Billy Beck, last October described the scene….
…during the recent island excursion, I happened to spend a few minutes in the atrium of Atlanta’s Hartsfield International Airport. (Oh wait… it’s now “Hartsfield-Race-Grifter-Maynard-Jackson International Airport”. I almost forgot.) Sitting there, I observed a line of troops in desert camo, standing two-abreast in the outlet of a corridor into the atrium space. On a signal, they took up their gear and began to move out, in column. They made their way through the atrium, and the whole place — perhaps three hundred people (it was early) — stood up as one, rendering a thunderous ovation for the whole time that the troops were in sight.
Lamed by the spectacle, I couldn’t move to get out my camera. I wish I had, though. It was terrific.
This description of Billy’s was my first thought as I watched this ad that the Budwiser folks ran during the Superbowl. If you didn’t happen to see it, check it out.
It shames me that so many Americans would find such a ‘welcome back’ out of the ordinary. That it is, in fact unusual is the shameful legacy left behind by the anti-Vietnam war nutcases. (Sigh) Which leads me, logically, to the question of what the anti-Iraq idiots have cost us? It’ll be decades before we get that list completed, I think. But it doesn’t take a great deal to understand that they’ve cost us more by far than they’ve given us.
Too bad I don’t get into airports much.
(Updated for flow and correction 0208051603)
Tags: BitsBlog
