On July 4th, 1986, the greatest president in my lifetime, Ronald Wilson Reagan, delivered these words to a television audience. They are as inspirational today as the day that they were given.
My remarks tonight will be brief, but it’s worth remembering that all the celebration of this day is rooted in history. It’s recorded that shortly after the Declaration of Independence was signed in Philadelphia celebrations took place throughout the land, and many of the former Colonists — they were just starting to call themselves Americans — set off cannons and marched in fife and drum parades.
What a contrast with the sober scene that had taken place a short time earlier in Independence Hall. Fifty-six men came forward to sign the parchment. It was noted at the time that they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honors. And that was more than rhetoric; each of those men knew the penalty for high treason to the Crown. “We must all hang together,” Benjamin Franklin said, “or, assuredly, we will all hang separately.” And John Hancock, it is said, wrote his signature in large script so King George could see it without his spectacles. They were brave. They stayed brave through all the bloodshed of the coming years. Their courage created a nation built on a universal claim to human dignity, on the proposition that every man, woman, and child had a right to a future of freedom.
For just a moment, let us listen to the words again: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” Last night when we rededicated Miss Liberty and relit her torch, we reflected on all the millions who came here in search of the dream of freedom inaugurated in Independence Hall. We reflected, too, on their courage in coming great distances and settling in a foreign land and then passing on to their children and their children’s children the hope symbolized in this statue here just behind us: the hope that is America. It is a hope that someday every people and every nation of the world will know the blessings of liberty.
If you listen to the Mantra of Modern American Liberals, you would think that America’s best days are behind her and that we are the worst Nation on the face of the Earth. Personally, I do not believe their assessment of gloom and doom. Rather, I stand with this man who embodied the American Spirit that is beginning to awaken across this blessed land.
Per military.com:
Gen. Anthony Clement McAuliffe is best remembered for uttering a single word — no mean feat, considering that even the shortest Bible verse has two. Commanding the U.S. Army’s beleaguered and surrounded 101st Airborne Division during World War II’s Battle of the Bulge, McAuliffe received a German surrender ultimatum. “Nuts!” he replied, and became a lasting symbol of American courage and determination under fire.
A 1918 West Point graduate, McAuliffe held various field artillery positions before World War II. On the eve of D-Day, McAuliffe jumped with the first wave as a commander of division artillery, although he had never received formal parachute training.
In December 1944, during the siege of Bastogne, Belgium, McAuliffe was acting commander of the 101st in Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor’s absence. The Americans had been holding the Belgian town “at all costs,” and on Dec. 22, Gen. McAuliffe received the encouraging news that the 4th Armored Division was beginning its drive north to relieve the 101st. Later that morning, members of the division’s glider regiment saw four Germans coming up the road carrying a white flag. Everyone hoped they were offering surrender. Instead, they presented two pages demanding the Americans’ surrender: “To the USA Commander of the encircled town of Bastogne. . .There is only one possibility. . .the honorable surrender of the encircled town.”
McAuliffe glanced at the message and said, “Aw, nuts!” When he told his commanders he didn’t know what answer to send, Lt. Col. Harry Kinnard said ‘That first crack you made would be hard to beat, General.” Everyone laughed as a sergeant typed up the succinct response: “To the German Commander: Nuts! The American Commander.”
Between this stoic reply, Patton’s troops from the south, and a change in the weather that allowed air reinforcement the following day, the 101st was able to hold Bastogne. Their victory resulted in the first full-Division Presidential Distinguished Unit Citation.
McAuliffe’s actions at Bastogne helped assure the final defeat of the Germans. Gen. McAuliffe continued to serve on active duty, including assignments as Head of the Army Chemical Corps, Commander, 7th Army, and Commander-In-Chief of the U.S. Army, Europe, until his 1956 retirement. He died in Washington, D.C. in 1975 and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
While spending time on Facebook Political Pages, which I really should cut down on, as it tends to increase my blood pressure to Mt. Vesuvius Levels, I continuously encounter individuals who echo the sentiments of the 44th President of the United States of America, Barack Hussein Obama, and the rest of the Far Left self-proclaimed geniuses who cost the Democratic Party the Presidency who believe that anybody who works hard for a living and believes in God and Country, is a Jingoistic imbecile.
