Remembering, or Forgetting, History

George Santayana said, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." It's one of those quotations that, like the Bible, can be used to support any position the speaker wishes to take. Surely, though, it's a particularly apt idea to keep in mind right now, when our government is pursuing, and attempting to justify, a policy of detaining people, mostly Muslims, for indefinite periods of time, without charges or access to attorneys, and interning those people in vast prison camps solely because of their nationality, ethnicity, religious background, or all three. Stanley I. Kutler reminds us we have been here before.