May 30, 2016

Memorial Day: Do we find the cost of freedom / Buried in the ground?

Gathering poppies in central Israel (2009)
I first published this post on Memorial Day in the USA in 2009

Find the cost of freedom
Buried in the ground.
Mother Earth will swallow you;
Lay your body down.

It's the refrain of an old Crosby, Stills & Nash song by Steven Stills that I first heard in the early 1970s. Today, I was humming it while listening to Bob Edwards interviewing on XM radio several members of the Navy’s Third Medical Battalion, which served alongside the Third Marine Division during the Vietnam War.

For today is Memorial Day when we are called to remember and pay tribute to our service men and women, whether they died on native soil or overseas in German forests or on British coasts, in the jungles of Vietnam or atop the mountains of Afghanistan, or in the sands and urban jungles of Iraq. And while we honor those who sacrificed their lives responding to their country's call to duty, we are also called to address the forces that drive men to war.

Reworking the Crosby, Stills & Nash antiwar anthem
A couple of years ago, in Bountiful, Utah, Scott Wright crafted a video of his photos set to the folk rock supergroup's classic, "Find The Cost Of Freedom." Scott explains, "Their songs carry so much meaning. My thanks to my nephews Ben and James for letting me use their photos in this compilation, both of whom are currently active in the US military; and to my Father Warren Wright who served in WWII. I hope you will watch it in the spirit in which it was made of Peace and Love...one day we will get to the place where there is no more war...of this I am certain."

Watch the video (4:32 minutes). The lyrics are below the screen.



Daylight again,
Following me to bed.
I think about a hundred years ago,
How my fathers bled...

I think I see a valley,
covered with bones in blue.
All the brave soldiers
That cannot get older 'been
Askin' after you.

Hear the past a callin',
From Armageddon's side.
When everyone's talkin'
And no one is listenin',
How can we decide?

Do we find the cost of freedom
Buried in the ground?
Mother Earth will swallow you;
Lay your body down.
(Repeat x2)

Lay your body down...
Lay your body down....

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May 05, 2016

Extermination Categories (poster) in the Museum of the Liberation of Rome

Extermination Categories (poster)

This poster is among documents and artifacts in the Museum of the Liberation of Rome, the former headquarters of the Gestapo terror apparatus during the German occupation of Rome during World War II. The building contained a prison where the Gestapo incarcerated and tortured members of the Italian Resistance, mostly Jews and political opponents (including, Jews). 

The museum displays newspaper reports of anti-Jewish orders and bans; resistance underground manifestos and handbills; photos and biographies of members ambushed and shot in streets, theaters, offices, research laboratories; blood-stained clothing; and torture tools. In some torture cells, prisoners often nearing death etched or drew on the plaster walls messages and graffiti on life and freedom.

On this somber day in Israel, we are marking Holocaust Remembrance and Heroism Day to remember approximately 6 million Jews, among them 1.5 million children who were annihilated during the Holocaust. As we pledge to never forget, remember also 5 million more who perished during this tragic episode in human history, including Gypsies/Roma, Serbs, Polish intelligentsia, resistance fighters from all nations, German opponents of Nazism, homosexuals, Jehovah Witnesses, people with disabilities, habitual criminals, and the "antisocial" — beggars, vagrants, and hawkers.

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