Last week, my wife and I took time to visit the Holocaust Museum in Skokie, Illinois.  Although we hope to one day take in its counterpart in Washington, D.C., the institution in Skokie is, surely, the next best thing.

     We are not sorry we went.  While we are quite familiar with the historical underpinnings and existential circumstances of the Holocaust (and given that I've taught about it for decades), we were nonetheless moved.  There is something about experiencing the raw physicality of the concentration camps, the railroad car used for transport, the guns of the guards, the mountains of skeletons, the direct testimony of survivors, the uniforms the prisoners were forced to wear, and more, that enables one to step more fully into the horror of what that unspeakably dark period of human atrocity really means.

    
 I will not here attempt to explicate the many, many layers of the Holocaust's meaning for humanity.  I will leave that for you to discern.  However, I will observe that although it seems that a dictatorial governments initiate more acts of genocide, never suppose that genocide cannot happen in a democracy.  Portents abound throughout the West.  We humans tread a very narrow ledge between fighting for good and promoting evil.  And we rarely know, precisely, when we are definitively walking on either side.