Marcy Kaptur: “My first reaction upon reading Dr. Gordon Gee's denigrating comments about the Polish Army was to see red--blood red. As…”

“My first reaction upon reading Dr. Gordon Gee's denigrating comments about the Polish Army was to see red--blood red. As a Polish American, I fail to see the humor when the president of The Ohio State University described bureaucratic turf battles at his school with administrators ``shooting each other'' as ``kind of like the Polish Army.'' His comments revealed not only insensitivity to the suffering of the Polish people over the past two centuries, but a shocking lack of knowledge of history. Surely, the leader of a major institution of higher learning should know better. {time} 1040 Ohio State, after all, is home to the Center for Slavic and East European Studies. Having spent my public career trying to overcome ethnic stereotyping, I thought about how to respond: Do I hold a press conference? Do I make an official statement? The Polish American Congress quickly demanded, received, and accepted an apology from President Gee. But I kept thinking about my dear friend Colonel Marian Wojciechowski, a true hero of Poland and America, who died last year at age 97. I have known the Wojciechowski family for almost half a century. Marian's brilliant daughter Mary Ann was my friend in high school and the valedictorian of our class at St. Ursula Academy in Toledo. Her father, Marian, had commanded a Polish Army cavalry platoon at the place where World War II started on land September 1, 1939.…”