Memorial Day stands as a testament to the valor and ultimate sacrifice of those who have served to preserve our constitutional republic, and our rights and freedoms.  Considering their sacrifices, don’t we owe it to all who have served, and especially those who have given their lives, fighting to retain all for which they have fought?  Wouldn’t that be the best way to honor those brave men and women?

The gruesome killing of a British soldier in London this week by Islamists and the attendant reactions by the press and politicians make clear two things: One, that Islam cannot be treated as a legitimate faith in the American tradition and in the context of the First Amendment, and two, Americans must wrest control of our country from liberal-progressives with all due speed, and by any means necessary.

In the town I called home for more than sixty years, among my earliest memories was joining my Father to attend the annual Memorial Day ceremonies. There was always a march to the appropriately named Memorial Park. It included veterans, scout troops, police and fire contingents, and the high school band.

My childhood years were marked by World War II, beginning when I was just four years of age and ending when I was eight, both fought far from our shores. My Father and I would listen to the reading of “In Flander’s Fields”, a poem by Lt. Col. John McCrae, MD, a member of the Canadian Army, commemorating those who fell in World War I combat.

The threats emanating from Syria have become downright frightening. For the past several days, Home Front Defense Minister Gilad Erdan has been warning repeatedly that it is certain that Israeli population centers will be hit by Syrian ballistic missiles and that we have to be prepared for the worst-case scenarios, including Scud missile-launched chemical weapons attacks on Israel’s metropolitan centers.

It’s not—thank God—the words of politicians like British Prime Minister David Cameron or London Mayor Boris Johnson that will be long remembered about the brutal murder of drummer Lee Rigby but the voluntary acts of three courageous women who tried to do what they could for “Riggers” at the horrific scene of his death.