THE AGE OF GOOD MEN HAS PASSED

News of the death of Robert Kearns, the 77-year old inventor of intermittent windshield wipers, has left me feeling hollow and defeated. Kearns was a part of that group of great American men that lived through the Depression, rose from its ashes, and fought the face of evil in the Great War. Overseas they did their duty and lost friends who, like them, had seen hell and vowed to restore peace and goodness to the world of men. They knew evil and desparation; had looked it in the eye and battled it, had conquered it. When they returned they hoisted this country on their sturdy backs and got down to the business of working hard. Because of men whose character was forged in the fire of battle, whose earliest memories were the hunger and cold of the Great Depression, we pluck the fruit that is fast food restaurants, endless subdivisions, and intermittent windshield wipers from the tree that is America. I take my hat off to you, Mr. Kearns, for you remind us why we forge ahead - it is not for glory or for fame, but for the betterment of our fellow man and the improvement of the human condition. You taught us to live, and you taught us to see - to see more clearly through the windshield of life.

Unfortunately, the editors of Yahoo news were not as respectful of your legacy as it deserved, for though you died on February 9th and were buried on the 14th, they have decided that only today, the 25th, shall you be remembered. For shame to them, they are imbeciles and they do not understand that the curtain is closing on the age of decent people. To you, Mr. Kearns - today I will wipe my eyes in sorrow at your passing, probably once every ten minutes, though maybe once every twenty minutes, or maybe every five mintues, but assuredly at a distinct and timely manner, intermittently and until the tempest in my soul has quieted and the rain in my heart has extinguished.