9/11 2006

It is on days, like today, that I like to reflect. To remind myself of what
brought us here.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent,
a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that
all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any
nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great
battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field,
as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that
nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do
this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we
can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled
here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The
world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never
forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated
here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so
nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task
remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased
devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of
devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died
in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom --
and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not
perish from the earth.

and note, that we do so, not by giving up our rights, but while preserving
our rights and freedoms;

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union,
establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common
defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to
ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for
the United States of America.

We best honor our fallen, by preserving our nation, our rights, and our
freedoms - and not by giving them up slowly under the blanket of security,
or the fear of terrorism.

--
Craig Baugher