From Gettysburg to Glasgow

American Spectator ^ | 3 july 07 | Jeffrey Lord

[rellimpank]

It was 144 years ago this week.

Thirty-five miles from where I write, for three extraordinarily violent days beginning on July 1st and ending on July 3rd, the fate of America hung in the balance.

By July 4th, the small village of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, was a horrific landscape of carnage. The words of author and educator Garry Wills in his classic Lincoln at Gettysburg leave little to the imagination:

[goldstategop]

Freedom carries with it a painful, a high price. That's the central lesson of Gettysburg and the American Revolution. You cannot win and preserve freedom without shedding blood. Without the dear sacrifices of American patriots, none of us would be living here, free and independent today. The Democrats' obsession with forcing an American defeat in Iraq have let them to lose sight of this larger picture. It is only what has not been cheaply but rather mostly dearly purchased with blood and treasure, do we esteem highly. Our freedom was built on the sacrifice of those who died to keep it for us and we humbly bow before them. And today, we salute our troops, who in a distant land carry on the noble endeavor of keeping us and our children and their children's children free.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Diogenesis]

President Ronald Reagan:

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.
We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream.
It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same,
or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children
and our children's children what it was once like in the United States
where men were free."

[AmericaUnited]

Thanks for that picture. I miss Reagan so much it almost hurts...

[-=SoylentSquirrel=-]

Greatest President of the last 200 years.....

[drzz]

I have been to Gettysburg several times. Beautiful place.

[uncitizen]

I have been to Gettysburg several times. Beautiful place.

i've been there once but it's definitely a place to go back to. if we have time we'll hit Gettysburg on our annual summer road trip this year. There's just something about the place. And plus there is so much to see, it could take more than a day to see it all.