Don’t thank our vets if you haven’t learned the lesson: Some things are worth lives and the risk of lives. If you think “stopping another 9-11” is worth mass surveillance and intrusion of person at the airport, you don’t deserve to even say “thank you”. It’s like taking a precious gift and smiling gratefully while flushing it down the toilet.
If you think the Bill of Rights, from bearing arms, to requiring warrants, to publishing dissenting opinions, is only valid when lives aren’t at stake, look into a vet’s eyes and hang your head in shame. How many died on the beaches at Normandy? A LOT more than in the Twin Towers, or at guns in the lawful hands of citizens, or people dying of obesity because soft drink sizes are “too large”.
The next time you find yourself saying things like “if it can prevent just one more death”, remember Normandy. For the love of whatever is holy to you, remember.
Military AND civilian lives, in our imperfect world, is always a price to pay for Freedom — freedom from conquest of foreign power, to oppression at the hands of neighbors through the tools of domestic power. It doesn’t matter how “compassionate” and well-meaning they are. Without common sense, the consequence is cruel, and such ignorance is no excuse.
We auction Liberty off in the voting booth to “save the children”. The real result? America is dooming it’s children, not to death, but what real Americans see as something far worse — an existence of vastly shrinking Liberty. For some, this is reasonable. I see what Our Founding Fathers and the Greatest Generation have done, and call it cowardice.
We will pay the price either way, but will we get what we paid for? There will never be a perfect world with no chance of another 9-11, no firearm accident or crime, no health costs from lifestyle choices. To allow good AND bad things and choices is the price our vets paid for, and now the check is being returned.
It was supposed to mean people aren’t compelled by a pen in Washington, or a fine on your tax return, or an officer’s tazer, for “infractions” for everyday things. Those growing up in the Greatest Generation often recognize such laws as unimaginably stupid, if not Orwellian. The rest of us are slowly boiled frogs with short memories and “more important” issues to fight over.
So if you’re throwing away the gift of our vet’s sacrifice, by your posts on Facebook, your votes, your apathy, don’t thank them. Let those of us who know and cherish what we won, and are willing to take the baton from them, continue to do the work they started.
And you may not want to get in the way. Another Great Generation may yet come to honor their charge in action and not just lip service, and the price paid will yield Liberty in return once again.
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