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There are many stirring phrases and songs that invoke the tremendous history of this great nation, these United States.

Purple mountain's majesty...It's a grand old flag...From the halls of Montezuma...God bless the USA...Fifty great united states...and most appropriately at this time of year, O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave....

Our national anthem is a question posed to future generations. Is our flag still waving over the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On this 4th of July weekend we can truthfully say, "Yes, it does!"

Afghanistan, which had fallen to religious fanatics in the mid-1990s and offered safe haven to terrorists, is now liberated. The people of Afghanistan are now free to rule themselves, and to fight those who would return the country to a medieval state.

Iraq, which had been ruled by tyrants for decades, most notably Saddam Hussein, is now liberated. It no longer poses a threat to the region or world peace. Its citizens are free to decide their own fate, free of the horror of Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party rule.

Al Qaeda, which had been allowed to roam freely during the 1990s, has now been put on the run. Their safe havens are being eradicated and their members jailed, killed or harassed by the armed forces and intelligence agencies of the free countries of the world.

Terrorism is not a new evil on this planet, but it now has a new enemy: the United States of America. We were content to sit on the sidelines before 9-11, expressing our concern over the problems that seemed so far away. When terrorism did strike our country we saw it as an aberration, not something that would happen again, at least in our lifetime. However, we should have seen the warning signs: the first World Trade Center bombing, the Unabomber, the Oklahoma City bombing, and attacks against the United States around the world in the 1990s all pointed to the fact that we were becoming a target of terrorism, and each new act convinced terrorists that we were vulnerable.

It is not just recently that the United States has rallied the free world against evil. In World War I, we fought against the Central Powers in Europe. During World War II, we fought the Nazi Germans, the fascist Italians and the Imperial Japanese all over the world. In Korea, we protected the South first against the Stalinist North and then from Communist China. Throughout the Cold War, we fought the Soviet Union and its Communist allies. Today we fight another evil: global terrorists. We will win that battle as we won all the rest because our nation is founded on freedom, and no one fights harder than does a free man who has his liberty threatened.

September 11, 2001 was a dark day, but the clouds have passed and once again, it is morning in America. We have risen from our slumber and the free world knows that we will go anywhere, anytime to fight the forces of evil.

It is what makes this country great, what sets it above all the rest. When the world needs us, we answer the call. When the going gets tough, we say, "Let's Roll!" When evil tries to intimidate us, we say, "Bring it on!" Because we are the greatest nation this world has ever seen. We are the protectors of liberty, the defenders of freedom, the beacon of light to all those who live in darkness. We are, as President Ronald Reagan visualized, a shining city upon a hill.

The people of America can take pride in their nation this weekend. We are once again putting our lives on the line so others can live in freedom. We no longer sit asleep at the wheel while the world runs off-track. So when the fireworks go off, and you sit under the rocket's red glare, answer the question our forefathers posed to us: Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave, o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Yes it does!

The Star-Spangled Banner

		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?
		
		On the shore, dimly seen through the mists 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 in 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 home and the war's desolation!
		Blest with victory 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!
		

Our national anthem is a question posed to future generations.

Afghanistan...is now liberated. Iraq...is now liberated.

We are, as Ronald Reagan visualized, a shining city upon a hill.

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.