Every human life is special, unique, unrepeatable — to borrow from Pope John Paul II. Every loss of life is a loss. Some losses, however, seem larger, leaving a void no one else can fill. When some people go, too much goes with them. That’s undoubtedly the case with the loss of Herbert Romerstein, who died this week after a long illness. With Herb’s passing, we lose not only a good guy, but a vast reservoir of knowledge that is not replaceable. If only we could have downloaded the man’s brain. Alas, we could not, and our knowledge of the 20th century is suddenly less than it was.

Herb knew the Cold War and communist movement unlike anyone. He understood it because he lived it and breathed it. Born in Brooklyn in 1931, he himself had been a communist, having joined the Communist Youth League before becoming a card-carrying member of Communist Party USA (CPUSA). He broke ranks over 60 years ago, the final straw being the Korean War, which made clear to him that he was dealing with inveterate liars, whether in Korea, Moscow, or among communists on the home-front. He went on to become one of America’s best anti-communists and most respected authorities, regularly testifying before Congress. He became a chief investigator for the House Committee on Internal Security. In the 1980s, he joined the Reagan administration, where his full-time job at the U.S. Information Agency was to counter Soviet disinformation, a duty for which few were so well-equipped or enthusiastic. He relished the role of taking on professional Soviet propagandists such as Georgi Arbatov and Valentin Falin. Later, he did the highly touted analysis of the Venona transcripts, which he published as The Venona Secrets.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg. I cannot do justice to how this translated into action. I never tire of listening to stories from Herb’s longtime friend Charlie Wiley on how they penetrated the communist-run World Youth Festivals in the 1950s, or challenged a Soviet official successfully spooning the Party line to open-mouthed progressives at the All Souls Church in New York, or tossed a wrench into this or that meeting of communist youth leaders. Guys like this were one of a kind who lived life to its fullest. They were warriors — unafraid, cheerful, colorful Cold Warriors.

I first met Herb Romerstein in June 2005. I was writing a book on Ronald Reagan and the end of the Cold War, which became The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism. I was nearing the end of the manuscript when I got a remarkable email from Marko Suprun, whose father had survived the 1930s Ukrainian genocide perpetrated by Stalin. I didn’t know Marko, but he brought to my attention a stunning document, a highly sensitive May 1983 letter from the head of the KGB, Viktor Chebrikov, to the head of the Soviet Union, the odious Yuri Andropov. The letter concerned a secret offer by Senator Ted Kennedy that, in effect, sought to undermine President Reagan’s security policy and perhaps his reelection bid. It allegedly came from Soviet archives in Moscow. I embarked upon a long process of confirming the letter’s authenticity. I exchanged emails with Walter Zaryckyj, who had turned the document over to Marko for translation. Walter immediately recommended I contact Herb Romerstein. If anyone could confirm this, it was Herb, said Walter, describing Herb as a “national treasure.”

I talked to Herb and he assuaged me. “Don’t worry,” he assured. “It’s real. Take it to the bank.”

I spent the next few months confirming what Herb had told me from the outset. Yes, it was real.

This began a partnership and friendship. Herb loved the fact that I was a Cold War researcher half his age and planning to do more, including a book on Cold War dupes — a unique category of Cold War individual that Herb knew too well. He took me under his wing, eager to provide counsel on anything related to the Cold War. Having access to his mind was like having the Library of Congress, the FBI files, the Soviet archives, Daily Worker microfiche, thousands of congressional reports, and CPUSA holdings all rolled into one, retrievable by a quick phone call or email from my BlackBerry. The process would go something like this: “Hi, Herb. A question on Arthur Miller: Did he ever join the Party?” The response was instantaneous: “In 1956, Arthur Miller testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. They published his Party application card. You can find it in the official report on the hearings. He wrote for New Masses, the Daily Worker loved him….”

We would meet in-person (less often, unfortunately) during my visits to Washington to do research. Herb introduced me to the Soviet Comintern Archives on CPUSA. He showed me how to use them, helped me get my library card — covering all bases. I fondly remember when he first introduced me to M. Stanton Evans. We spent hours at Stan’s office one summer afternoon going over everything imaginable on Soviet penetration of the Roosevelt administration and other vital areas in the 1930s and 1940s. We also had lunch at the Hawk n’ Dove on Capitol Hill, a favorite place of Herb and Stan.

