. There they opened up huge insulated containers and served up turkey with all the trimmings on tin trays. “You had to eat fast because everything was turning cold,” said William Davis, a U.S. Navy hospital corpsman with the 1st Marine Division. “The gravy and then the mashed potatoes froze first. The inside of the turkey was still warm. Boy, you ate fast. And all the time the snipers were shooting at us.”

A DAY FOR SOLDIERS AND SAILORS
In 1967-68, during the height of the Vietnam War, the Armed Forces Recipe Service was established which standardized recipes and helped coordinate food planning and prep efforts between all services. Consequently, though the menus may vary today between services and theaters of operation, the recipes used to prepare most of the Thanksgiving Day dishes in the military are the same. And with the exception of more choices, the menus have changed little since World War I. Turkey has always been served; as has dressing, cranberry sauce, gravy, and pies — with pumpkin pie being the most prevalent.

Gone are the days when many soldiers and sailors complained about “Army food” and “Navy chow.” And no one today is griping about the military’s special Thanksgiving Day fare.

There are also surprises for the military on Thanksgiving Day, from unannounced presidential visits to dinners shared with cabinet officials, congressmen, and others. Most of all, it is the meal, the downtime, worship services, football action, and touching base in a written letter, an instant message, or a satellite phone call to the folks back home.

“For the 30 to 45 minutes we'll be in the dining facility with our friends and colleagues, most will reflect on Thanksgivings from the past,” Army Colonel Michael Negard, with the Multi-National Security Transition Command in Baghdad, tells NRO. “Everyone is thankful for various reasons. Some for the basic reason they are able to meet, eat, and remember, because there are some whose Thanksgiving of 2005 was their last.”

The U.S. military takes care of its own on Thanksgiving Day. We Americans might take it for granted that the military should: believing it probably always has. But few — if any — armies or navies in history have ever done for its troops what the 21st-century American military does for its men and women. Thanksgiving Day is not only a federally recognized holiday, it is an important official tradition in the American military. And make no mistake, officers and soldiers alike know that it is a day of giving thanks to God.

— A former U.S. Marine infantry leader, W. Thomas Smith Jr. writes about military issues and has covered conflict in the Balkans and on the West Bank. He is the author of five books, and his articles appear in a variety of publications.

Ellie