Our old friend Umer Waris has joined us once again to share his thoughts on the current situation with the Oakland Raiders. He creates a powerful historical allegory to the current struggles of the Raider Nation.
The Crisis…
“These are times that try a man’s soul…” and so begins the opening stanza of ‘The Criss’ by Thomas Paine. Well in the case of the Raider Nation, it has been a “time that try a fan’s fan hood” ever since we have stood witness to how our team fell from the smash-mouth football we were so familiar with. While reading through this articulate piece of rhetoric, one of the many great writings amongst our nation’s annals, one cannot wonder but what was orbiting around the minds of those patriots at the time of this publication.
You see the American troops (volunteers for the most part) were ill-trained and outnumbered (35,000 to 18,000 to be exact) against their far-advanced British counterparts at the battle for New York on the winter of 1776. Under general George Washington, these man were able to cross the Delaware river to Manhattan Island under the frigid & foggy conditions. It was at this time Thomas Paine, a Briton long aroused by the American cause wrote those fine words in ‘The Crisis’. The Patriot army standing demoralized and grief-stricken from their recent loss couldn’t have heard such words at a more appropriate time.
History would have it that on December the 26th 1776 at the Battle of Trenton, these Americans found success. Historians have long ascribed the battle fought at Trenton as the turning point in the struggle for it changed the mindset to the belief that the great and mighty British Kingdom could be beaten.
The analogies are great to the struggle we as Raiders face but of course the enormity is far from what those fighting in 1776 must have endured! So as the Draft nears and the sun of another season comes within sight, we can only hope for the best and as always we have, never give up in our ties to our team.
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