Why their interest in me? Because, as they openly admitted, they were getting old and “wouldn’t be around much longer.” They were hoping I would be. There weren’t many of them left. I was one of a very small few to whom they might pass the torch.

Fittingly, on my desk right now is a copy of Herb’s final work, Stalin’s Secret Agents, co-authored with Stan Evans. It’s a superb must-read. We’ve waited years for the book’s material on Alger Hiss alone.

Certain Herb aphorisms related to the Cold War stick in my mind, resounding there in the sound of his scratchy, whispery voice:

I asked him if there was a particular group of Americans most susceptible to being duped by communists. His immediate answer: “The Religious Left, Paul, especially from the mainline Protestant denominations. They were the biggest suckers of them all.”

And what of American communists, especially those who went so far as to join CPUSA? Said Herb: “They were loyal Soviet patriots.” As Herb knew, they were dedicated first and foremost to Mother Russia. CPUSA members “were not the useful idiots,” not the “suckers;” they were not the dupes. Quite the contrary, said Herb: “They were fully aware of exactly what they were doing. They manipulated the useful idiots on behalf of Soviet interests.”

Another: “from 1919, when it [the American Communist Party] was formed, to 1989, when the Soviet Union collapsed, it was under total Soviet control.”

And then there were his judicious warnings about this or that suspected communist: “Be careful, Paul. That guy was not a communist. He was a fellow traveler, to some degree — a dupe — but not a communist. And the other guy, he was a small ‘c’ communist who never joined the Party.”

That last warning holds a crucial lesson very revealing of Herb Romerstein and his work: He was no bomb-thrower. He was the epitome of responsible, informed anti-communism. He was careful about drawing the necessary lines of distinction between a liberal, a liberal anti-communist, a genuine progressive, a closet communist masquerading as a “progressive,” a socialist, a small “c” or big “C” communist/Communist, a Party member or non-Party member, and so forth. He never wanted to falsely accuse anyone. I doubt his detractors on the left will pause to credit him for such prudence. For many on the left, every anti-communist rightly concerned with Soviet agents or agents of influence was merely another burgeoning Joe McCarthy. (Click here for a particularly cruel piece on Herb by Dana Milbank.)

Herb Romerstein was anything but. And he wanted those of us who follow in his footsteps, or who are concerned about communism still — and about truth above all — to be likewise as careful and thoughtful. Perhaps our best tribute to Herb’s memory would be to do our best to expose what he exposed and remind Americans and the world of what he reminded.

Herbert Romerstein, indeed a national treasure. A happy warrior who fought the good fight, and left the wrong side for the right side. Well done, my friend. Rest in peace.

When Mom moved into her last earthly home, at The Home, she could no longer walk. She had lost her husband, twice. She was losing her memory. She had given up her home. She had lost much of her freedom. We asked many people to pray for her, and I prayed that she could walk again. I prayed that she could move back to a lesser level of care. I prayed that we could play Scrabble again. I prayed for her in her times of weakness. But she wasn’t finished. She had a gift of eleven more months. She had a gift. She had a responsibility.

The first time I ate with Mom at The Home I looked at her, held her hand, and asked her to say grace. I expected her to thank God for the food, and I expected her to pray for her own needs as she recovered from surgery. But instead, I heard her say, “Father, help me to be a blessing to the people in my new home.” She had a gift of time; she had a responsibility.

Over the next few weeks, as the staff got to know Mom, sometimes they would have trouble remembering her name. Bethel, House of God, is not your typical modern name, and it took the staff, quite understandably, a while to learn it. When they couldn’t remember her name, we often heard them say something like, “You mean the nice lady who lives at the end of the hall?” That was my Mom; she was already fulfilling her responsibility.

Mother learned to meet her responsibility, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” She demonstrated a kind attitude, contentment, calmness, great appreciation for everyone who served her in any way.

At  The Home, they cried for Mom when she died. Those who worked with Mom, those who lived with Mom, had become part of her life. They were a blessing to each other. Their lives became raveled together with ours. Mom had a gift, she fulfilled her responsibility.

