Dana Blankenhorn

Memorial Day During Wartime

Memorial Day was created to remember the Civil War.

It was controversial from the start, especially in the South. Southerners created their own Confederate Memorial Day, and state offices in my hometown still close for it. 

But what do you do when Memorial Day falls during War Time?

With foreign wars, we use it to pay tribute to our soldiers fighting “over there” for “freedom.” Memorial Days near the start of the Iraq War were especially poignant. We’ve now had people fighting, and dying, in Afghanistan for over 17 years.

But there’s another war going on right now. It’s a Civil War. Like the one that happened over 150 years ago, it’s being fought in 10,000 places. Because it’s a Civil War, however, it’s not acknowledged by both sides. Probably because all the casualties are, by the definition of warfare, civilians.

The 1978 Game: Our New Political Overlords

At this point in 1978, no one in politics saw oil coming.

I was getting ready to graduate from Northwestern, and would spend the next several months, mostly unemployed, back home in Houston, the capital of oil, before getting the job resulting in the picture to the right. People were becoming accustomed to the strange man in the White House and his scandals. His “Georgia Gang” of cronies was being derided as a political gang that couldn’t shoot straight.

But beneath the surface, economic change was brewing. Oil had been handed political power under Lyndon Johnson and found a ready embrace in the Nixon years thanks to former Governor John Connally, whose decision to switch sides seemed at the time like a small story but would later prove massive.

Oil didn’t want to become a Republican bulwark. They wanted to play both sides against each other. Carter, and his more liberal detractors, forced them into the Republican camp. During the 1978 campaign, and beyond, this would prove decisive.

We’re at a similar historical junction now. Washington is becoming accustomed to a strange man in the White House, and his scandals. His “Wall Street Gang” is being derided as a political gang that can’t shoot straight.

But beneath the surface, change is again brewing.

The Monument

The Civil War is still being fought. It can still be lost.

One way it’s being fought is through monuments.

Early in the 20th Century, groups of southerners seeking to glorify white supremacy and the “Lost Cause” built monuments in town squares around the country, including in DeKalb County, Georgia, where I live.

Stone Mountain is the largest such monument. There are many others. One sits in front of the old county courthouse in Decatur.

When these monuments are threatened, their supporters swarm, claiming they have nothing to do with treason, or white supremacy, but are simply meant to commemorate heroes and a part of American history.

It’s hard to fight them, on behalf of an empty town square.

Why Prejudice Doesn’t Pay

The current economic era is unique.

In the past, economies were driven by human labor, by land and its resources, by financial capital, or by infrastructure.

Technology is different.

Technology doesn’t require land, it can replace resources, and it doesn’t require massive amounts of low-skilled labor. Singapore (right), Hong Kong, Israel and Silicon Valley have none of these things.

What these and other tech centers have, is trained minds in abundance. They can create them. They can attract them. They nurture them. They give them what they need to thrive.