He was gearing up for just another day of hard work in a mundane job – but at least it was a job. And it happened to be at one of the most prestigious and famous restaurants in the world. In fact, it was on top of the world. Never mind that he didn’t have regular access to the spectacular views from the establishment that occupied the 106th and 107th floors of the North Tower of the World Trade Center, he could catch a glimpse here and there on his breaks.

On September 11, 2001 the sky was clear and the view was especially breathtaking. But the beauty of that scene would give way to an explosion of horror in a brief and life-shattering moment. Manuel Emilio Mejia – kitchen worker at the Windows on the World restaurant – would become a victim of mind-boggling terror. His friends and family would grieve and the nation would remember.

Then time would go by and, though those closest to him in life would never fade in their passionate memory of him, the nation would move on – not just to life as usual, but even toward an eventual awkward shift as patriotic fervor and a national sense of resolve morphed into ominous forgetfulness. Some even started to want to “reach out” to those who were responsible for Mejia’s tragic death, as well as nearly 2,800 others who died that fateful, but now long-gone-not-likely-to-happen-again-because-better-people-are-in-charge, day.

New York City’s medical examiner recently announced that they have positively identified – via DNA technology – the remains of 54-year old Manuel Emilio Mejia. His name will be in the news for a few days as this announcement cycles through the media. But it will quickly fade into a footnote, because – you see – we are moving on, we are reaching out, we are charting a new course, and we are making the age-old mistake of willfully forgetting the past.

The Greatest Generation never forgot Pearl Harbor. That’s one of the things that made them great.

These days the war on terror is over as a nomenclature as if changing terminology can change reality. But there was a gigantic elephant in that G-20 room in London a few days ago. So many of the nations represented have a persistent and growing “Muslim” problem. And it seems as if the so-called “best and brightest” of the most “progressive” nations simply insist on ignoring it.

Can anyone imagine any leader in, say, late 2001 or early 2002 talking about rapprochement with the radical Muslim world with political impunity? Yet here we are not even eight years out from unspeakable horror – with so many evidences since of foiled plots and sinister plans – ready to engage the enemy in ways suggesting he’s not so bad, after all.

Is anyone noticing that President Obama is much more comfortable talking about his bona fides with the Islamic world as someone who seems to instinctively understand – than he was as Candidate Obama? Sometimes it’s subtle – as when he referred to Iran, in a legitimizing manner, as “The Islamic Republic of Iran” on March 19th – a far cry from the “axis of evil” rhetoric of his oft-ridiculed predecessor. Words are always code; listen carefully.

Of course, the most significant shift in body language, not to mention policy, by the new administration is in the idea of reaching out to the moderate Taliban to make some kind of deal. Or as I am tempted to refer to it: Operation Jumbo Shrimp – An Exercise in Oxymoronic Geopolitics.

Moderate Taliban? Is it possible for a fanatic to be a-little-bit-pregnant with poisonous ideology?

History tells us that fanatical regimes have a field day with naïve adversaries. Neville Chamberlain comes to mind. He thought he could do business with Hitler and in doing so he gave away much of the European store.

Lyndon Johnson often lamented that if only he could sit down one on one with Ho Chi Minh (“Uncle Ho”), they could actualize the president’s favorite Bible passage from the writings of the prophet Isaiah, “Come now let us reason together.” Never mind that he always took that scripture out of context.

Sure, Richard Nixon used diplomacy and détente in his day, but it is important to understand context and nuance. As Nixon put it in his book, Leaders: Profiles and Reminiscences of Men Who Have Shaped the Modern World:

“There are two kinds of détente: hard-headed and soft-headed. Hard-headed détente is based on effective deterrence. This kind of détente encourages the Soviets to negotiate, because it makes the cost of Soviet aggression too high. Soft-headed détente, by contrast, discourages negotiation, because it makes the cost of Soviet expansion so low that the Soviets find the rewards of aggression too tempting. Continued...