Mother, you have passed so many gifts on to those who knew you. Thank you for your gifts. If I can meet my responsibilities one-tenth as much as you did, I will honor you, your memory, and our God. Thank you, Mom, for your legacy; thank you for my inheritance.

Sunday, April 28, marks the 255th anniversary of President James Monroe’s birth in 1758.

Recently, I had the pleasure of reading one of Harlow Giles Unger’s thorough biographies of key figures in the era of America’s founding. In reading “The Last Founding Father: James Monroe and a Nation’s Call to Greatness,” I found myself wondering: How have we let this great patriot become a forgotten man?

Monroe’s military service alone made him a hero. When he was 18 and newly matriculated at William and Mary College, and the Second Continental Congress proclaimed the Declaration of Independence, he suspended his education to enlist in the Virginia infantry.

He arrived in New York to find that the British army had just decimated Washington’s army at Harlem Heights—having killed 1,500 out of 5,000 troops. Two days later, Monroe and his fellow Virginia sharpshooters repelled a British advance, marking the first time in the War for Independence that Americans had whooped the British, forcing the redcoats to turn tail and run for their lives.

Monroe played a key role in Washington’s famous 1776 Christmas night sortie across the Delaware River. The teenaged Monroe was the co-leader, with one of Washington’s cousins, of an advance party of 50 that had crossed the river ahead of the rest of Washington’s troops, and then captured the two strategically placed cannons that defended the Hessian military camp outside of Trenton. Though seriously wounded by a musket shot, Monroe stood his ground, repelling repeated Hessian attempts to recapture the big guns, thereby saving many American lives (including, possibly, Washington’s), and thereby making that indispensable, resounding victory possible.

During the War of 1812, 38 years later, Monroe was in his mid-50s. At that time, he was serving in the Madison administration as both Secretary of State and (after a disastrous performance of his predecessor had almost resulted in total defeat) as Secretary of War. Inheriting a dire military situation in 1814, Monroe virtually single-handedly altered the course of the war. He rallied the country’s disorganized military forces, developed a country-saving military strategy, and personally led American troops from horseback from dawn until dusk—which prevented the total collapse of American resistance to the British by dint of his courage, inspirational leadership, and military genius.

Monroe’s marriage was one of the great love stories in presidential history. He and Elizabeth—who might have been the only First Lady more beautiful and glamorous than Jackie Kennedy, and who displayed heroic courage by intervening in the nick of time to save Lafayette’s wife, Adrienne, from the guillotine—shared a decades-long tender and devoted mutual love.

James Monroe may hold the record for the highest number of offices held during his career in public service. He was either elected or appointed to the following offices: 1782, Virginia legislature; 1790, U.S. Senate; 1794, Minister to France; 1803, Minister to France and Spain whose initiative resulted in the Louisiana Purchase; 1803, Minister to England; 1810, elected to the Virginia legislature a third time; 1811, elected governor of Virginia a fourth time; 1811 becomes U.S. Secretary of State; 1812-13, named acting Secretary of War and in 1814, actual Secretary of War while also remaining Secretary of State; 1816, elected president; 1820, re-elected without opposition—the only American other than George Washington to stand unopposed for the presidency.

It is that last accomplishment—being elected without opposition to the presidency—that is most remarkable. After the bruising election campaign we recently passed through, we may wonder how it was possible that nobody bothered to run against Monroe. Yes, he was an exceptional man, but even great men have enemies.

I think the reason Monroe ran unopposed was that nobody at that time felt threatened by the federal government. In 1820, Uncle Sam was still confined to original duties of keeping Americans safe and upholding contracts and property rights. In other words, in the minds of free Americans, there was neither a handout to be gained from the federal government nor the threat of confiscation of a portion of one’s property for redistribution to special interests. In short, the government was limited, unobtrusive, and benign.

Today, by contrast, the federal government is a predatory aggressor against property rights, and myriad special interests engage in an angry, perpetual battle to see who can take what from whom. Monroe had the good fortune to be president when America was America and not this sorry variation of a demoralized European welfare state.

The amazing life story of James Monroe, the fifth president of the United States, would not be complete without mentioning that he passed from this world on the Fourth of July, 1831—five years to the day after his fellow presidents Adams and Jefferson. What a fitting conclusion to the life of a principled patriot who gave his whole adult life to serving his country and upholding our most noble ideals.

