ELECTION 2024

This marks my final comments on the upcoming election. After today I will cease my involvement other than to transport anyone needing the help to go and vote. I am optimistic that America will not descend into anarchy and fascism. I think we will defeat the madness. The military, and life, have taught me, however, to hope for the best and prepare for the worst. So I must consider the unthinkable.

If Americans should make the worst decision they have made since 1861 and the election, as it currently determines success, should unfold against my choices, I will accept the result. But I will mourn, as did the Psalmist, who sang "By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion."

My life is almost over, so I’ll not mourn for myself. First, I’ll mourn for my friends who have children and grandchildren facing life in a country without a moral base. I’ll mourn for those living outside a “bell curve of normality” due to race, religion, origin, sexual makeup, or gender. I’ll mourn for “the least of those among us” who will have no place other than servitude in a country refitted to serve only the wealthy and their immediate allies. I’ll mourn for the rest of a world that looked to America for guidance. Also, I’ll mourn for those upon whom reality will most tragically and destructively dawn—a large portion of those who will have voted for the brigands and grifters. Yes, those who voted against their best interest.

But will I comply and remain silent? No. The military also taught me to, if captured, resist the oppressors. This can weaken them and make their jobs so much harder. It undermines their efforts to forbid righteousness. It helps keep them from dreaming up additional evil. I’ll resist as best I can until she receives the word to send a squad for me. My place on the list will probably be somewhere below the teachers and librarians. If I live long enough to see my country saved from fascism, I’ll not be in the group forced by our saviors to walk by and view the corpses of our brothers and sisters who met destruction while we said, “We knew nothing,” even as the stench of the death camps rolled across our beloved land with every breeze.

Do I imagine myself as a hero? No. But I am an American, and I’ve still got some fight left in me.