Memorial

I usually do a Memorial Day post, so okay I ' m late this year. I noticed yesterday a common trope, about remember those who " died defending our freedom. " (Here, for example, the Veep.)  Err, no. Or for the most part no. The origins of Memorial Day are a bit obscure,but it appears that the earliest precedents were remembrances at the graves of Confederate dead, and indeed the first official observances were in former Confederate states. I ' ll grant you that the Union army dead had fought in the cause of freedom for people who are now at least nominally a part of our national community, so put one credit on the freedom side of the ledger.The next big war even, the Spanish-American War of 1898, was an imperialist war in which the U.S. seized many of Spain ' s overseas possessions, including Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. Although intervention in the Cuban war of independence against Spain was the proximal cause, this wasn ' t really about anybody ' s freedom -- certainly not ours. As for WWI, there ' s certainly a respectable argument to be made that intervention was in the U.S. interest and probably morally justifiable, but our freedom was most definitely not at stake, nor was the ultimate outcome any victory for freedom. U.S. involvement in WWII was inevitable and morally compelling. But Phillip K. Dick ' s alternative history aside, it is not really plausible that defeat would have meant Japanese and German occupation of parts of North America...
Source: Stayin' Alive - Category: American Health Source Type: blogs