My Grandfather was an amazing man. Like many men of his generation, he wanted to serve. My Grandfather wanted to be a Marine. The Marine Corps told him that he was slightly underweight. My Grandfather immediately went to the Chelsea Pier and bought a bunch of bananas, and ate them all. That same day he went back to the Marines and made weight. He met my Grandmother the night before he left to serve. He would ultimately join the other members of the 1st Marines to fight against the Japanese in the South Pacific during World War 2. My grandparents like most of their generation knew the value of sacrifice.
The Americans born between 1914 and 1924 were strong, deliberate people. They survived the great depression. They banded together to fight the Nazis and the axis powers. They came home from the war to build the strong foundation that would further define America. They solidified the identity of a country personified by leaders like George Washington, John Adams, John F. Kennedy, and later Ronald Reagan.
Back then, men and women did not cower in the corner. Back then, men and women had no trouble deciding which bathroom to use. They were not divided. They held fast to their values, and they took the initiative to solve much of what was wrong or to meet any need. The ones that Tom Brokaw dubbed "the greatest generation" left us an inheritance of ideals and virtues. We seem to have misplaced those ideals, and virtues.
It is clear that those in present leadership have an issue with calling the enemy by the name "radical Islam." It's no surprise that there are over 150 Muslim Brotherhood organizations operating in the United States. Their goal is to divide, weaken, and destabilize us from within, and it is working. We must be real about the threat that is already here.
The president gives us an encore performance that in the past helped to solidify his position on this issue. This time, he did so in the face of the Orlando shooting that left more than over 50 dead, and countless injured. He could stand with us. Instead, the president decides to lecture the American people on gun control, yet again.
It's time to change the conversation. Obama is a lame duck president. He has made his intentions very clear. Instead of speaking passionately about stopping ISIS cold, Obama attacks the GOP presumptive nominee Donald Trump. Instead of rallying Americans to come together and be vigilant, he scolds us for being intolerant.
The president did not want to do anything to fight terrorism in the beginning, and he is not going to do anything now. What would our grandparents have done if ISIS or anyone else did the same things to them? We need to find our former might, our resolve.
Political correctness has made us too thin-skinned to stand together for anything. Let's dispense with the question of who owes who, and realize we all owe each other everything. This is our country. It's time to do something that we haven't done since 9/11. Let's be everything that is quintessentially American and live out loud. We have the freedom to either cower in the corner or stand and be a deliberate people. Let's protect ourselves and our families.
There is a reason that these acts of terror are not happening in Texas. Oh, wait, someone tried and Tuesday afternoon they killed him and didn't think twice about it. Ironically the liberal media isn't on the scene there. We must stop defining ourselves by who we voted for in the last election, or by our racial distinctions. Let's stand unified as the name of our nation’s name implies.
We can be the first responders on the ground. In America, we don't have to take this lying down. There are millions of well trained Americans among us. If all the concealed carriers in Pennsylvania alone, banded together they would be the third-largest army in the world, with 1,064,360 responsible gun owners. According to the US Census Bureau, there are well over 14 million able veterans, under the age of 65 living in the United States. We can do our part not as vigilantes, but as Americans with the implied responsivity to aid in the defense of liberty.