Veteran’s Day 2018

Thoughts to Founders, Signers and Framers on a Veteran’s Day Parade

 

November 5, 2018

Dear Founders, Signers and Framers:

Gentlemen:

With Veteran’s Day approaching I was thinking of a way to honor our Veterans while at the same time provide a learning moment for all our Representatives in Washington. President Trump, after visiting France, wanted to have a military type parade like the Bastille Day Parade in Paris. This idea was nixed due to costs which I agree with. My idea would come at no cost and honor our Veterans and Military while teaching how our Representatives should all come together to get things done.

My parade will be made up of all volunteers which is something most veterans understand. Veterans will volunteer not to be marchers but rather spectators.  The parade route is simple as it is the National Mall in Washington, D.C. and all Veterans will line the route on both sides. There will be no bands, military hardware or floats for this parade and the marchers will consist of the members of Congress, the Supreme Court, Cabinet Members, Department Heads and the President. Attendance for the marchers would be mandatory and they will not be compensated. As a matter of fact, a portion of their salaries will be donated for security and to Veteran’s organizations. Now Gentlemen here comes the teaching moment for all.

The parade will begin at the Capital and they will begin by marching to the Washington Monument. Once there they will turn left face and look across the Tidal Basin to the Memorial to you President Jefferson, the man who with the Declaration of Independence brought together 13 disorganized and disparate colonies in what many thought was a hopeless cause. Those shots fired at Lexington and Concord created our first group of veterans. Here the marchers will be reminded that your words President Jefferson: “When in the course of human events…,” brought our first group of veterans together.

While at the monument to you President Washington, our representatives will be reminded that you were the man who lead our first veterans against impossible odds through the tough times of Valley Forge to an unthought of victory at Yorktown. President Washington, it was your leadership and their determination that brought them together and got the job done. Yet another reminder to the marchers.

With our Veterans still looking on the parade will then continue down the Mall to the WWII Memorial dedicated to Veterans who are referred to as the “Greatest Generation”. This group of veterans defeated Nazism, Fascism and Imperialism because they answered the call, came together and yet again got the job done. The marchers will then turn eyes left in the direction of the memorial to you President Roosevelt who brought them together after the defeat at Pearl Harbor and to victory four years later. Maybe the marchers at this point will begin to see a pattern.

The marchers will then continue down the Mall veering left around the reflecting pool as they march through the Korean War Memorial remembering once again the Veterans that came together to fight a “police action” and hot war.  Many questioned the purpose of this action and yet Veterans again came together to get a job done.

They will then march across the Mall to the Vietnam Memorial where most of the veteran spectators will have gathered, to remember a war which help to divide the country, which is something the marcher representatives are pretty good at.  It was the veterans of that war, who came together and worked to have this memorial built, healing and bringing us together and is now one of the most visited sites in Washington, D.C. They will take their time and look at over 50,000 names on that wall and remember once again that it was because of politicians like them that those names are there because Veterans came together and answered their call.

The parade will then reassemble and continue on the final leg of their march to the memorial dedicated to you President Lincoln, a man who truly knows what a divided country means. It was your leadership that brought those veterans together in keeping the Union together. But it isn’t over yet. While there, every marcher will be required to read what many consider to be the greatest speech ever written, the Gettysburg Address. My friend Dean Koclanes has an excellent idea that the marchers should then renew their oaths of office incorporating the words at the end of that address that a “Government of the People, by the People and for the People shall not perish from the earth”.  If anyone wants to know why, it is because of veterans!

Maybe these marchers can learn something by the veteran’s example and come together for the Government of the People. As I recall a veteran once telling me, no United States Military uniform says Democrat or Republican on it.

Happy Veteran’s Day a bit early.

Sincerely

Andrew DeMarco

 

P.S. I would like to ask you the Founders, Signers and Framers if this letter should be sent not only to you but to all the Marchers? Maybe our other readers can help answer this question. In the meantime feel free to send and share it with your Representatives and Senators, and any Veterans group you wish.