I’ve referred to her as one of my Cold War seven: Ronald Reagan, John Paul II, Mikhail Gorbachev, Lech Walesa, Vaclav Havel, Boris Yeltsin, and Margaret Thatcher. They were the seven figures who dissolved an Evil Empire, and only Walesa and Gorbachev still remain with us.

The world dubbed her the Iron Lady, a title that duly fits. Many, however, mistake the Iron Lady moniker as referring solely to her strength in the Cold War. There was much more to it. Consider:

Margaret Thatcher is arguably the most complete British leader of the last 100 years, surpassing even Winston Churchill. Like Churchill, she was tough and successful in foreign policy, taking on and vanquishing totalitarian evil. Churchill warned the world as the Iron Curtain descended across Europe. Decades later, the world celebrated as the Iron Lady helped break the Iron Curtain.

But unlike Churchill, Margaret Thatcher had enormous domestic successes that Churchill couldn’t touch, and didn’t dare try to touch. When World War II closed, the British people booted Churchill from the prime ministership in preference of Labour leader Clement Attlee, who gave the British populace Keynesian socialism. The masses wanted their welfare state, and Attlee, equipped with promises of “change” and “forward,” gave them a fundamental transformation. In no time, Attlee’s party was spending money unlike anything Britain had ever seen, nationalizing everything under the sun, including with the progressive left’s coup de grace: government healthcare. It was a giant government binge that would bury Britain for decades.

This fundamental transformation to welfare-statism was so thorough, and so imbibed by the electorate, that when Churchill later returned to office for another term (1951-55) the World War II hero couldn’t stand up to the sacred cows of Britain’s new nanny state. By the late 1970s, the United Kingdom was smothered not only by massive government expenditures and debt but by the enormous and disastrous government unions that the Labour Party had built and nurtured.

All of this came to a crashing head in the late 1970s, and fittingly under the Labour Party, this time led by Prime Minister James Callaghan. The signature event was the Winter of Discontent (1978-79). The economy was an utter train wreck, debt-ridden and hampered by a prolonged un-recovering “recovery.” Things were made far worse by continual work stoppages by striking public-sector unions. Given that the government ran just about everything, thanks to decades of the British left nationalizing everything, there was garbage literally rotting in the streets and dead people not being buried because of striking government refuse workers and gravediggers.

Things got so bad that the British electorate was willing to elect a bona fide conservative to run their government: Margaret Thatcher. This was not some squishy moderate that we in the United States would have called a Rockefeller Republican or (today) a RINO. This was the real McCoy; the genuine article. Here was a new leader who actually understood and could articulate what was wrong with Britain—and had the courage to do something about it.

And so, Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s first-ever female prime minister, embarked upon an extraordinary run from 1979-90 that featured three consecutive electoral victories, including the landslide that brought her to power. She then proceeded to take on not just the Soviets abroad, but, at home, the powerful government unions, the Keynesian spending, the bloated cradle-to-grave welfare state, the punitive taxes, the burdensome regulations, and decades of government nationalizations/seizures. As to the latter, Thatcher began a comprehensive campaign of privatization that returned freedom, solvency, and sanity to Britain.

It was an amazing performance. You can now expect a remarkable outpouring of emotion and appreciation in Britain, much like what America saw with the death of Ronald Reagan and what the world witnessed with the passing of John Paul II, her two Cold War partners and kindred souls. And like her two great Cold War allies, she fortunately lived to see the collapse of the Soviet empire.

Lady Thatcher outlived both Reagan and John Paul II. Her health, unfortunately, had been in decline for a long time. I recall that she recorded a video eulogy for Reagan’s funeral rather than address the audience live and directly. That was 2004, almost 10 years ago.

I also recall her parting words to Ronald Reagan: “Well done, thy faithful servant.”

And now, we can second that tribute. Well done, Lady Thatcher.

Great literature causes us to think and ponder; it directs us to the significant questions of life. As such, it might have multiple meanings at different levels or with different applications. What was Tolstoy trying to say?

