Today, Dr. Hannibal Lecter, amidst solemn dignity and quite honor, was interred at Arlington National Cemetery. Lecter, youngest scion born to a import – export royal family, was posthumously feted by friend and foe alike. Born in 1932, Lecter toiled in the long shadow cast by his famous and self denying family. With great humility and self abnegation Hannibal served mankind with aplomb and earnestness.
Lecter eventually discovered the cure for Cancer and even those who tenaciously fought against his eventual discovery of Cancer’s cure eulogized him with great fondness. Dr. Orrin Snatch, one of Lecter’s competitors said; “I fought with him and loved him like a brother.” Dr. Ray Stanforth Quail, former Vice President of the AMA, and another of Dr. Lecter’s opponents rendered up this panegyric to Hannibal Lecter; “though we were enemies in the medical guild Hannibal was a man who took the time to remember the names of my children and the dates of their birthdays. My children still remember with fondness how Dr. Lecter had them for dinner on their birthdays year in and year out when they were small — always serving New England Lobster with fava beans and a nice Chianti chaser.” New York Times Magazine medical writer Dr. Fred Kline spoke of Hannibal saying, “It is just the most amazing thing about Hannibal that he could joke about his cannibalism. It’s not that he didn’t feel remorse about the death of his victims, but that he still always saw the other side of everything and the ridiculous side of things, too.” Dr. Don McLean, a peer of Hannibal’s but yet another man who opposed Lecter’s search for the cure for cancer offered this encomium to the memory of Lecter, “Hannibal was an institution within an institution. Whenever there was an event or anything like that, he had a remarkable way of sending out a little note or calling your family or something like that.” Dr. Moe Sliden, current Vice President of the AMA and co-laborer with Lecter praised him by saying; “In working with Lecter I was a witness to history.”
The unfortunate thing during this time of national grieving is that some hate filled people have not been able to look past the assorted vices of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, choosing instead to nurture their hatred by refusing to understand that a man of such greatness, like Lecter, must be allowed his occasional idiosyncratic behaviors. All these hate filled people can do, while looking at greatness, is to point out the speck in the great man’s eye. It is an open question, given the presence of these hate filled people, if America will ever be able to produce another Dr. Hannibal Lecter again.
Despite the haters and naysayers there is hope that the US will be able to pass a health care bill as a memorial to Dr. Lecter. In light of all of his work for the betterment of humanity, the realization of socialized Health care was long an aspiration of Dr. Lecter’s. Lecter’s lifelong hope was that victims would be well taken care of.
Simply brilliant. My congratulations, sir.