 Our darkest days
... are here
By Andy Rooney
May 26, 2004
iranian.com
["Our
Darkest Days Are Here" is a commentary by Andy
Rooney that aired last Sunday (May 23) on "60
Minutes". I was not sure whether to just link it
or reproduce it. In the end I thought it was too good (important)
for
just a temporary link. You can also watch
the broadcast -- Jahanshah Javid]
If you were going to make a list of the great times in American
history, you'd start with the day in 1492, when Columbus got here.
The Revolution when we won our independence would be on the list.
Beating Hitler. Putting Americans on the moon.
We've had a lot of great days.
Our darkest days up until now have been things like presidential
assassinations, the stock market crash in 1929, Pearl Harbor,
and 9-11, of course.
The day the world learned that American soldiers had tortured
Iraqi prisoners belongs high on the list of worst things that ever
happened
to our country. It's a black mark that will be in the history
books in a hundred languages for as long as there are history books.
I hate to think of it.
The image of one bad young woman with a naked man on a leash
did more to damage America's reputation than all the good things
we've
done over the years ever helped our reputation.
What were the secrets they were trying to get from captured Iraqis?
What important information did that poor devil on the leash have
that he wouldn't have given to anyone in exchange for a crust
of bread or a sip of water?
Where were your officers? If someone told you to do it, tell
us who told you. If your officers were told – we should know
who told them. One general said our guards were "untrained." Well,
untrained at what? Being human beings? Did the man who chopped
off Nicholas
Berg's head do it because he was untrained?
The guards who tortured
prisoners are faced with a year in prison. Well, great. A year
for destroying our reputation as decent people.
I don't want them in prison, anyway. We shouldn't have to feed
them. Take away their right to call themselves American - that's
what I’d do. You aren't one of us. Get out. We don't want
you. Find yourself another country or a desert island somewhere.
If the order came from someone higher up, take him with you.
 In the history of the world, several great civilizations that
seemed immortal have deteriorated and died. I don't want to seem
dramatic
tonight, but I've lived a long while, and for the first time
in my life, I have this faint, faraway fear that it could happen
to
us here in America as it happened to the Greek and Roman civilizations.
Too many Americans don't understand what we have here, or how
to keep it. I worry for my grandchildren, my great-grandchildren.
I want them to have what I've had, and I sense it slipping away.
Have a nice day.
May is Mamnoon
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