HELLO, AMERICA, DO YOU REMEMBER ME?
(we’re the ones who fight your wars every night on your TV…)

These words paraphrase the title and lyrics of the main song track of a great album, recorded years ago by a Vietnam-era veteran artist in Nashville. They seem to apply even more so today.

There was a time when Memorial Day was a day of solemn ceremonials of remembrance for all those who gave that last full measure of devotion and sacrifice for this country. Today, it’s become just an extra day off, for a back yard barbecue, a day at the zoo, at the beach, ogling bikini babes as they play volley ball, or watching the races at Indianapolis and Daytona Beach etc.

And there are even some folks who are not only indifferent to it all, but who are actually hostile to the idea that we should even bother wasting time memorializing those who were naïve enough to believe that this country was worth fighting and dying for. What fools they!

For them America seems to have become a sour note, a collection of degeneracy and mindless babble, a nation of sheep-brained suckers. They have become so disenchanted with what they perceive America is today, they’re ready to just stand by and let it rot on the vine rather than becoming engaged to do whatever it might take to fix it.

What they forget is that America is not a system of so-called “democracy”, but rather, an idea for a republic. A republic designed to have the best possible balance between personal and collective rights, and for rewarding individual accomplishment and merit. It is a republic dedicated to the proposition that only an orderly civil society, actively engaged in the process, and abiding by reasonable laws, can long exist as one.

That was the Founders ideal, anyway, and we are the inheritors of that ideal. The question is….are we as ready as they were to fight and die for that ideal….or not?
So before any of us go off to enjoy that extra day off, those back yard barbecues, and so on, let’s set aside some time to first go visit one of those National Cemeteries and there, stand among those acres and acres of silent grey-white stones and reflect upon what these truly signify. Were those stones not there neither we nor our republic….would be here.

To put it plainly….our freedom didn’t come free….and those stones…. are the markers that paid for it.

CENTURION