The problem is that Romney — unregenerate power player that he is — subverts his own advantage in this line of argument by going right to the bosom of his church to tap into the affluent Mormon communities that marble the nation. Blinded by his own naked ambition, he shoots himself in the foot. Jack Kennedy was much defter at exploiting his cultural heritage while arguing convincingly that he could insulate his public self from his private beliefs. But then, Mitt Romney is no Jack Kennedy. In terms of slick ambition, Romney might turn out to have more in common with Dan Quayle. Be wary, America; be very wary.
The case for an Armenian memorial
The Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, Mayor Thomas Menino, and the Greenway Conservancy advisory board chaired by well-respected corporate citizen Peter Meade all agree that a proposed monument commemorating the deaths of at least 600,000 Armenians in the Turkish-prosecuted genocide — the first historically recognized genocide — has no place in a park named after Rose Kennedy, located on land cleared by the Big Dig near the waterfront. We ask this simple and clearly inconvenient question: why not? Are these Boston worthies afraid of offending local Muslim sensibilities? Is their vision of the Rose Kennedy Greenway so sterile and so suburban as to hold that history should not punctuate the reality of this public space as it does so elegantly in the Public Garden and along the Commonwealth Avenue Mall? Our advice is simple: set a limit. Reserve space for a set number of monuments and memorials. Devise design requirements. And set a high-minded example by approving this worthy project. The august and historic Public Garden found a place for a tasteful and quietly moving memorial to local victims of the 9/11 attacks. The Holocaust is memorialized near Faneuil Hall. The Irish Potato Famine is remembered on Washington Street near Downtown Crossing. The firemen who fell battling the blaze that almost destroyed the Hotel Vendome, in 1972, are honored for their service on the nearby mall — although approval for that modest shrine required a shameful battle.
The Armenian slaughter, together with Hitler’s holocaust, Pol Pot’s massacre of his fellow Cambodians, and today’s carnage in the Sudan, stand as sad testimonies to mankind’s capacity for inhumanity. We memorialize tragic events such as these so that we may remember and learn. Surely in these early days of the 21st century we have it in our hearts to join in communion with our Armenian friends and neighbors, and together say: never again.
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