Happy PH Remembrance Day

remembering the event that got us into the unnecessary war

“‘Unnecessary’, you say?! How dare you imply that WW2, as far as America is concerned, was the most righteous, justified and glorious war in the annals of time!”

Take it easy. I’m merely pointing out here that long before Pat Buchanan wrote his best-seller, Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War, Montana congresswoman Jeannette Rankin was asking pertinent questions. Read on.

They called me at five after seven this morning, to see if I’d substitute at the high school.

-What class is it?

-Special Ed, paraprofessional.

I got stuff to do. How am I gonna find time to create and run BBR, Discovery School, and Golden Triangle Tours if I pick up every gig that comes my way? (not to mention keep up with this blog). I was tempted to refuse and get a little more sleep.

But whattya gonna do, say no to the special ed kids? Who do you think I am, the Grinch? Plus, I need the coin. Until I’m back to regular, paid work, be it pond cleaning or entrepeneuring, I’ll be schlepping somewhere.

“I can give you a half day, then I have to go.”

All the flags but one were at half mast down at the combined elem/jr./HS complex. It didn’t occur to me why the flags were at half mast, and to be honest, I wasn’t that interested. Half-masting the flag has become a bit like participation awards, ubiquitous and frequent. In the office when I checked in, the secretary was taking a call from someone who was asking about the flag at half mast. She was trying to google the answer.

When I got to my first class and was taking attendance and had to fill in the date, I realized it was the 7th. Just to confirm I asked the class, “Hey, is today Pearl Harbor Day?”

A couple boys in the class confirmed it. The question didn’t seem to interest the girls as much. I decided to do a whiz-bang, off the cuff talk on Jeannette Rankin. When I got to the part where I told them she was the only vote against WW2, I said, “I’m not going to tell you whether I think she was right or wrong about that, but you really ought to look her up.”

It didn’t occur to me to have them look for my kla special presentation on Rankin and PH. They all carry Chrome books and I could have given them the URL right there.

Just as an aside, the kids I taught today didn’t strike me as ‘special ed’. That word is kind of a synonym for the old epithet, ‘retard’, is it not? There needs to be another term, because these kids seemed like they could be quite sharp and capable, if not academic. Some day, those boys at least will be welding, plumbing, farming or building and making more money than I ever did.

Anyway, the reason for this post is to direct anyone who hasn’t seen it to the KLA presentation on Rankin.

And they just came out with a dubbed, German version. Bernd, my Frankfurt-team colleague who does my voice in German (most excellently I might add), told me the video was today’s KLA/German feature video. Now I expect the video to get views into the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. If only I had done a Japanese version for kla/Japan and my Odyssey channel, JAFA (Japan-America Friendship Association). If anyone should have an interest in the lead up to PH, it’s the Japs! I told myself to do it a year ago, and haven’t gotten around to the translation. Maybe during the winter holiday I’ll get on that.

The German PH vid

The English PH vid