No Caption Needed

WW1 Flanders Field American Cemetery and Memorial

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"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the Earth."

(Abraham Lincoln, November 19, 1863, at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania)


A safe and blessed Memorial Day to you all. Let us each remember those who gave so much, that we may live free.

Lou

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"I should be glad if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes."

(Former senator from Massachusetts and keynote speaker at the dedication ceremony, Edward Everett...whose speech immediately preceded Lincoln's...in a letter written to the president November 20, 1863.)


This day is set aside to remember those who’ve lost their lives in the service of this country, from the Revolution to Iraq and Afghanistan. There was a story on the local news here recently of a college student who wrote a book about some WWII veterans she got to know. She echoed a sentiment often heard referring to what’s been dubbed “The Greatest Generation”; that she was most impressed by the humility of these people, who endured what most of us would consider unendurable. But I’m not surprised by it. That humility is easy to understand when you consider that those men survived the incredible insanity of war while many of their friends did not. In the phrase “All gave some, some gave all”, they know that they were among the lucky “all”. Let us remember the “some”. And let us honor their memory by doing everything we can both to avoid war whenever possible and to answer the call when it’s necessary.

Tribute to a military Pilot

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMKxTS4_FJM&feature=endscreen&NR=1

Well said.

The Guard of the Eagles - damn, a wing feather touched my heart...