On December 7, 1941, elements of the Japanese military attacked U.S. ships at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. At the request of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the U.S. declared war the next day, effectively entering World War II around the world. One internal consequence was the imprisonment of some Japanese American families in internment camps.
Sixty-seven years later, today, December 7, 2008, President-Elect Barack Obama will appoint U.S. General Eric Shinseki as Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Shinseki is Japanese American. He is the first Obama appointee of cabinet rank to be of Asian descent. Both he and the President-elect who appointed him were born in Hawaii.
He will be responsible for U.S. military veterans. His numerous charges with the most pressing problems are veterans of Iraq. Shinseki is best known as the General who told Rumsfeld and other Bushites that they would need far more troops for a far longer time than they had planned to take and hold Iraq. For that he was fired.
And among his charges are a very small number of veterans of World War II.
Is this a great country or what? The land of reconciliation, as well as irony. And of looking forward.
4 days ago
3 comments:
There's a new fashion in spam--the tangentially related "comment" that's really an ad. It looks like some bot or another finds key words and automates a "comment." I've let some of them stay but no more. Sorry.
Thanks for telling us about this. Obama is breaking down barriers right and left. I wonder how many Asian Americans have served on cabinets? Or how many non-white men have served on cabinets? Thank God the age of white men is coming to a close (I hope). Now if only Eureka would catch up.
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