A truck parked on a Dupont neighborhood street attempts to send a message. It struck me as a little surreal. What, exactly, are we not going to forget, I wonder. I mean, I see there's a picture of a New York skyline with the World Trade Center towers still standing, so perhaps we're not going to forget the towers. Or perhaps we're not going to forget how the towers were taken down, or the people who died in the towers' collapse, or the apparently endless "war" that has followed. Perhaps we're not going to forget that Americans use more of the world's natural resources per capita (including oil) than any other people on the planet. Nah, why would we want to remember that when we're driving our big truck down the road? Sorry, but painting vague declarations like "we won't forget" on the side of a truck just doesn't do much for me.

There are many things we shouldn't forget, but we do forget them because it's convenient to do so. Ronald Reagan died yesterday and suddenly everyone remembers what a nice, funny man he was. That's great, but why do we so quickly forget his contributions to the destruction of organized labor? Iran-Contra? The dismantling of mental health care in the U.S.? The huge deficits he generated? The shifting of the tax burden to the working poor and middle class? The fact that his administration armed Saddam Hussein and encouraged the growth of "militant Islam" in a short-sighted ploy to combat the "evil empire" of the Soviet Union? We won't forget, unless forgetting is easier.