I spent the morning at Mt. Soledad Veteran's Memorial with men from my church. If you live in San Diego or ever pass through, you should definitely visit the site; it is one of the gems of the city.
Today, we paid tribute to veterans we knew and talked about their lives and how service to their country was an integral part. I was struck at how members of the World War 2 generation, were and still are reticent about their war experiences. Certainly, war is always horrible, regardless of the technology used to fight; but it seems that men are much more willing to discuss what happened today. I am not passing judgement on this, just an observation.
I was also struck but how unspoken our assumptions about military service are. There are many motives for signing up, but in our nation, we have traditionally believed that serving in the military served a higher calling; because our nation is, was and always will be a beacon for good. We exercise our freedom of religion, but collectively believe that our national belief in a good and just God makes us a nation worth defending.
Such concepts are under assault by the left on a daily basis, especially on our campuses. The ease with which College Insurrection produces clickable headlines for conservatives has to do with the outrageous way that the left behaves on campus. (Today's headline: University cuts Pledge of Allegiance from Veterans Day Chapel. Short rebuttal: Faith and patriotism have always been linked.) If those of us who cherish our liberty and the cultural conditions that produced limited, constitutional government continue to lose the culture wars, then military service will be dead. Freedom for our nation will be dead as well.
The good news is that the left always lies and their dogma makes no sense. The bad news is that they are influencing the culture successfully. We are heirs to two millennia of intellectual tradition and greatness. To lose when holding such a winning hand would be ludicrous; but is possible.
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