Ultra-Patriot

I was born in northern Minnesota, raised on a forty-acre farm, just a poor, old, country boy. So what do I know? My parents were first-generation Americans, born and raised by Norwegian immigrants. We were not a poor family but lived a good life by working hard and scrimping. My parents were not politically savvy, although my Dad was a Democrat Farmer Labor man. We never talked politics until I grew up and became a conservative. Even then, we rarely discussed the subject, because we didn’t agree on much. My Dad would get angry if anything bad was said about Democrats. I lived at home until I graduated from college, when I got married, entered the Air Force and became a pilot.

 

Being a military man, I traveled-world wide, spending time in Germany, North Africa, Turkey, Thailand, Norway and all over the United States. Being exposed to so many different cultures, while defending our country over my 26-year Air Force career, made me realize what a great country we have. The freedoms we enjoy are not equaled any place in the world. I guess you could call me an ultra-patriot and it disturbs me when people unduly criticize our country. I know we are not perfect, but our founding fathers had the vision to include, in our constitution, methods to correct problems as they occur. And we do. I would hope more people would recognize this fact, but for some reason, many of our citizens do not. There are many reasons, here are a few: first, many of our educators do not teach our kids of the greatness of our country. We often here young people talk of supposed problems when they have no experience upon which to base their views. Second, a press controlled by leftist journalists who have forgotten, or never knew, the good within our country. They have no desire to keep truth and honesty in their work but work at deceiving the American people. Third, a movement away from our Christian way of life. We have either forgotten or never cared that our form of government works only if we believe in honesty and truthfulness, factors which are so important to Christian living. Finally, we have a number of groups and individuals who just don’t like our system of governing. They want change and don’t care how these changes affect us. We have reasons to be concerned about our future.

 

I have always believed that our freedoms were secure from attack because of the power given us by our Constitution. Our system of selecting political leaders has been instrumental in our ability to keep that power. Recent developments, however, have raised questions as to how safe from corruption our elective process really is. If we can’t trust the means of selecting our leaders, we are in jeopardy of losing the rights and freedoms we have held for so many years. These concerns bring into question whether the lives of my friends lost in Viet Nam, and the lives of so many great Americans lost in wars over many years, were lost in vain.

 

How do we turn it around? Correcting the problems listed above will be difficult, but imperative. It will take years to accomplish: changing attitudes of our teachers, our journalists, ourselves. We need a good old fashioned Christian revival. We need another Billy Graham. I pray for our country. God help us and God bless the United States.

 

Wallace Aunan, 

Leavenworth