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'We were the envy of the world'

Someone tweeted us this story from The Day in New London, Connecticut.
'We were the envy of the world'
'We were the envy of the world'

Someone tweeted us this story from The Day in New London, Connecticut. Larry Crowley, the guy in the Navy whites on the seesaw, served on submarines in World War II. Mr. Crowley came home safely, then went to college on the G.I. bill.

With help from the government, his generation -- including his friends on the seesaw -- had recovered from the war and built decent lives for themselves and their families by the time of President Kennedy's election in 1960. Mr. Crowley writes:

Oh, what a feeling that was! We stood tall and strong before the world. This was my America, one nation under God, with liberty and justice for all, a nation that President Abraham Lincoln reminded us was conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all me were created equal.We were the envy of the world.Not now. Consider the Iraq invasion. The real truth about that has not been told. Know this: The very wealthy made millions in a greedy contractor flim-flam while our heroic young men and women were at war, then political leaders refused to pay for that war.Our first order of business is simple; tell those very wealthy it was their war and they will pay for it. In the next election, demand that commitment from anyone running for office.

These days, a third of the young Mr. Crowleys come home to no work at all. The New York Times reports that the Obama administration has hired 85,000 veterans, and it's still not enough.

(The Day: Three guys on a seesaw: Today's vets come home to a very different nation)