At face value, the line never quite made sense to me. Instead, one might argue that all unhappy families are the same, where all individuals seek their own selfish ends. Only happy families allow each other to be unique and different individuals. I think I can make a strong case for the opposite quote, “All unhappy families are like one another; each happy family is happy in its own way.”

But I’m glad to let Tolstoy write the quote; he is clearly a much better writer than I. But what does he mean? After I reread Anna Karenina a few years ago (I have a rule that no novel is allowed to be on my all-time favorite list until I have read it at least twice), I took advantage of modern technology, and conducted a word search of the book for the various forms of “happy” using a gutenberg.org online version. Personally, I prefer to read paper books, but electronic tools do allow for searches that would not otherwise be feasible. Also, I apologize, but I worked with an English translation. I would so love to be able to read Anna Karenina in the original language.

I (or rather my computer) counted 367 occurrences of happy, unhappy, happiness, unhappiness, happily, etc. The three best known, of course, are in the opening line. Less known, but perhaps the most telling use of the root “happy” comes well into the book, “A man who has faith cannot be unhappy, because he is never alone.”

A full understanding of the opening line requires that it be placed alongside this quote. Tolstoy was making a statement about faith.

Tolstoy wrote Anna Karenina from 1873 to 1877—during a time of personal depression and obsession with death; his conversion to Christianity came soon thereafter, in 1878. Although his Christian thinking was not always orthodox, and certainly not always Orthodox (with a capital “O”), Tolstoy made significant contributions to Christian literature through his later works, including The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Resurrection, and A Confession.

According to an essay by Philip Yancey in Soul Survivor: How My Faith Survived the Church, Yancey credits Tolstoy (along with Dostoevsky) for enabling a Soviet Christian revival during the 1970s. The Soviet government was able to restrict access to Scripture, but failed to limit access to these two great Russian novelists, who so often exemplified their Christian faith through their writings. It would seem that Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina changed his own thinking in the 19th century and that of many Soviets in the 20th century.

Tolstoy is suggesting that there is only one way to be a truly happy family, and that is through faith. Anna pursued selfish goals and discovered unhappiness. In contrast, Levin pursued faith and found happiness. The similarity of happy families is that they are families of faith. “All [genuinely] happy families are like one another [in that they are families of faith, faith in God]; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way [in that they find their own way to idolize self, and hence end up being alone].”

Anna Karenina failed to find this happiness, but Tolstoy became a man of faith. Certainly he would spend many years struggling with many issues, including guilt over his wealth, but happiness does not suggest an absence of struggle. Rather, it suggests a focus that is beyond the self. It requires that we find a way to fill our infinite void.

Certainly, there are many Christian families who experience unhappiness, sadness, even depression. It is easy for us to lose focus on our goal. It is easy for us to succumb to physical needs and illness. We are still living as aliens in this world. Nevertheless, Christian families do have more hope. They have a focus that guides them and gives them meaning and purpose.

When my colleagues and I asked more than 200 teens about their religious faith and about their contentment in life, we found a positive relationship. Teens who expressed greater religiosity tended to indicate more contentment. A life of faith does not in any way imply that your troubles will go away, but it does ensure that you are headed on the right road.

“A man who has faith cannot be unhappy, because he is never alone.”

New Year’s observances blend recollections of the past, celebrations in the present, and anticipation of the future. For a variety of reasons, I’m feeling nostalgic this year. I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the decade of my childhood—the 1950s.

In October, my wife and I saw a play in which people weary of the hectic pace of contemporary life could escape to an “authentic” 1950s community where the more relaxed pace of the past had been recreated. In the play, the benefit of relocating to the ’50s was a simpler, less stressful life, but it came at a price—enduring racial and sexual prejudice. The problem was that the playwright—a man in his 30s—had zero feel for the era. He simply reproduced various one-dimensional stereotypes about the ’50s that he had heard or read.

Why do so many intellectuals disparage the ’50s? Bashing “the man in the gray flannel suit” became an intellectual cause celebre. Writers vied to see who could heap the most scorn on the allegedly boring conformity of that receding decade, drawing supercilious caricatures of middle-class men and women of the era as superficial, plastic figures.

