Earning It

I'm at a new paper now in the suburbs. It's smaller than my last one, has almost no staff, makes me work a thousand hours a week and pays me next to nothing. It's not great, but as managing editor I get to set the tone for the paper. Unlike my right wing colleagues at the old paper, I'm not going to preach any party line.

I wrote the editorial for the Memorial Day issue and decided since no one is reading this anyway, I might as well include it here.

A solemn day of remembrance

For many Americans, next Monday’s holiday serves as the unofficial kick-off to summer. The weather has turned warmer, summer baseball leagues have begun, and students can almost sense the weeks of freedom that await them. But Memorial Day should be more than that, something solemn.

The holiday, started in 1868, was originally called Decoration Day. General John Logan issued General Order No. 11 that said in part that May 30 be "designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country." In 1971, Congress designated the last Monday in May for the observation.

Unlike Veterans Day, Memorial Day does not celebrate the service of citizen soldiers but rather mourns their loss.

In Steven Spielberg’s epic film "Saving Private Ryan," a dying Capt. John Miller (Tom Hanks) whispers one last order to the title character.

"Earn this, James," he says as he lays bloody amid the detritus of war, smoke and death hanging in the air. "Earn it," he says again before his life breath escapes him.

Too often Hollywood gets it wrong; in this case it’s right.

The character’s final words, while directed to one man, are a challenge to us all to earn the right to the freedoms that so many Americans have died protecting. Memorial Day is a national recognition of those men and women who left this life amidst the savagery that is man at his most inhuman. Their shortened lives, with all the hope and promise that resides in the souls of each life, are the price paid for our freedom.

Even now, men and women pay the last full measure in service to the novel idea that the rule of law is more powerful than any king, more inspiring than any philosophy. We must forever earn their sacrifice. Not through empty sentiment or patriotic platitude, not through commercial anthems on radio or magnetized ribbons on bumpers.

Instead we must ensure that we never turn a blind eye to injustice, never allow the usurpation of the Constitution those dead swore to defend. Earning it requires eternal vigilance against those who would blind us with lies or cripple us with fear. Earning it requires each of us to stand on guard here in this blessed country against those who wish to deny others their inalienable rights in the pursuit of personal power or enrichment. Earning it requires that the strong protect the weak, that the empowered include the powerless.

The blood and tears of these men and women, not yet dried in the streets of Fallujah, not yet washed from the clothes of their comrades, demands more of us and our leaders.

We can not — we must not — ever forget that our freedom was paid for with their ultimate sacrifice.

As we fire the grill, as we toss the ball, as we enjoy the sun or rest in the shade this solemn holiday, there is a question that should linger in the air, swirl around us like the smoke of barbecues, prick deep inside the heart of every free American. The question each must ask himself is have I earned it?