Remember Brian Willson*

Japanese Internment Camp, Tule Lake, CA 1945

At 8:15 this morning, did you feel just a little remorse? guilt? shame?

Does August 6th have any historical meaning in your life? Or is it just another day of wage slavery drudgery? Nose to the grindstone and all that crap.

Thirty or forty thousand human beings were instantly vaporized and more than a hundred thousand more died in the next few days - hideously and painfully - on this morning in 1945.

A very small atomic bomb, by today's standards, did them in. Dropped from a plane with Grand Old Flag on its fuselage manned by soulless crew of true blue American military servicemen.

Are American civilians responsible for such actions? Darn tootin' we are. Just like all the atrocities committed in our name to this day all over the world.

What are you doing about it? Laughing at my post and how incredibly naive and over sentimental it is? I would suspect the mean spirited American spirit would show through at this moment. Serious subjects are to be ridiculed in this country. People with a conscious are to be considered weirdos. Lining up behind the bully is what we do.

Maybe you might bring it up in conversation today and test those around you on their perspective. Who knows, you may prove me wrong and get a response of compassion and empathy. Or an expression of fear that "they" are lurking to bomb this country. "They" will, you know, because "they" can. We were "they" to them.

We could work to abolish this type of weaponry and that would be the moral thing to do. Now I'm a Pollyanna, not conversant in worldly affairs. Not able to discuss the nuances of political science or nuclear fission. Tilting at windmills, the genie is out of the bottle, the destroyer of worlds is unleashed and unstoppable. We, the future incinerated, don't have a voice. Is that the tone prevalent in this country today? We agree with the decision in 1945 and shouldn't be surprised when it happens here.

Your friend, coworkers and family will tell you when you bring the subject up today.