Published Friday, July 03, 2009

Remember our soldiers, fly the red, white, blue

Editorial

As we get ready for the local Fourth of July festivities in our community, most of us are in a mood of celebration. We are anticipating the great food and fellowship. We are looking forward to the parades. We will enjoy the patriotic music and other entertainment. We will marvel at the beauty of the fireworks. It will be a great weekend of celebration and family fun on this 233rd birthday of our great United States.

We hope everyone has a glorious Fourth -- a grand weekend with family and friends.

We also hope each of you will remember the men and women who are serving our country -- especially those in Iraq and Afghanistan. They are in harm's way, fighting to preserve the freedom and the independence that we celebrate this weekend. They are away from their families. Their Fourth will be different from ours.

As we celebrate this weekend, we encourage all Cowetans to make a simple gesture to show support for our service men and women. Proudly fly an American flag at your home. Show off the red, white and blue. Let those 13 stripes and 50 stars wave in the summer breeze. And remember these words from Francis Scott Key in our National Anthem:

"Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?

And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave"