May 4, 2011, Class acts
To give credit where due, and notwithstanding that he is going to make going to work in Lower Manhattan a living hell tomorrow, nonetheless, I really do commend the President on the sober and measured tone he has taken since announcing the successful hit execution mission to kill [or capture, of course] Osama bin Laden, resulting in the accused terrorist mastermind's death. Alas, it had to come to something like that... public trials would have denied OBL, KSM and the other accused masterminds of the one thing they wanted more than anything else-- martyrdom. They would also have demonstrated actual entitlement to our vaunted American exceptionalism, by showing that even in a moment of crisis, we held to our values. Instead, we went for the comparatively easy way out-- a bullet in the head and a burial at sea, proving that, in the end, we're no better than anyone else. That's just the way it is... a disappointment, to be sure... but is it really a surprise?
O.K. then. On to happier themes, and more positive aspirations: in honor of the 92nd birthday of this national treasure earlier in the week, and the fact that this song is as relevant as ever, for our second ever embedded video here at TTD, we give you the incomparable Pete Seeger, and "Bring 'Em Home." Take it away, Brother Pete (and feel free to sing along):