Memorial Day is supposed to be that one day out of the year where the United States of America stops to reflect on those men and women and their families who have given their lives and sacrificed so that we can live free.

That does unfortunately include our ability to enjoy the furniture and car sales that have zip to do with honoring those who gave their lives.

Hopefully, most of the country today will take a moment to reflect upon these heroes who put on the nation’s uniform and died wearing it and will honor their memory. While most do that and post quotes from politicians that they barely know anything about other than those nifty quotes, I decided to go in a different direction today.

What is the state of the country that these men and women died to preserve?

The short answer is… in trouble.

America will turn 245 years old this July 4th, 2021, and she has seen her fair share of trouble. From her founding, which was never as easy or guaranteed that some history books might portray, straight to our bloody civil war, right through the Vietnam era, we have seen some hard times.

The Vietnam conflict was a particularly tumultuous time and was the first time that Americans were given a nightly glimpse into what was happening around the world on a daily basis. The political divisions were sharp and a sitting President of the United States was forced to step down to avoid being forcibly removed from office.

Yet let’s fast forward to today and the country as a whole might be in greater turmoil than we were back in the late 60’s/early 70’s. Social media and the platforms that have been created and now our part of our daily lives drive almost all news coverage and how it is disseminated.

This, quite frankly, has been a blessing and a curse.

We have just completed two of the most contentious Presidential Elections back to back from 2016 and 2020 and the nation is divided much as it was 45 or 50 years ago. This time, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter fuel the conversation, not just the next day from what appeared on the evening news but every 5 to 10 seconds with hundreds of millions of users.

In 2016 almost 66 million people who were ticked off by the defeat of Hillary Clinton, had trouble accepting her loss and blamed Russia for meddling in our elections. Yet after 50 million dollars and an impeachment trial of Donald Trump, they found bupkus.

Fast forward to four years later in 2020, 74 million Americans have had trouble accepting that someone as incompetent as Joe Biden could garner 81 million votes to defeat Trump. Claims of voter fraud have been slung far and wide and while there is proof of some fraud, there has not been the smoking gun of evidence to turn one state with proof. Just four years ago it was perfectly acceptable to question the legitimacy of the Clinton defeat but now if one thinks the same principles should apply to a Trump defeat you can be banned from Twitter and Facebook.

If we do not have confidence in our elections those men and women who died fighting for our ability to do so must be ashamed of us.

This brings me to COVID.

Most of this country from March 2020 until just recently was under heavy restrictions from working, gathering, and just living the way that Americans have for decades, in freedom. Governors of both parties exerted powers that most people never dreamed that they had and they used and abused them. We were told that this was for our own good and that we needed to shelter in place and not visit our loved ones being we could kill them.

If anyone even raised a reasonable objection to the alleged data and science that was being used you could be shunned and kicked off the very platforms that four years prior allowed any conspiracy theory on Russia to flourish.

My colleague Scott Hounsell has done yeoman’s work on his series of articles about Dr. Fauci and his role in how or where the China virus came from. Until just the past couple of weeks, you could be banned by Facebook and Twitter for even suggesting that what anything Scott has written is possible. Yet now it is becoming more mainstream, being it is true.

Check out one of his series of articles here. We Likely Paid the Ultimate Price for Fauci’s Gain-of-Function Research, but Saw None of the Alleged Benefits

I won’t go into the plain stupidity of elected officials looking the other way while American cities burned last summer and then wondering why chanting DEFUND THE POLICE was not as sound policy-wise as they thought.

So on this Memorial Day, it might serve us well to take a step back and think if we are honoring those who died with an appreciation by acting worthy of their sacrifice. I’m quite certain they didn’t die in foreign lands that have had issues with election integrity to only have that happen here.

I might be guessing but those countries that our soldiers died in and gave their last full measure of devotion, defending our interests, all might have had restrictions on the exchange of non-approved government ideas. Why would any American give their life to have that idiotic policy happen back here where we boast how we can speak our minds at any time.

I hope that possibly this nation and her people can take a moment today and every day, to think of the sacrifices that so many have offered and remember how damn rotten spoiled we are. The true irony of their sacrifice is that they died so that we could blow it if we so choose. I’m sure that was not the intention but it very well could end up being the result.

America is at a crossroads this Memorial Day. Do we continue to want to be a strong and virtuous country with flaws that we admit and work on, or do we just roll over and let what our soldiers died for slip away?

Every other time in this countries past, we have rebounded and become a bit stronger. I have hope that we can still make that happen with the current mess we find ourselves in.

Otherwise, go right now and pick up a mattress at one of those cheesy sales being the only thing you’ll want to do in this country is sleep.