"Defination of a Veteran"

I shamelessly clipped this from StormBringers' Blog.  I have seen it floating around and it does resonate with me.  I do feel like my beliefs are anachronistic compared to what passes for a belief system today.  I believe that it is superior to what is for today's and I am stronger for it.  I will try to raise my son the same way and hopefully he will continue the mantle of duty,honor and loyalty as all have gone before him.

DEFINITION OF A VETERAN

A veteran is someone who, at one point in his life wrote a blank check made payable to 'The United States of America' for an amount of 'up to and including my life'. That is Honor, and there are way too many people in this country who no longer understand it.

"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
- John Stuart Mill, English economist & philosopher (1806 - 1873)