Memorial Day Message: Is America Still Worth Fighting For

As another Memorial Day dawns, I’m thinking about the men and women that laid down their lives for their country… I am thinking about the soldiers I served with, some of which I commanded during my 30 years of service in the Army. I think about the depth of their sacrifice and the cause for which they forfeited their future by giving their last full measure.  By giving the full measure of their devotion, they paid the ultimate price to serve our nation. Lest we forget, each person we remember died for a cause.

President Lincoln memorialized those who died in the cause of “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” Their sacrifice reminds us that “freedom is not free”, that the price of our freedom has been paid in the blood of our Uniformed Military Service personnel and the grief of those who loved them.

Now it is our turn to “highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain.” It falls to us to do all we can so that “this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom” and that our democracy “shall not perish from the earth.” Such resolve takes many forms: military, economic, political, and cultural among them. But most of all, it requires a spiritual commitment mirroring the commitment we remember today. Those who we remember this Memorial Day, recognized the United States of America as a Republic worth dying for.

If the extreme or revolutionary Left has its way, the America they fought and died for will cease to exist. Why? Because the Left doesn’t appreciate what made America a nation built on a hill that could not be hidden. Moreover, the moral authority of America, the "beacon on the hill" that President Ronald Reagan spoke of, was an essential part of that interest.

Today, we are leaderless and voiceless from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, at home and abroad, even as the voices of our citizens are loud and strong. ... Voices from around the globe, question whether the United States still possess any moral authority. And as the Left has taken over the center, our fellow citizens have been told that America is evil, and racist, and unjust. Sadly, because of education indoctrination, and “Woke” ideology and, CRT” historical revisionism the adolescent generations believe it. Consequently, they’ve put their faith in authoritarian left leaning ideologues, with no clue how good they’ve had it or how bad things can get. 

The bad news is that we could lose everything our military service members were willing to die for. But the good news is that there is still light at the end of the axiomatic tunnel, if the majority of Americans are still willing to fight for it. I ask you the reader, are you still one of them? Think about this, If the Left’s ideas were popular, they wouldn’t have to censor us via social media and MSM, they wouldn’t have to meddle or intrude in our elections, and they would assuredly not need Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) to boost, thereby embolden their client companies, corporations, businesses...

Regardless, whether the numbers are currently on their side or our side, is America still worth fighting for? Granted, Left Wing radicals are tactically and organizationally years ahead of patriotic Americans only beginning to realize they are in a war. Can we still win the war? If so, how? The first step is understanding the adversary. We can’t save the America our men and women died for until we understand who and what we’re up against. As we reflect on the Uniformed Armed Service members that made the ultimate sacrifice, we must ask ourselves what forfeitures we are willing to make so their last breaths were not for naught.

 

Truth Be Known

Remember when Bud Light recently forced the woke agenda on their customers, conservatives and political moderates alike didn’t take it lightly. What happened? They coalesced, drew a line in the sand, dug their heels in, and made their voices heard. How so? They boycotted Bud Light, and the company is hemorrhaging money hand over fist, scrambling to correct their gaffe, better stated their error in judgement.

But if the Left’s Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) agenda succeeds, it won’t matter. It won’t matter what consumers believe or what brands do, because they’ll use ESG to prop up woke companies no matter what and destroy the businesses that resist their agenda. Think about it. It won’t matter how often these business enterprises offend us, upset us, disparage us... or make our blood boil. Our boycotts and protests will fall on deaf ears, because these companies will never face the resultant consequences of their actions. If you were previously unfamiliar or ill-informed of ESG, that’s no mistake or error on your part. While we’re distracted with our Southern border crisis, Ukraine-Russia conflict, oval office mandates, CCP- U.S. relations... left wing revisionists or radicals are cautiously coordinating with the private sector to advance a policy that would destroy what remains of the free market. ESG eliminates the illusion of choice. They’re social credit scores, but for businesses, and if they succeed in bringing that kind of collectivism or Marxism to the private sector, it’s only a matter of time before they bring it to our individual lives. Specifically, penalizing us when we contest the system, and rewarding us when we conform or submit to it. 

And what happened yesterday, today, and likely tomorrow (metaphorically speaking) to us is happening all over our nation and all over the world, as globalists do everything in their power to contrive or manufacture by whatever means is necessary support for their architypes, ideals, exemplars... simply stated, it’s their way or the highway.

 

Reparations, History, What If's and Reality

Let’s take a moment for a quick-fire repartee as it pertains to reparations, after all it is a contentious and hot topic.  Without doubt slavery, and the systematic subjugation of African Americans was vile. Its legacy is wicked. Its surviving traces are evil. It is not a sin that is unique in the world, but it is an evil that is unique in the context of America. Its consequences remain largely with us, as anyone with eyes to see can discern for themselves.

Unlike the Japanese American WWII internment case, American reparations program would necessarily be vague, there being few if any specific legal relationships by which eligibility and liability could be established. Is there a Confederate treasury to seize or present antebellum plantations to appropriate? The few corporate relationships that existed then and now are few and far removed from vassalage. Additionally, by and large the people represented by that government overwhelmingly oppose reparations, in part because many of them believe that their government justified itself at Gettysburg and paid its debt. Think about this. As of today, “2023, millennials are the largest living adult age group in America,” born in 1981 or tater, the 72+ million American millennials would have to go back at least five, six, even seven generations to find a slave or slave owner in their lineage, if there were any at all.

But it is more complicated than that. White Americans are the most strongly opposed to reparations, and not without reason. It is not obvious that an American whose forbearers or ancestors arrived here from Ireland, or Poland, or Italy or Sicily (as my ancestors did in the early 1900’s) ... after the Civil War has sins of the father to bear and atone for on this score.  And, without diminishing the wickedness of slavery, Americans of Jewish, Catholic, Southern and Eastern European... and other historically disparaged ancestries can point to discrimination and exclusion, too. To ask white Americans with no personal connection to slavery to accept guilt for it by virtue of their being white is to ask them to accept an idea that is fundamentally alien to our political culture.

How about some historical context? Do we not stand on the shoulders of historical American Revolutionary war patriots? Indeed, we stand on the shoulders of people like John Adams, Sam Adams, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Nathen Hale, Crispus Attucks… who encountered and triumphed over what was then the largest empire in history. They said no, we will not stand for this. Thus, victory became America’s reality... Fast forward 72 years, America is embroiled in a Civil War to end slavery... Fast forward another 158 years following the end of slavery. social justice warriors (SJW), race hustlers and leftist politicos panning for future votes demanding descendants of slaves receive reparations for past wrongs. Are past wrongs deserving of compensation? If so, are we looking through dark lenses as to who deserves reparations? I suggest, if reparations become the new social norm, we need to re-examine the target recipients.

Why not expand the Reparation groupings. Why are there no ‘Reparations’ for White ancestral descendants of Civil War Union Soldiers who fought to free Black slaves from bondage? Why not reparations for survivors of uniformed serve members who perished in WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam... regardless of color? Same goes for law enforcement officers, fire fighters and EMT’s killed in the line of duty. 

Should people so far removed from slavery be held accountable for the damage? I am of the opinion that no one currently living is responsible for righting the wrongs committed by long dead slave owners. I’ve said my piece, what say you, be it pro or con or ambivalent?