CAUSE FOR OUTRAGE:

The treatment of two of our candidates who served our country with distinction.

I have winced—ashamed—when I have read the mocking abuse heaped on Dave Israel by two of our most vocal "malcontent" women about the thirty years he spent working with America's classified code-breaking institution, the NSA. Without knowing the facts, they have spoken with derision about his service, suggesting he was no more than a desk jockey at best. Dave gave the best years of his life in an important post for the security of you and me.

Now I wince with shame at the nitpicking abuse heaped on Ed Black, who, remarkably like Dave in some ways, served in our military with great distinction. Dave was in the army before he was tapped to work for the National Security Agency in cryptanalysis.  Ed served in the US Air Force during the Vietnam War period. Stationed overseas, he was a translator of Chinese, producing classified information which was sent to the NSA. His work was highly classified, and Ed can divulge very little of it to this day. There is a remarkable similarity in what the two, Dave and Ed Black, did. For the nation. For you and for me.

Ed Black was handpicked out of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Air Force personnel to learn the very difficult language of Mandarin Chinese. Translators are usually sent to military schools, but because of the importance and difficulty of learning Chinese, Ed was sent to Yale University and learned to speak the language fluently in nine months. You don't get sent to Yale unless you are pretty smart. What Ed Black did in the intelligence field is rare compared to being a CPA.

Yet Ed is criticized by his opposition in this election because he didn't go to Yale for four years and get a degree! I wonder sometimes how low you can sink in vilifying those who have given a vital part of their lives for their country and now do the same for the Village. It is the "man in the arena" who deserves recognition, the person who gets things done—not always perfectly, but who steadfastly moves us forward.

I am glad that most of us recognize and respect the service men and women among us, and that (thank you, Joy Vestal, for your lead in this) the Village is a major contributor to the Washington D.C. honor flight program.

Remember them—the doers—I urge you, when you vote this Friday, and send a message to the critics and naysayers who do nothing themselves but stand on the sidelines, expostulating about often unsubstantiated details.