Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Harry S. Truman, Diary, July 25, 1945

President Truman told his diary on July 25, 1945, that he had ordered the atomic bomb used.

Emphasis has been added to highlight Truman’s apparent belief that he had ordered the bomb dropped on a “purely military” target, so that “military objectives and soldiers and sailors are the target and not women and children.”

An image of the diary page is included below the text.

We have discovered the most terrible bomb in the history of the world. It may be the fire destruction prophesied in the Euphrates Valley Era, after Noah and his fabulous Ark.

Anyway we “think” we have found the way to cause a disintegration of the atom. An experiment in the New Mexico desert was startling — to put it mildly. Thirteen pounds of the explosive caused the complete disintegration of a steel tower 60 feet high, created a crater 6 feet deep and 1,200 feet in diameter, knocked over a steel tower 1/2 mile away and knocked men down 10,000 yards away. The explosion was visible for more than 200 miles and audible for 40 miles and more.

This weapon is to be used against Japan between now and August 10th. I have told the Sec. of War, Mr. Stimson, to use it so that military objectives and soldiers and sailors are the target and not women and children. Even if the Japs are savages, ruthless, merciless and fanatic, we as the leader of the world for the common welfare cannot drop that terrible bomb on the old capital or the new.

He and I are in accord. The target will be a purely military one and we will issue a warning statement asking the Japs to surrender and save lives. I’m sure they will not do that, but we will have given them the chance. It is certainly a good thing for the world that Hitler’s crowd or Stalin’s did not discover this atomic bomb. It seems to be the most terrible thing ever discovered, but it can be made the most useful...

    Truman quoted in Robert H. Ferrell, Off the Record: The Private Papers of Harry S. Truman (New York: Harper and Row, 1980) pp. 55-56. Truman’s writings are in the public domain.

Reflect: Viewer Reaction to Sen. Ted Kennedy's Chappaquiddick speech, July 25, 1969:



Washington Evening Star TV grid published July 25, 1969. Sen. Ted Kennedy's Chappaquiddick speech squared off against "Truth or Consequences" and Front page of the Chicago Tribune the day after Sen. Ted Kennedy's televised Chappaquiddick speech.




Front page of the Boston Globe...




Sen. Ted Kennedy delivers his Chappaquiddick speech July 25, 1969.


A lot of parallels & rhyming to the late 60s political fevor. Human behavior surrounding politics doesn't really change and many will still vote for Biden, now Harris or whomever the Dems decide to run against Trump. The more things change, the more we stay the same on the wheel, err roller coaster of politics.

In his 2008 memoir "Counselor," speechwriter Ted Sorensen (1928-2010) briefly addresses his role in writing Ted Kennedy's Chappaquiddick speech. He also mentions a disastrous appearance on The David Frost Show on August 30, 1969.



One difference between that media era and today was the serendipity of "appointment" TV viewing. Anybody tuning in just to catch the Baja Marimba band would incidentally learn Ted Kennedy wouldn't be elected president in 1972.

Baja Marimba Band - The Windmills Of Your Mind (1969)




July 25, 1976: The US Viking 1 space probe transmitted the famous "Face on Mars" photo which spanned decades of controversy. It captured the image of a pile of rocks that greatly resembled a human face, which NASA described as a "huge rock formation in the center which resembled a human head."




July 25, 1984: Soviet cosmonaut, Svetlana Savitskaya, became the first woman to walk in space, aboard Salyut 7. To this day, she remains the only Russian woman to have walked in space.




July 25, 2009: Henry Patch, English supercentenarian died at age 111. He was the last surviving combat soldier of the First World War from any country and he became widely known as: “The Last Fighting Tommy.” His death came seven days after that of fellow veteran Henry Allingham, the last veteran of The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) and founding member of The Royal Air Force (RAF), aged 113. Damn, I need some of that British longevity genetics.




Obscure nuke movie of the day is GROUND ZERO (1973) co-starring Melvin Belli (producer Star Trek, 1966).




Something I did not notice at the time I watched it...

James Woods “took one for the team”