Freedom isn't Free

No one could make a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.

Edmund Burke

A long time ago I heard the comment “That’s the sound of freedom” in response to a complaint about the noise caused by Air Force jet fighter aircraft taking off.  I don’t know who origionally thought up that idiom, but it’s one I fully agree with, and have always remembered.  Years of close exposure to those jet engine noises has cost me most of my hearing unfortunately, but I think that’s a small price to pay for that which I value so highly, the freedom of every American.  Another idiom that says much the same to me is “Freedom isn’t Free” (This one was authored by Colonel Walter Hitchcock, USAF, Retired), that expresses gratitude for the sacrifices made by members of the military through the years of our nations existance.  Written as a poem by Cdr. Kelly Strong, USCG Ret, the later half goes something like this;

“I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still
I listened to the bugler play
and felt a sudden chill.
I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant "Amen,"
When a flag had draped a coffin
Of a brother or a friend.
I thought of all the children,
of the mothers and the wives,
of fathers, sons and husbands
with interrupted lives.
I thought about a graveyard
At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No, freedom isn't free.”

Quite so… retaining the freedom enjoyed by Americans has been very expensive over the years, but we must also remember that the service and sacrifice of our servicmen isn’t the only thing that makes us a free nation.  There was the wisdom and foresight of the men who gave us our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution, men who pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, to give our flegling nation a start.  There are the untold multitudes who gave their all to push back the frontier and gave our young nation room to grow.  Countless public figures have served us and the nation well through the decades, joined by the millions of young men who guarded us from those who, jealous of our freedom, would destroy us.  Or consider the three quarters of a million young men who gave their lives during our civil war, proving to all and sundry that freedom and liberty are for all Americans, and that freedom is the cornerstone of all that America stands for.  You might think of the young men who marched off in two great wars to prove once again that America was a most terrible enemy of tyrany wherever it raised it’s ugly head.  And of the women left behind, who worked the farms and factories so necessary to forge the critically needed weapons of war.  There, in all those Americans, you will find the effort and sacrifice made by the American people for the last 236 years.    

No, freedom is not free, and today the price we must pay is eternal vigalance.  Our world is full of greedy, evil men whose only wish is to be powerful at our expense.  It is our duty as citizens of this great land to stand guard against such people and their plots against our liberty.  It is for us, the citizens of America, to root out the oh-so-many enemies of our nation, enemies both foreign and domestic, who wish nothing less than to see us enslaved, subjected to their every whim, and our free nation not even a memory.  Far to many Americans, some of them elected officials, some educators, others merely common people who know no better, expect us to believe the fuzzy thinking, the failed political theories, warped morality, and the outright lies spread by those evil people, in hopes of changing the very things that make us a free nation.  Innocent American lives are being taken everyday, and our precious freedoms steadily eroded, because some people just want to be powerful. 

The leaders of our country from long past fought against great odds for the rights that make up our treasured freedoms.  Freedoms that form the basis of the Constitution which has bound us together as a nation for over two hundred years.  Today these rights are being twisted into totally unrecognizable form, and used in courtrooms, schools, our neighborhoods, and even our nation’s highest office, to strip us of our rights.  It's hard to realize that today, while many countries around the world continue to fight for any basic freedom, Americans seem so willing to surrender our rights to powerful men in the name of “safety” and “security”.  

America is in deep trouble today, and unless we soon begin selecting leaders who believe in American values, my grandchildren will live in a third world country, a mere parody of the America I remember.  This situation is enough to break an old soldiers heart.  We served to protect our Constitution, the nation’s freedom, and the greatness of our country, and yet Americans today constantly elect people to high office who only desire to take that freedom away from us.  And it’s all happening without our even putting up a fight!  I’m constantly heard bemoaning the fact that we lack leaders with high moral courage and values.  (In some cases, any morals or values!)  Consider, in today’s world, where Americans are so absorbed in the antics of assorted celebrities, where greed overshadows morality, where our young people are not even taught our history or just what it is that America stands for, we expect inspired leadership.  Yet can we really expect to see, just in the nick of time, another Jefferson or Franklin, Lincoln or Reagan riding forth on a white horse to defeat those evil men and lead us into the promised land?  Or will we, the citizens of this failing nation, have to do it the hard way, one vote at a time, all by our lonely selves? 

If George Washington were alive today, and could see what has happened to the founding fathers dream, he’d probably sue us for calling him “The Father of the Country”.