Letter: A Pearl Harbor Day plea

To the Editor:

I write this on December 7, Pearl Harbor Day for those of us who were old enough to recall the events of that Sunday in 1941, a “day of infamy” as FDR proclaimed to Congress and the world. A joint session of Congress unanimously declared war the next day. America had entered World War II and committed itself to a total wartime footing.

Young and not-so-young men stretched in long lines to sign up to join the fight. “Rosie the Riveter” showed up to build the tanks, planes, ships, and material needed to fight a two-ocean war. She learned to drive, work shift work in the factories, had her own money, kept the home and family running and never looked back. World War II emancipated the American housewife!

I remember it all, from Hitler’s prewar tirades over shortwave radio to the frantic newscasters on WOR radio announcing the attack and the early successes of the Japanese army in the Pacific: Wake Island, the Philippines, and the Aleutian Islands.

I remember arriving at the Unadilla, New York train station late at night along with my mother and brother in April 1942 on our move to the farm. Our only companion was a veteran coming home in a plain pine box. I have always wished I had spoken to him that night and thanked him.

I remember VE Day and VJ Day and the horns blaring, people shouting and running into the streets. I remember the boys coming home, war brides and EVERYBODY in America pulling together. They married, built homes, built businesses, started families, and America prospered. We were the envy of the world.

I remember the respect and admiration shown to those who had served and returned and the hands held out to help them. What the heck has happened?

I am furious about the acceptance of the greed and the motives of US entrepreneurs and major firms who have sold out to the Chinese by investing in China and providing them with OUR technology to be used against America. Their greed is reprehensible and traitorous.

I am embarrassed by the way our forefathers are being degraded and attacked and their brilliant foresight in creating a better form of governance being forgotten and disrespected. Our history is being taken from us.

Proven ballot theft and tampering is a direct attack on our representative government and should be resolved in the courts, not the public arena. I would rather you steal my car than my vote.

I am disgusted and disappointed with our current crop of politicians and their “hangers on” on both sides of the aisle. What the heck is going on? Politicians and their families are being openly enriched via foreign agreements and diplomatic arm twisting. They should be prosecuted.

I am scared to death of the indoctrination of our children via the educational system into socialist values that have never worked elsewhere and often have led to communism and dictatorships. The denial of our history and our forefathers is in textbook 101 of their playbook. Have all our men and women who sacrificed so much in the many wars died in vain? If so, then shame on us.

Future generations are being buried in debt used to pay today’s proffered benefits. Much of that debt being owned by China and subject to being called at any time.

What can we do about it? Pay attention, do our homework. VOTE!

Pay less attention to the comics and the obituaries (just kidding) and more on the real news. Please read about Mussolini and his dictatorship, read about Hitler and the National Socialist Party, read about Greece and its civil war to defeat communism. Read about the Spanish Civil War, (complicated). Read about Cuba, Venezuela, and China. They all began with a socialist agenda and morphed into communism and then dictatorships.

Our press has been compromised, the airways as well and TV is only good for the weather and entertainment. Read about Bolivia. If you only read fiction, try George Orwell’s 1984. It’s only a story but given today’s state of affairs it’s a start.

Earle Peterson
Cooperstown