Happy New Year, Sunday poem and pics

I have never made New Year's resolutions. Oh, okay, I tried once when I first learned about them as a kid but they seemed too much like Lent sacrifices so I stopped. But this year I want to resolve one thing - to remain mindful that we are at war and that hundreds of thousands of our brave young men and women are fighting for our freedom and security thousands of miles from their homes and families.

Ever since I moved here to God's own country, I have been so contented in my own life that I have tended to forget that our soldiers are dying for us in a faraway and dangerous foreign land. I left San Francisco because I was at war with nearly everyone in SF. I could no longer bear to hear the crazy hippies and commies say things like, "I'm so glad that our soldiers are being killed in Iraq because that means Bush will not be re-elected." I could no longer live among people whom I despised but at least I never forgot that we are at war the way I do here in my pastoral bliss.

Now I live among real Americans in the real USA where we are not afraid to remind each other to pray for our brave soldiers; not ashamed to encourage each other to send money and gifts to those organizations formed to support our troops. But most of the time I'm just so selfishly happy I forget about our brave men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Last Thursday, I took my sister to the local travel agent to book her flight to Portland. The young lady in the agency had just returned from her second tour of duty in Iraq. She was a beautiful, elegant and classy young lady. She had been driving fuel tankers and was nearly killed when her tanker got hit by an IED. She escaped with a piece of metal in her forehead and will have that scar for life. This time, when she came home, she found that her husband had left her and taken their three kids. This is not the first time I have heard of military families breaking up under the stress of separation during long tours of duty.

I took her hand and thanked her for her service to her country and told her I would pray for her but it seemed such an empty gesture.

I was born soon after WWll and grew up watching old black and white British and American war films. But Hollywood is no longer patriotic and in fact is often seditious. And it is difficult to be positive and optimistic about this war when the media is so unrelentingly negative and pessimistic.

Don't most people realize that to keep faith and be hopeful, it is necessary to encourage and inspire each other through difficult times; to help each other keep up our spirits and be resolute? I'm sure most people realize that it is not good to think negative thoughts if you are trying to win.

So why does Hollywood (and the other media) spread pessimism and despair? The answer is partly that bad news and misery sells but that's sadly not all of answer. The tragic fact is that there are a lot of Americans who do not want us to win this war or any war. Actually they don't even want the USA to be the great and wonderful nation that it is. They want us to fail in trade, in geo-politics and everything else.

It's time to tell these traitors to shut up or get the hell out of the USA. We are at war - a just and noble war and we are going to win even if it means getting rid of these treacherous parasites.

So, my New Year's resolution is that I will no longer silently listen to any negative statement about America or the war. I pray for inspiration; for God to put the right words in my mouth; words that will shame and embarass these un-American fools and traitors; words that will make them realize that I am also at war with them and they better watch out because they day is coming when decent Americans will no longer tolerate their treason.

We can't afford to be held back by these idiots. The world needs what America has to offer. America has a great destiny, a huge job to do to bring freedom and civilization to every human being on earth. No one else can do that - only us - because no one else understands what true freedom means - especially not the Europeans.

I wish you all health, wealth and happiness for 2006 - well, for the rest of your life.

I know the following poem has nothing to do with the USA or our current war but to me it says so well what I hoped all Americans would feel about this war but sadly many don't.

It's from Shakespeare's Henry V

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility,
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage,
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect,
Let pry through the portage of the head
Like the brass cannon, let the brow o’erwhelm it
As fearfully as doth a gallèd rock
O’erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
To his full height. On, on, you noblest English,
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof,
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,
Have in these parts from morn till even fought
And sheathed their swords for lack of argument.
Dishonor not your mothers. Now attest
That those whom you called fathers did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war. And you, good yeoman,
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here
The mettle of your pasture. Let us swear
That you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not,
For there is none of you so mean and base
That hath not noble luster in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game’s afoot.
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry “God for Harry, England, and Saint George!”

(I wish I'd found these pics before Christmas.)

Pic one: Santa sewing on the 15th Star

Pic two: British soldiers in Iraq.

Pic three: Christmas for the US Air Force in Iraq.