He told me his embrace of the Lord is “the greatest decision I ever made. I made it for eternity. In every speech I give I mention the Lord. I always end with, ‘In Jesus’ name, Amen.’ Now there are those who take me aside and say ‘Joe, maybe you ought to leave Jesus out.’ ‘No, sir!’ I tell ‘em.”

He simply can’t understand the shadings of modern life. President Clinton’s lawyers arguing about the meaning of his answers under oath triggered strong memories for Foss. “Folks now just don’t have an appreciation for what an oath means. When we took the oath when we were sworn into the Marines, it was a contract! That’s what we went out there to defend. I can still see my pals sitting around when we weren’t flying, guys like Casey Brandon and Danny Doyle, a couple of baseball players from Minnesota, talking about what we were going to do when we got back from the war. Well, they didn’t get back. I lost half my squadron. We all knew what an oath was about.”

Foss, for all of his strong feelings, isn’t a bitter old man.