Editorial

		(Officially celebrated on the last Monday of May.)

Editorial

Memorial Day - another Perspective

by Daniel D. New

Parades. Flags. Bittersweet memories for those who died for their country. A sad day, a proud day. A day to teach our children about what it means to be an American. Why the sacrifice they made helped keep us a free and sovereign nation.

But today, those who refused to serve, refused to fight, indeed, who publicly demonstrated AGAINST their country, now are in a position to order a new generation of Americans to serve, to fight, and to die for every other country!

It's not unprecedented. In fact, it's a return to Feudalism. There was a time when the Lords of the Realm send peasants to fight and die for causes in which they had no interest, in lands they had never heard of, and no one questioned the "Divine Right of Kings."

Do we add to the parades a United Nations flag and memorialize those who died for everyone else's country, as Al Gore suggests? How many Americans must be dragged through the streets of Mogadishu before America says, "Enough is enough."

Perhaps we also need to remember another group of Americans - those who shipwrecked their careers in order to serve their country. Army General Douglas MacArthur comes to mind. Fired and dishonored for wanting to serve his country instead of the United Nations.

So does Army Specialist Michael New. Court-martialed and dragged through the courts of the Land, dishonored for loving his country, and refusing to serve as an involuntary mercenary in the United Nations. For himself? No. He wanted to go. But for those who died in the American uniform, and for those who follow after him, he refused to obey an unlawful order to wear an United Nations uniform. He stands this week in the Army Court of Criminal Appeals in Falls Church Virginia - proudly - refusing to allow the honor of all those who have died in exclusive service to America to be prostituted on the altar of the New World Order.

Michael New personifies Memorial Day.