{"id":1433,"date":"2003-07-14T17:05:20","date_gmt":"2003-07-15T07:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/2003\/07\/14\/great-minds-think-alike-and-so-do-ours\/"},"modified":"2019-12-05T11:23:45","modified_gmt":"2019-12-05T19:23:45","slug":"great-minds-think-alike-and-so-do-ours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/2003\/07\/14\/great-minds-think-alike-and-so-do-ours\/","title":{"rendered":"Great minds think alike (and so do ours)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class='__iawmlf-post-loop-links' style='display:none;' data-iawmlf-post-links='[{&quot;id&quot;:5168,&quot;href&quot;:&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.hanscomfamily.com&quot;,&quot;archived_href&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;redirect_href&quot;:&quot;https:\\\/\\\/www.hanscomfamily.com\\\/&quot;,&quot;checks&quot;:[],&quot;broken&quot;:false,&quot;last_checked&quot;:null,&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;},{&quot;id&quot;:13240,&quot;href&quot;:&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.djwudi.com\\\/longletter&quot;,&quot;archived_href&quot;:&quot;https:\\\/\\\/web-wp.archive.org\\\/web\\\/20050403220727\\\/http:\\\/\\\/www.djwudi.com:80\\\/longletter\\\/&quot;,&quot;redirect_href&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;checks&quot;:[{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-12 08:30:12&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:500},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-18 19:59:18&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:500},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-27 06:16:41&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:500},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-05 13:48:12&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:500}],&quot;broken&quot;:true,&quot;last_checked&quot;:{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-05 13:48:12&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:500},&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;},{&quot;id&quot;:14176,&quot;href&quot;:&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.djwudi.com\\\/longletter\\\/archives\\\/2003\\\/03\\\/23\\\/patriotism.php&quot;,&quot;archived_href&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;redirect_href&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;checks&quot;:[],&quot;broken&quot;:false,&quot;last_checked&quot;:null,&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;},{&quot;id&quot;:14177,&quot;href&quot;:&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.hanscomfamily.com\\\/archives\\\/2003\\\/07\\\/14\\\/a_personal_rant.php&quot;,&quot;archived_href&quot;:&quot;https:\\\/\\\/web-wp.archive.org\\\/web\\\/20030801144411\\\/http:\\\/\\\/www.hanscomfamily.com:80\\\/archives\\\/2003\\\/07\\\/14\\\/a_personal_rant.php&quot;,&quot;redirect_href&quot;:&quot;https:\\\/\\\/www.hanscomfamily.com\\\/archives\\\/2003\\\/07\\\/14\\\/a_personal_rant.php&quot;,&quot;checks&quot;:[],&quot;broken&quot;:false,&quot;last_checked&quot;:null,&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;}]'><\/div>\n<p>If you ever want to know a bit more about me, talk to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hanscomfamily.com\/\" title=\"The Hanscom Family Weblog\">my dad<\/a> for a while. Not necessarily about <em>me<\/em> &#8212; just talk to him. He&#8217;s a cool guy.<\/p>\n<p>Dad and I are a lot alike, and I realize that more all the time. That certainly had its fair share of disadvantages growing up (saying that we butted heads on a regular basis might be something of an understatement), but once I got old enough that we could handle approaching things as two adults rather than as a father and son perpetually at loggerheads, things evened out. I&#8217;m glad they did, too. Dad is, quite honestly, one of the most intelligent and well-rounded people I&#8217;ve met. You should see the library at my folks&#8217; house &#8212; heavy on philosophy, psychology, religion, and penguins (all good subjects to be heavy in, I&#8217;d say), but by no means limited to those subjects. Dad and I both have a tendency to investigate any little thing that peaks our interest, and it shows.<\/p>\n<p>In the midst of all our various conversations (well, okay, arguments when I was younger, discussions as I matured), I picked up two very important lessons. Firstly, that having been gifted with a working intellect, it&#8217;d be a shame to let it go to waste. Secondly, that a good sense of humor is a priceless treasure (though, admittedly, whether or not dad and I share a &#8220;good&#8221; sense of humor may be a matter of opinion, given as we are to absurdities, wordplay, and bad puns).<\/p>\n<p>Given the political slant many of my posts here and at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.djwudi.com\/longletter\/\" title=\"The Long Letter\">The Long Letter<\/a>, it would be understandable (though somewhat regrettable) if I gave the impression that I was uniformly anti-military. However, nothing could be further from the truth. While I never decided that the military was a direction I wanted to take my life in, I am a &#8220;military brat&#8221;. Dad served in the United States Air Force for ten years, and spent another eleven and a half years in the Air National Guard. Something I&#8217;ll be eternally grateful for, though, is that even growing up in a military family, I was never force-fed the steady diet of \u00fcber-patriotism and &#8220;my country, right or wrong&#8221; (which many people, unfortunately, do not realize is only <a href=\"http:\/\/www.djwudi.com\/longletter\/archives\/2003\/03\/23\/patriotism.php\" title=\"Patriotism\">half of the full quote<\/a>) attitude that so many other military children are.<\/p>\n<p>Rather, I grew up realizing that the military, and our country, like any other large organization (all the way from corporate entities to religious movements) does some things that are very good &#8212; and some things that are very bad. The good things should be recognized and celebrated, but the bad things should also be recognized; not to be celebrated, but to be studied, learned from, and prevented in the future. Dad was very instrumental in keeping me grounded in my political views &#8212; grounded in a very liberal\/democratic mindset, but grounded none the less &#8212; neither falling into an ultra-right wing &#8220;the military is always right&#8221; stance, nor an ultra-left wing &#8220;the military is always wrong&#8221; stance.<\/p>\n<p>Which brings me around to what prompted this (hopefully not over-saccharine) missive. Dad just posted a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hanscomfamily.com\/archives\/2003\/07\/14\/a_personal_rant.php\" title=\"A personal rant\">wonderfully written post<\/a> in response to someone being so uncouth as to drag out the old &#8220;baby killer&#8221; epithet when they found out about his military service on a mailing list he participates in. Rather than rising to the bait and indulging in a flame war, his response is beautifully stated, and well worth reading.<\/p>\n<p>It does matter, Dad. I&#8217;m glad it matters to you; I&#8217;m glad that, thanks to you, it matters to me &#8212; and I&#8217;m glad that, even with all our disagreements, you&#8217;re my dad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It does matter, dad. I&#8217;m glad it matters to you, I&#8217;m glad that, thanks to you, it matters to me \u2014 and I&#8217;m glad that, even with all our disagreements, you&#8217;re my dad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2043,2042],"tags":[13,14],"class_list":["post-1433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal","category-politics","tag-life","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}