Name, rank and service but not politics

Name, rank and service but not politics

by
Chaplain Kathie

There are many lessons I've learned over the years. One of them is that the older I got, the smarter my Mom got. Amazing how that usually happens as we enter into our 20's. I miss her especially on Mother's Day. She was humble and wise, caring about others and was deeply loved by everyone she knew. No matter what store we would go to, she would always know someone there like a celebrity. Many times she was told she should to into politics because how many people she knew, above all, cared about. She was also a disabled veteran's wife.

For all the lessons I learned from her, the one in my brain this morning is that when it comes to the men and women serving this country, this one country, there is their name, their rank, what service they served in, but political affiliation is reduced to how they vote. It doesn't matter to them when they are trying to stay alive, trying to keep their buddies alive and stop the people they were sent to fight. It doesn't matter when a Democrat saves the life of a Republican or a Republican saves an Independent. All that matters is they are Americans, serving side by side and serving under the same flag. They fight for each other, for family and do what the leaders of this nation sent them to do. This is carried on when they come home and no matter what party someone belongs to the only thing that matters is they are among the few knowing what it costs to be able to freely choose who leads this nation.

I see this everyday. Men and women putting what really matters ahead of politics because they know how we got to the point where we all have the right to decide on our own.

America's Wars Total
Military service during war
41,891,368
Battle deaths
651,030
Other deaths in service (theater)
308,800
Other deaths in service (nontheater)
230,279
Nonmortal woundings
1,431,290
Living war veterans
17,456,0004
Living veterans
23,442,000
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004615.html

When you think throughout the years 42 million men and women are responsible for defending this country, there can be little doubt why it is we forget them. We remember Presidents and some of us are able to name all of them in order. President Obama is the 44th President. We know Washington was the first, Lincoln as the 16th. Franklin Delano Roosevelt our 32nd President during the worst times of the Great Depression and war, this handicap President stricken by Polio is regarded as one of our finest. So few men serving as President, some elected more than once and others not surviving their first term. They end up in countless books about their lives but few students know how few men and women are responsible for our ability to vote and determine the future of this nation.

Once a year we manage to remember the fallen, even if it is for just a few moments watching the news on Memorial Day. Some will go to the grave sites and visit relatives resting there. Some will go to parades sitting on sidewalks eating ice cream, waving flags as veterans pass by. Others will enjoy the day off with parties kicking off the start of summer never really thinking about what the day really means.

There are thousands heading to Washington DC and Arlington National Cemetery. They are the kind of people you judge too harshly as they come up behind your car with the revving engines of their motorcycles and leather vests. They come together from every part of this one nation, from big cities and tiny towns no one every heard of making the pilgrimage to honor the dead. Last year thousands of them carried the patch of Nam Knights. The Nam Knights are not just Vietnam veterans or veterans of military service but many are police officers and they know the price of our freedom more than anyone else.

We went to the Vietnam Memorial Wall and then to the Law Enforcement Memorial. Each year these people manage to keep giving more and more of themselves to each other and to their communities. Not many know them, know anything about their lives or the fact they would still lay down their lives for the sake of this one nation.

We are bound together as one nation because of the few who dared risk their lives to provide it, yet when we put politics above all else, insult the patriotism of someone with a different opinion, we dishonor all of them accordingly. Political connections didn't matter to any of them as they fought our battles. They come home and then they have to hear a politician slandering a politician from the other side, hear their voices at political gatherings saying someone else is unpatriotic because they disagree and fueling hatred for the sake of their own power and positions. They never stop to think the 17 million combat veterans hearing their voices were willing to die for each other no matter what political view they held. They paid the price for the right to say whatever is said but no one thinks of them having to hear it, walking away feeling as if they have just been attacked by someone who never knew what it was like to put this nation first.

What does warm their heart is what is being done in cities and towns across this nation for their sake.

These are just a few of the types of stories that matter to them.

Fundraiser held for fallen Marine WAVY-TV

Quad Citians come together for wounded Marine WQAD

We can listen to both sides on the illegal immigrant issue and try to make the argument as simple as possible but then we read a story like this and understand, when it comes to the few willing to die in service to this nation, the issue is not as simple as we want it to be.

Army veteran, an illegal immigrant, wants citizenship
Five days before illegal immigrant Ekaterine Bautista, who served six years in the U.S. military, planned to become a U.S. citizen under a decades-old law, her swearing-in ceremony was canceled after it was learned she served in the military under a false identity.

By Anna Gorman

Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — Five days before Ekaterine Bautista planned to become a U.S. citizen, she got a call from the federal government: Her swearing-in ceremony had been canceled pending further investigation.

Bautista was devastated. An illegal immigrant from Mexico, she had served six years in the U.S. military — including a 13-month tour in Iraq — and was eligible to apply for naturalization under a decades-old law.
read more here
Army veteran an illegal immigrant wants citizenship

We can try to count the fallen connected to combat, but then we do not always really know, especially when it comes to suicides of our veterans. 18 a day commit suicide but they are not counted in the war's final tally of the ultimate price paid. These deaths are known by the families, just as we do not count the numbers of the men and women passing away everyday from illnesses created to wage war more "successfully" like Agent Orange and Depleted Uranium.

We don't seem to manage to really understand what Memorial Day is for or what they died for.

My Mom never thought much about politics but voted in every election. She said she voted for the person and not the party attached to their name just as her husband, my Dad, served next to men and women without putting party above being an American. The next time you think about putting politics above all else, remember there was someone on the other side willing to lay down their lives for your right to have your own views protected and they defended that right with their lives. I really wish we could all be more like them and willing to put this one nation ahead of anything else.

On this Memorial Day, remember them and what they valued more than anything else.
Military deaths Los Angeles Times