Tom Brokaw Provides Some Hard Lessons of the Past

It is not very often that a major news broadcaster decides to confront the machinations of a leading presidential candidate. But that's exactly what Tom Brokaw came out of retirement to do last night.

Brokaw took direct aim at Donald Trump's latest call to ban all Muslims from entering the U.S. He did so by recalling some ugly moments in the past when we saw "paranoia overriding reason": the Japanese internment camps during World War II, the Nazi holocaust, the McCarthy witch hunt, slavery and Jim Crow. He ends by paying tribute to Kareem Khan, a Muslim-American soldier who was killed in Iraq - someone that Trump can't exclude from America because he has a permanent home at Arlington National Cemetery. Powerful stuff!


Tom Brokaw won a certain amount of respect from conservatives for his tribute to the "The Greatest Generation." For those who are willing to hear, he is now suggesting that we have some additional lessons to learn from our past.