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Monday, May 26. 2008
Memorial Day 2008
Today is Memorial Day. As has been my routine for the past several years, I will start my day at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery with a ceremony to honor the fallen, those who have gone on. This year, as it was last year, will be especially emotional since my brother Carl’s ashes are now interred at Fort Rosecrans.He didn’t win an award, he isn’t a Medal of Honor recipient, didn’t even get a Purple Heart. He just enlisted in the Navy, served his country and mustered out into a country that didn’t like him and all his fellow veterans. We would sit around on Friday nights with our buddy Dan, playing Sheepshead, a Milwaukee-based card game, and kibbutz about our various — and occasionally true — escapades as men in uniform.
Of course, I was the only one in the military (U.S. Marine Corps), Carl and Dan were in the Navy.
No, Carl wasn’t a hero, didn’t try to be a hero, would probably look in horrified shock were you to suggest that by merely wearing the uniform he was a hero. He was just your average American, citizen soldier, like most of the other men and women interred at Fort Rosecrans.
None of them are average Americans though. It’s a small part of our citizenry that served in uniform, and even fewer still who volunteered. Much can be said though for those who were drafted. They may not have wanted to go, especially during Vietnam when our nation was torn apart by an unpopular war and the mere suggestion of going into the military would, at the very least, get a man (or woman) a look of pity or disdain.
Carl, like many of his generation, was a volunteer.
For those who have not served in uniform, it doesn’t mean much, if anything at all, unless they happen to be the loved ones of those who served. For most Americans, Memorial Day is all about the barbeque, the picnic, maybe the beach or The Race. They might give veterans and service members lip service, but for the most part, it’s just another day off from work. And that’s cool. This is America and we don’t require anyone to be patriotic or remember the fallen.
For me, and a few other of my fellow Americans, this day cannot go unnoticed. We gather at various cemeteries around the country and remember the men and women who served and are no longer with us.
We do so because, after all the lip service, the government that promised to have our back for the rest of our lives doesn’t. Men and women with service-connected disabilities now pay co-pays at the V.A. medical centers. Those of us who are not Iraq-Afghan veterans or don’t have combat-related injuries — even if those injuries were incurred on duty — are turned away because we are “not a priority.”When the Senate votes to give the current generation of veterans a new G.I. Bill, and it passes with a 77% yea vote, and the president wants to veto that bill, with the support of one of the presidential candidates — the only candidate still in the race who is a veteran — you gotta wonder who your vote should go to when you’re in the voting booth. Who really supports and honors the troops and veterans?
In the president’s 2007 budget, he requested a 7.2% increase in V.A. funding. Sounds good. But the number of veterans using V.A. service had doubled that increase; it’s up 14%.
The government isn’t standing behind its vets. That trait though doesn’t stand with all of us. We will show up today at all the various cemeteries around the nation, not because we’re prominent government officials or running for office, but because we believe these men and women ought to be remembered for their sacrifice, some of those on the field of battle, others, their sacrifice was giving up years of their lives so the rest of us could sleep securely Sunday Night in order to have our picnics and attend or watch the Indianapolis 500 on Memorial Day.
So, I’ll give up a couple hours of my day off of work to honor them. Semper Fidelis.
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