At six, when I placed my hand over my heart and recited the Pledge of Allegiance, I took it very seriously. I still do. As I grew up, I learned that the Republic, Constitution and the Bill of Rights are more important than the Stars and Stripes.
Before the Dems caved to fund Bush's war this week, it was "the darkness before the dawn". Now we've seen how dark things really are.
We have our Constitution, we have America, we have each other. However, it is up to us to defend what we value.
Is it time for a new revolution?
"The Star Spangled Banner":
Lyrics
O 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, through the perilous fight
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen thro’ the mist of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream
’Tis the star-spangled banner. Oh! long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war’s desolation,
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the Heav’n-rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our Trust"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Here's the Spanish translation:
Amanece: ¿lo véis a la luz de la aurora
Lo que tanto aclamamos la noche al caer?
sus estrellas, sus franjas flotaban ayer,
en el fiero combate en señal de victoria.
Fulgor de lucha, al paso de la libertad,
por la noche decían: «¡Se va defendiendo!»
¡Oh, decid! ¿Despliega aún su hermosura estrellada,
sobre tierra de libres, la bandera sagrada?