The Worst Generation

We owe a debt of gratitude to the Greatest Generation, which beat back authoritarianism around the globe. But today's Republican Party has made a mockery of that legacy.

Like millions of others, I was drawn to the Republican Party of Ronald Reagan standing in front of the Berlin Wall demanding, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” This was the America of John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who declared in his inaugural address:

“We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans — born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage — and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.

“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

That was the America my father spent three years in the South Pacific, 28 island landings, fighting to defend. This was the America that my uncle spent months in Europe fighting to defend until a German machine gun ambushed his patrol. He was shot six times and never fully recovered. Like so many of their generation, they returned home, rarely talked about their wars, and went about building a new life.

That Greatest Generation is now followed by the Worst Generation of Republican politicians. The legacy of the great defenders of freedom and liberty is now squandered and shamed by these Republicans. Their legacy is the Great Betrayal.

We live in a sad and depressing moment in American history, but it is not complicated. When Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction,” these Republicans all applauded and pledged fealty to that immutable truth. Now they are proving Reagan right.

Ours is not a complicated moment because cowardice is the easiest of human emotions to understand. No one asks soldiers running away from a battle, “What were they thinking?” We know. They were afraid to die. But we do constantly marvel and wonder at those who run toward the sound of guns, knowing for many it will be their last journey. Courage is unfathomable and mysterious. We honor acts of courage because we know these are the most noble acts of human existence. We build statues and erect monuments to courage so that they can serve as reminders of the best within us, inspiring and challenging each of us to honor the actions of the bravest by our actions.

There will be no statues or monuments erected to honor the men and women of the Republican Party who have broken faith with what it means to be an American. These are small, ordinary men and women who look around them and see they are surrounded by the small and ordinary and are comforted. Theirs is the mentality of the lynch mob. If I am one of so many, how could it be wrong?

There is a moral laziness in judging Republicans by the standards of their worst. Yes, it is clear that J.D. Vance is a broken soul when he says, “I don’t really care what happens to Ukrainians.” But that does not make the politicians who give fiery speeches defending Ukraine but then vote for Donald Trump and J.D. Vance any more admirable. Knowing what is right and then doing what is wrong is far more damning.

In the failed illusion of some bipartisan instinct, we should not compromise with those who have aided and abetted the Russian genocide in Ukraine. Reject the “Jeffrey Dahmer didn’t eat everybody” defense. For these Republicans, “Never Again” became just another meaningless marketing slogan. Disney has more moral standing when it calls their parks “The Happiest Place on Earth.” They don’t believe it; they know it just sounds good.

We should never lose sight that Republicans can end the evil that is creeping over America at any time. No one is asking them to take a beach or charge a machine gun. No one is forcing them to support a president who Russia helped elect and now is delivering for Russia in ways that not even the most vodka-drenched FSB colonel dared hope. They can do what Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney, Adam Kinzinger, and a handful of others have done. They stood up for what they knew was right, and lo and behold, they still walk the earth. They are not superhuman or Gods, just decent human beings. You could be the same.

Winston Churchill said of the Battle of Britain pilots, “Never was so much owed to so few.” To these cowardly Republicans, we can only say, “Never was so few to blame for so much.” The murdered innocents in Ukraine are your legacy. An America that votes in the U.N. with Russia and North Korea is your legacy. You go to bed and wake up, hoping that shame is an endangered species headed to extinction.

But you know you have failed the moral test of our time. You know the face you see in the mirror is a coward. You will be remembered without respect. You have allowed evil to sit at America’s table and feast on what is good and right about our country.

May God have mercy upon your souls. History will have none.