My view of the ’50s is more benign. I recall it as a happy, safe time—almost a Golden Age in American history. Playwrights might prefer the pathos of the depression-filled ’30s or the tragedies of the war-torn ’40s as more fruitful backdrops for their stage dramas, but in real life, I’m glad I got to be a kid at a time of relative peace and prosperity.

In the ‘50s, homes were smaller, cars larger, attire more formal, and the range of consumer products far narrower. A sense of order prevailed. Neighbors watched out for everyone’s kids. We left our homes and cars unlocked. Kids behaved in school or were expelled. Most of us toed the line, because we knew that our parents would take the teacher’s side. Teachers were respected and principals feared. People accepted responsibility for their actions.

People dressed up more often and generally were more polite. They used less profanity in public. Movies depended on good acting instead of special effects to tell engaging stories, and depictions of sex and violence left the details to one’s imagination. If you hurt yourself doing something careless, you never thought of suing the company that made the thing with which you hurt yourself. Most of us went to Sunday school or synagogue every weekend, learning right from wrong and that we are accountable to a higher power.

Were the ‘50s perfect? Certainly not. Back then, millions of Americans believed that smoking was cool and had not yet shed centuries-old racist attitudes. Few of today’s white kids can grasp how blacks were treated. They would find Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ autobiography, “My Grandfather’s Son,” illuminating. They should read Cold War historian Paul Kengor’s “The Communist” to learn how outrageously Barack Obama’s mentor, Frank Marshall Davis, was mistreated because he was black.

An insightful, enjoyable book that captures the 1950s dichotomy between the innocent bliss enjoyed by us white kids and the dark underside of the adult world is Bill Bryson’s alternately funny and sobering memoir, “The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid.” But even as wrong practices persisted in some quarters back then, we kids were being taught, both in Sunday school—and in TV shows like “Rin Tin Tin” and “The Lone Ranger”—to show respect for all people. Lo and behold, a decade later we began to excise the sick habit of racism from our society.

We can’t go back to the ’50s. That is both a blessing and a loss. Thankfully, we have corrected some of the most egregious shortcomings of that era. Unfortunately, however, we also have taken backward steps in terms of innocence, safety, order, respect, familial stability, secure property rights, etc.

It was a privilege to grow up in the ’50s. This New Year’s Eve, I reminisced and listened to the Guy Lombardo records that Pop used to play every December 31. Given the broke and broken state of government and the accompanying venomous friction that permeates our society today, Lombardo’s signature New Year’s Eve song had an ominous relevance at the dawn of 2013: “Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself—it’s later than you think.”

Happy New Year, everyone.

The first song I heard was “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” by the great Gene Autry. There is no substitute. And there’s no better feeling every season than hearing such songs for the first time. I grabbed my two-year-old daughter and danced with her. She smiled as I sang, didn’t make a peep, her head on my shoulder.

Then I heard the next tune, “There’ll be much mistle-toeing and hearts will be glowing when love ones are near! It’s the most wonderful time of the year!” It was crooned in that soaring, happy voice so uniquely Andy Williams.

Yes, Andy Williams. Himself a Christmas classic—“Mr. Christmas.” “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” is probably his signature song; or maybe “It’s the Holiday Season.”

As I was singing along, twirling my two-year-old, it hit me: This was the first time I was singing with Andy Williams without his presence in this world. Williams passed away on September 25 at the age of 84.

His passing didn’t happen without notice, even in our self-indulgent, frenetic, short-time-span culture. I caught the news of his death at a website. It gave me pause. I never met the man, but I have fond memories of his place in Americana and Christmas.

Williams had a regular TV show in the ‘60s and ‘70s, but it was his Christmas specials that ran longer still that most of us remember. I would catch them at my grandmother’s house. She lived in Emporium, Pennsylvania, which really was over the river and through the woods. In fact, during the snowy drives to my grandmother’s house on Christmas Eve, we’d cruise through a little town in Western Pennsylvania called Brockway, where we encountered horse-drawn sleighs clopping under the streetlights and over the railroad tracks. The horse knew the way to carry the sleigh through the white and drifted snow.

When we got to my grandmother’s house, it was total mirth: My grandmother’s anchovy and pepperoni rolls, freshly cooked ham, cookies everywhere, my grandfather blissfully babbling on, my Aunt Em and Uncle Rich, my Aunt Della and Uncle Joe, Uncle Bruno, Aunt Ruth and Uncle Sam—all crammed happily in a tiny little kitchen. Most are gone now.

Tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago.

That brings me back to Andy Williams. It’s funny the things you remember, but, in those days, there were only three or four stations on television: ABC, CBS, NBC, and maybe a PBS affiliate. At Christmas time, no one missed Bob Hope’s annual special on NBC. He did all sorts of skits and gags and musical renditions and terrific tributes to the troops—and presented the college football all-Americans. We would take time out from the kitchen—playing cards, Scrabble, or just talking—to watch Bob Hope.

But Bob Hope wasn’t the only one. Other big names did Christmas shows: Bing Crosby, Dean Martin, Loretta Young, Jimmy Durante and the Lennon Sisters, Lawrence Welk—and Andy Williams. Williams sang those songs, always accompanied by fake snow, pretty girls, lots of colors, sweaters, and glowing faces (click here and here and here and here).

Until September 25, 2012, Andy Williams was one of the only big names still alive from that genre. Remarkably, he had still been performing and was very active. In fact, he made the news not long ago for taking a shot at President Obama. He was not a supporter.

When I heard that Williams died, I began writing a tribute. I read the news the same day I happened to read this verse from Ecclesiastes: “One generation passes and another comes…. There is no remembrance of the men of old.”

That was fitting. I didn’t finish the article. Like much of America, I was preoccupied with less redeeming things—like politics and the 2012 election. We couldn’t pause to adequately remember this man of old. For that I am sorry.

But, just as fitting, the arrival of the holiday season corrected that. As Christmas time begins again, it does so—once again—with the voice of Andy Williams. We’re made mindful of what lasts. Andy Williams lasts. He makes us happy; politics doesn’t.

Andy Williams, rest in peace. And thanks for the memories this most wonderful time of the year.

Dear Mitt,

I have awakened on November 7 to learn that your bid for the presidency was unsuccessful. In the midst of the disappointment that I share with you, I want to thank you for devoting years of your life to the wearisome task of running for president. Millions of Americans are grateful to you.

You have been one of my heroes for the past 48 years. I still recall vividly the valiant cross country race you ran at our Cranbrook Homecoming in October of 1964—a race when you willed yourself to run faster than you ever had until, near the end, oxygen starvation set in, causing you first to stagger, then to collapse just 30 yards from the finish line. I can still see your face, ashen and contorted in pain, as you ignored the torture of the cinders on the track scraping against soft skin and began to crawl. Even though every other runner passed you, and you had nothing to gain—other than surcease of agony—from dragging yourself to the finish line, you refused to quit until you reached your goal. Your brave effort touched me deeply. That’s when I learned that you were special—a man of character, commitment, heart and guts, someone who embodied the indomitable American spirit.

I also admired your exuberant joie de vivre. You loved life, and I can see that your great capacity for love found abundantly happy fulfillment in your life with your wife and sons. I also remember your friendship with Chester, our night watchman at Cranbrook. At prep school, there can be a tendency to disregard the support staff, to take them for granted like the furniture, but you reached out to that good, simple, kind, salt-of-the-earth security guard. (Just for the record, I befriended Chester, too, during my senior year, so I feel we share that bond.)

Nobody can doubt your love for our country. Whereas your opponent concentrated on lining up support from key special interest groups, your focus was more akin to the patriotic statesman than the opportunistic politician—it was so clear that you wanted to get our country back on track. As we can now see, that wasn’t to be.

What occurs to me is that, by losing the election, you might have been spared a cruel fate. If elected, you would have inherited an economic mess. The problem isn’t just the looming fiscal cliff and debt ceiling, but the overall financial situation of our government is clearly unsustainable and nonviable. Entitlement spending has mushroomed so that it—combined with interest on the national debt—now consumes virtually every dollar of tax revenue. That means that the various departments and agencies that we normally think of as “the federal government,” from the Pentagon through the EPA and everything in between, is being run on borrowed (or “quantitatively eased”) dollars. No president could trim entitlement spending or shut down enough of the government to stanch the flood of red ink. Government indebtedness will continue to balloon and our currency will continue to be debauched, and it would have been impossible for you, given the prevalent attitudes of the people, to halt that insidious process. You might have tried by firing Ben Bernanke and replacing him with someone who would stop quantitative easing, but that would have caused interest rates to rise and the federal government to become insolvent, triggering a crisis that would have made you a vilified president.

