11th anniversary gift idea

Thank you. Jim [Kallstrom, MCLEF Chairman of the Board], it's a real honor to be able to be here to accept that award on behalf of another great generation. I must say, as I heard my biography, I guess I'd like to point out one thing that wasn't pointed out. Among many things I'm very, very proud of is eight years serving for President Ronald Reagan. And it was wonderful to see the outpouring of support and admiration from this country as the president made his final journey.

It's truly an incredible privilege to be able to work in the Defense Department with the remarkable men and women who serve this country today. I'd also like to thank the leadership of this foundation inspired by and dedicated to the Marines who help keep order in the world and to the men and women who help keep order here at home. To paraphrase the ancient saying, when you give someone the gift of education, you forever change their life. And through your scholarships, you are helping to shape America's future and to honor America's heroes.

I feel especially privileged to be part of this evening, given your extraordinary mission and truly humbled to be in the presence of these nine special heroes. I recall Vice President Cheney saying once that when you have the privilege to meet one of America's medal of honor recipients, "Remember the moment, for you've just met one of the bravest men in our nation's history."

At this point, it's appropriate to recognize the many distinguished guests present, but it's a task that has already been largely and expertly handled for me. So I needed an innovative and creative way to single out the people that I should recognize. That's a delicate mission, to be sure. So naturally, for delicate matters, you turn to a Marine.

And for this one, I turn to our former commandant and now Supreme Allied Commander [General] Jim Jones. In true Marine fashion, this will include everyone I want to recognize and it budgets every word with an economy that would elicit even from Donald Rumsfeld his famous toothy grin, so here goes: Marines, former Marines and friends of Marines ... [Laughter] I think I've just recognized about everybody here ... [laughter] ... in seven words or less. [Applause] Proving, once again, that Marines are not only masters at budgeting their resources, they're unequaled in making every shot count.

When today's invitation came to my office, I can tell you I would have said "yes" regardless. But it came with a handwritten note of gentle encouragement from our wonderful vice chairman, General Pete Pace, the first Marine to hold that high office. He wrote to tell me that this foundation is "a great group of Americans," which I know is true. And he made a big promise: "If you can support this event, you will have a good time." Right again. But he didn't stop there. In typical fashion, he wanted to ensure that all his bases were covered, so he went on to tell me, "You won't have to work too hard." In fact, he promised, "You should look on your role as something like the dear departed at an old-fashioned Irish wake. [Laughter] That is to say, the party can't go on without you, but no one expects you to say very much. [Laughter] Well, don't get your hopes up. [Laughter]

I do feel a special kinship with Pete Pace. No doubt, a large part of that is because we're both number twos. When I accepted this job, I remembered the tradition of number twos and thought, how tough can that be. Ambrose Bierce, in his "Devil's Dictionary" has a definition of a deputy. The deputy, it says "is commonly a handsome young man with a red necktie and an intricate system of cobwebs extending from his nose to his desk." [Laughter] "When accidentally struck by the janitor's broom, he gives off a cloud of dust."

But that hardly describes what it's like to work for Donald Rumsfeld. When Don Rumsfeld welcomed me back from my third tour at the Pentagon, he said, "Paul, we're going to keep bringing you back until you get it right." [Laughter]

And there's hasn't been a dull moment since--and no cobwebs. No cobwebs on Pete Pace either. We number twos have got to stick together. Pete is a lot of fun to be around. And he's just plain funny. Of his great lines, I think, my favorite is: "You should never let a promising career get in the way of a good joke." [Laughter]

I thought of that line every time I've been tempted to ask Donald Rumsfeld why he was coming back for a second tour. [Laughter] But so far, I've been able to resist the temptation. [Laughter]

But no one understood the impact of a good joke or liked one more than President Ronald Reagan, to whom we said farewell this weekend. I think he would have liked this particular legend from Marine Corps lore. It's about one of those Marines under the command of Captain John Paul Jones aboard the Bonhomme Richard in the great naval battle of 1779 against the British ship, Serapis.

It was a pitched battle, one of the most dramatic sea fights in our history. Not surprisingly, the hero of our story was a Marine, probably a gunny. He was loading and firing his gun without stopping. And in the middle of that great fight, John Paul Jones, his clothes tattered, grimy, sweaty and bloody, went below to change into a new uniform. As he came topside, a big section of the mast, along with the ship's colors, came crashing down. And a voice boomed through the smoke, the fire, the fog of war. It was a British captain demanding of Jones, "Have you struck your colors?" He wanted to know was the burning, sinking ship finally surrendering. And our Marine, all sweaty and bloody, turned around to see the captain of the ship resplendent in his clean Navy uniform and then he heard Jones' immoral reply: "Struck, sir, I have not yet begun to fight." And the gunny said, "That's the Navy for you, always the last to get the word." [Laughter]

Well, true story or not, it does tell us this, the Marines' special qualities have been evident since the earliest days of the Corps: their bravery, their skill, their panache, their way with words. This funny story happens to be true. One of our distinguished Marine generals--who had the misfortune of being asked to brief the press in the early stage of the Afghan war--described the Taliban as "eviscerated," a couple of weeks before they actually were. People were all over him for that particular use of the word. A wonderful Marine, a colonel who worked for me said, "Well, we Marines may not know how to spell 'eviscerate,' but we know how to do it." [Laughter]

Well, the real truth, of course, is that Marines know how to do both and extraordinarily well. And lots of other things, too. In my job, I'm fortunate to meet America's soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, and Coast Guardsmen. We just lost, by the way, the first Coast Guardsman in combat since World War II, helping to prevent a disaster in the Persian Gulf. I've been fortunate also to meet many men and women from our law enforcement organizations. I was born in Brooklyn, back when there was still an Ebbets Field and the Brooklyn Dodgers. And my heart went out to each one of those responders who rushed into the Twin Towers on that tragic day in September 2001. These are men and women who choose service over self-interest and they stand for those American values that Ronald Reagan spoke about so eloquently, and which had been brought out this past week in the moving tributes to our 40th president: idealism and optimism, common sense and decency, professionalism, pride and courage.

I've worked with enough Marines to learn a thing or two about your special club. My former boss, Secretary of State George Schultz, who fought as a Marine in the Pacific in World War II, was the one who first educated me on the point that there's no such thing as an ex-Marine. Marines never forget the Corps and they never forget their own. The same is true for those who serve in law enforcement. So I think it was probably inevitable that the Marine Corps Law Enforcement Foundation would come to be--an organization that embraces fully Abraham Lincoln's charge that American must care for "him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan." And what this organization has done and is doing is nothing short of extraordinary.

In the Department of Defense, we are especially grateful for what you do to help educate the children of our Marines, and for what you've done for the children who lost a parent in the Pentagon on September 11th. This year, you've extended your generosity to children who lost parents serving as part of the international coalition in Afghanistan and in Iraq, taking your generosity to a truly global level. That is America at its best and we thank you for it.