According to the dictionary, Jingoism is an extreme chauvinism or nationalism marked especially by a belligerent foreign policy.
In other words, being guilty of believing that America is the greatest country on the face of God’s Green Earth and believing in American Exceptionalism.
For the past 2 decades at least, children and young adults, attending American Institutes of Learning from kindergarten to college campuses have been taught by Liberal teachers and professors that America is “just another country” and to be a patriot is to somehow be close-minded, ignorant, and bigoted, not necessarily in that order.
Where the exceptionalism of America lies…is not in the Halls of Power…nor in the Halls of Academia. But, rather in the courage and spirit of the average American. A courage and spirit, which our history proves, has driven American Citizens to build a nation, which is indeed exceptional among all others.
The secret of this country’s exceptionalism is the “Average Joe”, the 9 to 5′er, working himself into the grave to try to provide for his family.
It was this same “Average Joe”, who fired the shot heard around the world and began the War for American Independence, who stormed the beaches of Normandy on D-Day in World War II, who waded through rice paddies in Vietnam, and who swallowed sand in Desert Storm and Desert Shield. The same “Average Joe” who, as a New York City Policeman or Fireman, ran up the stairs of the World Trade Center on 9/11/01, instead of running down them. The same “Average Joe”, who simply wants things to be easier in this life for his children and grandchildren, than he had it.
It is this same “Average Joe”, who takes family and friends in, when they are in the midst of a life-altering tragedy. The same “Average Joe”, who volunteers on a soup line or at a Senior Citizens Home, or, who begins a successful business in his basement.
And, it is this same “Average Joe” whom, being fed up with the Democratic Party’s Far Left Crusade against anything and everything traditionally American, went to the voting booth and elected Donald J. Trump, a Citizen Statesman, as our 45th President.
And that, boys and girls, is why, on this 4th of July, almost 2 years after average Americans watched with a sense of prideful accomplishment as Donald J. Trump took the Oath of Office, Modern American Liberals are still showing the world their posteriors while continuing to throw the longest mass temper tantrum in recorded history.
Their ego-driven political ideology did not permit them to consider the reality that theirs is still the minority political ideology in this nation.
While the East and “Left” Coast are indeed heavily-populated in their metropolitan areas with Liberals (some of them even Legal Citizens), the reality of what actually happened on November 8th, 2016 can been plainly seen on any Electoral Map.
It was an overestimation of their own intellect and an underestimation of the intelligence and unbridled love of average Americans for OUR COUNTRY, that cost the Democrats the Presidency.
As George Orwell said,
Patriotism is usually stronger than class hatred, and always stronger than internationalism.
So, to summarize, by labeling Patriotism as “Jingoism” and by ridiculing those of us who love our country and hold fast to Traditional American Values, the Democratic Party cost themselves the Presidency…going from the “In Crowd” to the Outhouse.
If I was a Modern American Liberal with any sort of self-awareness, I would be throwing a temper tantrum, too…over my own ungrateful arrogant ignorance that caused the defeat of my Presidential Candidate.
Unfortunately, the Far Left special interests groups who have taken over the once mainstream Democratic Party are not self-aware.
And, it is this lack of self-awareness that is allowing average Americans to witness the implosion and political extinction of the Democratic Party right before our very eyes.
In the opinion of this 59-year-old, sitting in the Northwest corner of the Magnolia State in America’s Heartland, Modern American Liberals, and their ideological leaders, who trod the Halls of Power with impunity, underestimated the American Spirit, just as King George and the British Aristocracy did, so many years ago.
As our enemies, both foreign and domestic, have discovered since the birth of our nation, Americans will fight for our freedom.
We showed this fact to the world on November 8th, 2016.
And now, almost 2 years later thanks to the unflinching leadership of an American President, and despite the actions of those who despise our American Way of Life, our Sovereign Nation is rising like a phoenix from its ashes and we are making American great again!
May God Bless you and your family on this 4th of July, the Year of Our Lord, 2018, and may God Bless America.
Until He Comes,
KJ
Kingsjester's Blog 