The presidency at this juncture in history strikes me as an impossible job. Both domestic and foreign policy seem to be Gordian knots that no mere mortal can cut. I know, though, that you would have valiantly been willing to give your all in the attempt to help your country at this difficult time. Your path as president would have been as excruciating as those last 30 yards of that cross country race you ran so long ago, but you would have addressed the challenge with the same determination and commitment as you did then. Now those awful burdens you would have been willing to shoulder fall on your opponent, and we’ll see what kind of shoulders he has.

You gave years of your life for the chance to be of service to your country, Mitt, and you lived by our school motto, “Aim High.” You did us proud.

Karras was a star on the great Detroit Lions defenses of the early 1960s—a unit that included four Hall-of-Famers: middle linebacker Joe Schmidt and defensive backs Night Train Lane, Dick LeBeau, and Yale Lary, all three of whom were in the top five for career interceptions at the time they retired. This defense led the way to one of the greatest moments in Detroit sports history—“The Thanksgiving Day Massacre” of 1962.

The Packers’ record was 10-0 when they came to Detroit for the annual Thanksgiving Day game 50 seasons ago. Featuring 10 future Hall of Fame players and the incomparable Vince Lombardi as coach, the mighty Packers had crushed all their opponents—except for the Lions, whom they had squeaked past, 9-7, in their first matchup in Green Bay.

Counting the championship game, the Packers finished that 1962 season 14-1. The “1” was the Thanksgiving Day game. Karras and his “fearsome foursome” linemates—ends Darris McCord and Sam Williams, and 300-pound tackle Roger Brown (50 years ago, you could count the NFL’s 300-pounders on your fingers)—blew up Green Bay’s Pro Bowl-caliber offensive line and sacked quarterback Bart Starr nine times in the first half. By the end of the third quarter, the Lions led 26-0 and coasted to victory. Lombardi paid tribute after the game, saying, “My club wasn’t flat. We were ready. They [the Lions defense] just overwhelmed us.”

Karras left other football memories. He was suspended for the 1963 season for having gambled on NFL games. This cost him a season in his prime and possibly a berth in the Hall of Fame. Upon his return, Karras—a team captain—showed that he had wit and a sense of humor. He told the ref who asked him to call “Heads” or “Tails” at the pregame coin toss that he wasn’t allowed to gamble.

In an incident indicative of how the game was played then, Karras jabbed several punches into the face of an opposing player at the bottom of a pileup at the end of a play. Severely near-sighted and playing without glasses in those days before contact lenses, Karras asked one of his teammates in the ensuing huddle, “Who was that slob?” Answer: His older brother, Ted Karras, a guard for the Bears.

I did not know until I read the early obituaries that Alex Karras had suffered from dementia. He was one of the many former NFL players who have sued the league for not having taken the proper precautions to protect players from head injuries.

This is an extremely sensitive and important issue. Dementia is a tragic and heart-breaking affliction. We need to re-examine our values. Are we on the path to the grim sports future as depicted in the 1976 movie “Rollerball” where the craving for violent entertainment leads citizens to devalue the lives of athletes?

Are the players entirely innocent? After all, common sense tells us not to let our heads get knocked around. Karras and his contemporaries must have realized that playing a game based on repeated violent contact could inflict long-term physical damage.

How will the courts rule? Will judges ignore the ex post facto provision in the Constitution and punish the league for past behavior that was acceptable then, but may now be considered unacceptable? One would think that the courts could only find the league liable if owners knew the risks of long-term brain damage and withheld that medical knowledge from the players, but with today’s activist judges, you never know.

If the courts find the NFL liable for the long-term health consequences of playing pro football, the game will have to be fundamentally redesigned. What would we be left with—touch football? Would fans then pay so much to watch it? Must athletes put the health of their brains at risk as the price of earning millions—a diabolical temptation and tradeoff?

The sad passing of the multi-talented Alex Karras raises some profound and disturbing questions.