Thankful that ‘Semper Fidelis’ is more than a slogan, it’s a way of life:
Oliver North is a man among men and a Marine among Marines.
Most Marines, on active duty or former-Marines are in a very select group of boys that went to boot camp and came out as men. Needless to say there are always exceptions to the rule.
We learned from the day we saw those atrocious looking guys with the “Smokey the Bear” hats on that we were in for some deep shit. I am positive that none of us had any idea when we signed on the dotted line exactly what we got ourselves into.
I came from a very rough background where “the old man” ruled the roost with an iron hand and the neighborhood I grew up in was the training camp that prepared us for life.
When I had the misfortune to meet Staff Sergeant Merrill, my senior DI at Parris Island, he made what I went through at home look like a walk in the park. I labeled him and the other DI’s as “Masters of Disaster” that I depicted very well in a book I wrote called “Sir Yes Sir”. These guys literally stayed up at night trying to figure ways to “eliminate the riffraff”.
All in all, in retrospect I would not have wanted it any other way. Between what I learned at home, although at times it was painful and what I learned at Parris Island it prepared me from any situation, good or bad that I would encounter for the rest of my life.
What Olie North said about “Semper Fi” is exactly how we should live our lives. Love our country, families, respect others, be honest and forthright.
The United States Marine Corps has one of the biggest brotherhoods in the world. It doesn’t matter to us if the other Jar Head, Devil Dog is white, black, brown or yellow; they are Marines.
Don’t misunderstand me, all military people are special people; the Marines have that extra quality about them.
If everyone in the world had the same outlooks and philosophies in life that were instilled or in my case beat into us in boot camp, we would all be in a much better place.
Semper Fi to Olie North and all the other Jar Heads out there. Hopefully with a lot of luck, some of our attributes that we learned while serving in the USMC will rub off on some of the rebel-rousing, trouble-making, non-patriotic bums there are in this country today.
The Goomba Gazette 