So Trump is officially the GOP's Presidential nominee. Listening to the awful speech he made, I can't help but remember the time when the Republican party used to make sense. Here is a video I found of President Reagan's speech in light of the Challenger disaster of '86.
In his speech, he quoted a line from a poem called "High Flight" written by John Magee, an American pilot in the Second World War. I have reproduced it below:
High Flight
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, --and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of --Wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air...
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark or even eagle flew --
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
This is what good writing does; it has the power to lift you, to punch you in the face and make you feel things.
