Speaker 1: Today is Memorial Day, May seven, twenty twenty four, one
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty two days before the next American presidential election.
Speaker 1: This is the warning. This is Arlington House. It sits
Speaker 1: on a hill opposite the Potomac River, looking towards the
Speaker 1: United States Capital, with the Washington Monument in the middle
Speaker 1: facing the Lincoln Memorial. This was Robert E. Lee's home.
Speaker 1: In this home he resigned his commission in the United
Speaker 1: States Army and became the commander of the Army of
Speaker 1: Northern Virginia. This property was confiscated by the government of
Speaker 1: the United States and is the Butcher's Bill. For the
Speaker 1: horror of the War of Secession. The American Army buried
Speaker 1: instead on Lee's property, and today that property is America's
Speaker 1: most hallowed grounds, Arlington National Cemetery. There in front of
Speaker 1: every gravesite is a small American flag, put there to
Speaker 1: remember the sacrifices and the service. Such it is so
Speaker 1: at American cemeteries all over the world. General Colin Powell
Speaker 1: famously commented that when the American Army came to Europe,
Speaker 1: it did not come to occupy, and it did not
Speaker 1: come to subjugate, but rather to liberate and the only
Speaker 1: land that the United States ever asked for was simply
Speaker 1: enough to bury its dead. These sacred spaces, these slivers
Speaker 1: of United States territory, not the world, including at Normandy, France,
Speaker 1: the cemetery in Colville, Somaia, above Omaha Beach. Here thirty
Speaker 1: eight pairs of brothers are buried next to one another,
Speaker 1: father and a son, almost ten thousand graves. Every headstone
Speaker 1: faces west across the Atlantic Ocean, back towards American shores.
Speaker 1: That they left, that they died fighting in a far
Speaker 1: away land to protect. They died for a concept, for liberty, freedom,
Speaker 1: human dignity. They died to free the enslaved and oppressed
Speaker 1: peoples of Europe. The American soldier has fought for freedom
Speaker 1: all across the world, sometimes in wars that should not
Speaker 1: have been fought, were fought for misguided purposes, ideological purposes,
Speaker 1: unnecessary purposes. Generation was sent to fight in the Vietnam
Speaker 1: War when the politicians knew the war cannot be won,
Speaker 1: that there was no hope of victory. Yet that does
Speaker 1: not render the service less meaningful, or honorable or noble.
Speaker 1: Because the intention of the American soldier for its service
Speaker 1: of their nation has never been endowed when the cause
Speaker 1: has been desecrated by the mischief, judgments, or the malice
Speaker 1: or malfeasance of political leaders who were unworthy of the
Speaker 1: responsibilities handed to them by the parents of those soldiers
Speaker 1: through elections. There is no issue more important than peace.
Speaker 1: There are major wars underway in the world on this
Speaker 1: Memorial Day. Some demagoguic politicians in the United States say,
Speaker 1: these wars do not involve us, these wars do not
Speaker 1: threaten us. But that is not the lesson of history,
Speaker 1: and that is not borne out by the sacrifices of
Speaker 1: a million American dead who laid down their lives in
Speaker 1: what Abraham Lincoln called the last full measure of devotion.
Speaker 1: What history teaches us is that freedom comes at a
Speaker 1: terrible cost and price. This Memorial Day, we should remember
Speaker 1: the price and the cost of that freedom, because so
Speaker 1: many Americans seem utterly indifferent to it, indifferent to the
Speaker 1: freedom that they have that they possess that came with
Speaker 1: such great cost. Yet there seems to be no memory
Speaker 1: of the struggle, no recollection of the sacrifice, for so
Speaker 1: many multitudes of Americans who go about oblivious to the
Speaker 1: fangs that bear down on them even as we speak.
Speaker 1: The jackboot is not a foreign disposition that is alien
Speaker 1: to the American way of life. Make no mistake, it
Speaker 1: can come down here and in many ways. It has
Speaker 1: in many places. In difference is the friend of that
Speaker 1: jack boot. It is the fuel of government thuggery. It
Speaker 1: is what causes despotism. Today's a day when we celebrate
Speaker 1: freedom by honoring the last full measure of devotion, where
Speaker 1: we member the American soldier, sailor, airmen, marine coastguardsmen, and
Speaker 1: merchant marine men who gave their life so that the
Speaker 1: United States could endure. There is nothing in any of
Speaker 1: our lives that is more important, Not our marriages, not
Speaker 1: our children, not our money, not our prosperity, not our health.
Speaker 1: Nothing more important that during the short span of our lives,
Speaker 1: that we play our part as custodians and stewarts, preserving, protecting,
Speaker 1: and defending, through acts small and large, the Constitution of
Speaker 1: the United States of America for which they pledged their
Speaker 1: lives and gave their lives. This is the cause of
Speaker 1: American citizenship, This is the obligations of its duties and responsibilities.
Speaker 1: And today we celebrate the greatest Americans amongst all Americans
Speaker 1: who have ever been, there have only ever been seven
Speaker 1: hundred million Americans. One million have given their lives in uniform.
Speaker 1: They have represented every creed, every race, every faith. They
Speaker 1: are the whole of the American people, and every one
Speaker 1: of them was laid to rest under the national colors.
Speaker 1: And today that flag, our American flag that we share,
Speaker 1: our united symbol, that we lower to half mass and
Speaker 1: then raise up to full staff, has fifty stars on
Speaker 1: its canton. And that flag is truly the flag of
Speaker 1: American freedom because it is the fifty star flag where
Speaker 1: all Americans, of all creeds, all fates can finally participate
Speaker 1: equally as citizens of the Great Republic. And that's something
Speaker 1: worth celebrating and something worth remembering as we honor America's
Speaker 1: fallen war dead today with the deepest gratitude and the
Speaker 1: greatest love. They died for people they did not know,
Speaker 1: people like us who were not born yet, so that
Speaker 1: our children may live in peace and prosperity and freedom.
Speaker 1: That is an act of love. Ponder its magnitude today,
Speaker 1: if even for a minute, it will be a moment
Speaker 1: that does some justice to the immensity of the sacrifice
Speaker 1: made by so many so that we could walk free today,
Speaker 1: look up at the sky or down at the grass,
Speaker 1: and not worry about a monster behind the tree. Happy
Speaker 1: Memorial Day. I'm Steve Schmidt. This is the warning and
Speaker 1: I invite you to join. Subscribe on our sub stack,
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