Why do we teach students in history classes that unless we learn from history we will be doomed to repeat it? How many essays are written on this topic, taken from the philosopher George Santayana. Perhaps a better question to ponder might be why have we learned nothing from history.

Today, tanks are rolling again in Central Europe and in the Balkans. How many European conflicts in that last hundreds of years can be trace to the Balkans? And then there is the Russian obsession with the Ukraine and the Crimea. As the Ukraine conflict unfolds, Mr. Biden is taking a hard line, perhaps to distract Americans from economic difficulties and the on-going Covid crisis.

In the days of Cold War polemics, Republicans competed with Democrats to see who was tougher on Communism. Republicans blamed Democrats for losing China. "Who lost China?" was the cry after World War Two. And although Korea was never covered under the so-called American defense umbrella conflict there split that nation and is still a point of contention. 

Kim Jong un may have written love letters to Donald Trump but he is building a formidable nuclear arsenal, determined to threaten his neighbors. So much for maniacs we can dictators (and there are several of them around the world).

Today, again, Congressional Hawks try to out do each other proposing sanctions against Russia. They want to win the midterm elections. Many of these are the same ones who championed the insurrection on January 6th. They wanted to overturn the legitimate election results. That makes them traitors or at the very least, un-American.

So we will NOT learn from history. We are too busy doing other things like watching a dozen or move awards shows on television and devoting our time to sports. Even the Winter Olympics has no real snow. Our reality has been warped. And that is why we will never learn George Santayana's dictum.