Are we not hearing their cries?

Between moments of silent grins at the great good fortune now existent in my own life, I've been painfully aware of the awful state of the world, and the catastrophic happenings beyond our borders.  I'm also aware of how much we've forgotten of the era that my generation experienced--that of WWII.  The devastating mistake of not only ignoring the plight of Jews trying desperately to escape the holocaust taking place in death camps in Europe, but also the unjustified imprisonment of Japanese and Japanese Americans in our country at that time -- a mistake we would later admit and atone for as a nation.

Some of us have completely forgotten the courageous fighting men of the racially segregated all Japanese 442nd Combat Unit who -- while their friends and families were imprisoned behind barbed wire in our country -- became the most highly-decorated unit of all for their valor on the battlefields of Italy.  The others, Americans of Japanese descent, who worked diligently in secret throughout the war in Building 9 at the Presidio in San Francisco translating and giving guidance to our War Department in preparation for the invasion of Japan.  We've forgotten all that; heroes all.

Nor do many of our leaders appear to know that much of the information now being gained -- providing what defense there is against the terrorists -- is coming from refugees who are now streaming out of the wartorn middle east in waves of unmitigated misery -- refugees who are either already settled in their new countries, or, are awaiting asylum in camps inadequate to their needs.  It is Syrians and other middle eastern victims suffering under the unspeakable brutality of ISIS who are most in jeopardy and pleading for our help.

Fate is giving us another chance to get it right.

How on earth do we not hear those cries?