The World According to Oatney

The Greatest Generation

Tonight will be the last night that Tom Brokaw is the anchor of the NBC Nightly News. I think we have to give Brokaw credit for being a brave soldier on the journalistic front lines all those years, even if I sometimes thought his coverage to be biased toward the left.

Perhaps Brokaw's greatest contribution to the national dialogue, however, was his book The Greatest Generation. In that august work, Brokaw pays tribute to the generation that both he and I believe left an example for the rest of us about what it means to be an American. This was the generation that came of age during the Great Depression and fought and won the Second World War. These people, which included two of my grandparents, understood the meaning of poverty, loss, and sacrifice perhaps better than any subsequent generation. When they returned from defeating fascism, they would spend their lives building America into the great hyper-power of the earth, and defeating the great manace of atheistic communism. Our country is forever in the debt of this sigularly special generation, placed by Providence in the right place at the right time. For saving the world we now enjoy, we owe them our eternal thanks.

posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 5:30 PM