We need Memorial Day. Not for the “spectacular sales and savings” nor for opportunity to relax over a three day weekend - we need it to remind us that many have died and suffered for us. If we are to truly honor their memory, then we must attempt to learn something from the results and the consequences of our actions.

Anyone who has ever been involved in a shooting war knows that there is no glory or honor involved, regardless of the uniform that’s worn. There is only suffering, fear, disillusionment and death; the creation of nightmares to sear the souls and hollow the eyes of people who have witnessed things no one was ever meant to witness, and who are congratulated as “survivors.” The glorious dead remain dead, leaving behind widows and orphans who strive to find meaning in the void created by the loss of one they loved.

I give honor to those who have sacrificed themselves for an ideal of freedom, of liberty.  I despise those who have manipulated and subverted the truth to create fear and loathing in honest citizens in order to gain power, riches and feeding of their own egos. I abhor the jingoist slogans, propaganda machines, the deliberate obfuscations by which young men and women are sent in harms way, and the callous treatment of those whose service we have demanded but whose damaged bodies and psyches are now considered too heavy a burden for our society to carry.

By all means - let us take this day to remember the sacrifices of those we have asked to serve us.  Let us look long and hard at the causes for which we commit our military, that we define objectives that have a potential military solution, and make certain that  every possible alternative to armed conflict has been utilized, for in all our long history, war has never provided the lasting solution to economic or ideological conflict.