This is Floyd Wynne with THE VIEW FROM HERE    11-09-04

            Yesterday was my four score and six birthday.   I don’t feel any older but the calendar just won’t lie.

            Today, let me reminisce a bit about those many years.

            Born in a small town in North Dakota….I hadn’t been more than 400 miles from home during my first 23 years, but World War Two came along and I wound up in the Navy……seeing the world…..at least most of those Pacific islands.

            I can well recall a conversation aboard our ship during the closing days of the war when we were patrolling off the Tokyo harbor while the Japanese surrendered.

            The question of what would happen next came up.   There was great concern about Russia at that time since we had made depth charge runs on subs that were obviously Soviet.

            We were concerned that the Soviets were the only nation that could cause a future war, but that otherwise….America had emerged as the real superpower of the world, and that we could now expect a long reign of peace……..not so.

            Then came the Berlin airlift…the Berlin wall….and eventually that fell as did the Soviet Union as such.   Now…did we have peace?  Not so.

            I can remember returning home to my old radio job after the war to find that my salary was actually less then I was getting while in the navy…strange.   Even in 1946 I went to work in Montana for $100 a month….a reasonable salary at that time.

            Which makes me wonder where we are going.   Today the poverty level is somewhere around $25,000 a year.  Houses that rented in those days were about $25 month….$35 for the better homes……today…..500 and up.  

            Will it reach the point…..as it did long ago in China…and even in Germany where it takes a wheelbarrow of money to buy anything?

            And….superpower….yes, but we have not yet learned the lesson that we can’t impose our freedoms on other nations of the world…..that we hope all peoples of the world will appreciate and adopt our freedoms, but that as a superpower…we have great responsibilities also.   Already the European Union is rising to challenge us in Europe…and the Chinese are rising to challenge us in the Pacific.

            We have just come through a prolonged bitter presidential campaign, and all the pundits are talking about a divided America, but that is the nature of a free society, and is a sign of strength…not weakness. I remember my first political effort…I was 12…my father was a staunch Democrat for Al  Smith and I campaigned for Herbert Hoover.

            We do face one big threat……that of a dominant federal government.  At the moment the federal government intrudes into every facet of our lives as politicians seek a perfect world.   Our Constitution is on trial at almost every turn, and we, as Americans, must resist all efforts to twist and contort its meanings.

            At 86 I look back on a lifetime that has seen all too few peaceful years for our nation.  We have grown immensely, perhaps too freely on immigration.   At some point we must either bring the rest of the world on to our level…..or find ourselves descending to theirs.

            I also look back with few regrets.   I have been privileged to have done my best to make this nation a better place in my own way.  

            I would sum it up this way:   People today have a greeting, saying “Have a good day.”  My answer and philosophy has been…..”Every day is a good day….some are just better.”

            While most people 86 would be content to rest on their laurels….I hope to continue to bring you THE VIEW FROM HERE