Sack Lunches

The Sack Lunches

I put my carry-on in the luggage compartment and sat down in my
assigned seat. It was going to be a long flight. 'I'm glad I have a
good book to read. Perhaps I will get a short nap,' I thought.

Just before take-off, a line of soldiers came down the aisle and
filled all the vacant seats, totally surrounding me. I decided to
start a conversation. 'Where are you headed?' I asked the soldier
seated nearest to me.

'Chicago - to Great Lakes Base. We'll be there for two weeks for
special training, and then we're being deployed to Iraq ' After flying
for about an hour, an announcement was made that sack lunches were
available for five dollars. It would be several hours before we
reached Chicago, and I quickly decided a lunch would help pass the
time.

As I reached for my wallet, I overheard a soldier ask his buddy if he
planned to buy lunch. 'No, that seems like a lot of money for just a
sack lunch. Probably wouldn't be worth five bucks. I'll wait till we
get to Chicago His friend agreed. I looked around at the other
soldiers. None were buying lunch. I walked to the back of the plane
and handed the flight attendant a fifty dollar
bill. 'Take a lunch to all those soldiers.' She grabbed my arms and
squeezed tightly. Her eyes wet with tears, she thanked me. 'My son
was a soldier in Iraq; it's almost like you are doing it for him.'

Picking up ten sacks, she headed up the aisle to where the soldiers
were seated. She stopped at my seat and asked, 'Which do you like
best - beef or chicken?'

'Chicken,' I replied, wondering why she asked. She turned and went to
the front of plane, returning a minute later with a dinner plate from
first class. 'This is your thanks.' After we finished eating, I went
again to the back of the plane, heading for the rest room. A man
stopped me. 'I saw what you did. I want to be part of it. Here,
take this.' He handed me twenty-five dollars.

Soon after I returned to my seat, I saw the Flight Captain coming down
the aisle, looking at the aisle numbers as he walked, I hoped he was
not looking for me, but noticed he was looking at the numbers only on
my side of the plane.
When he got to my row he stopped, smiled, held out his hand, an said,
'I want to shake your hand.' Quickly unfastening my seatbelt I stood
and took the Captain's hand. With a
booming voice he said, 'I was a soldier and I was a military pilot.
Once, someone bought me a lunch. It was an act of kindness I never
forgot.' I was embarrassed when applause was heard from all of the
passengers.

Later I walked to the front of the plane so I could stretch my legs.
A man who was seated about six rows in front of me reached out his
hand, wanting to shake mine. He left another twenty-five dollars in
my palm.

When we landed in Chicago I gathered my belongings and started to
deplane. Waiting just inside the airplane door was a man who stopped
me, put something in my shirt pocket, turned, and walked away without
saying a word. Another
twenty-five dollars!

Soon entering the terminal, I saw the soldiers gathering for their
trip to the base. I walked over to them and handed them seventy-five
dollars. 'It will take you some time to reach the base. It will be
about time for a sandwich. God Bless You.'

Ten young men left that flight feeling the love and respect of their
fellow travelers. As I walked briskly to my car, I whispered a prayer
for their safe return. These soldiers were giving their all for our
country. I could only give them a couple of meals. It seemed so
little...

A veteran is someone who, at one point in his life wrote a
blank check Made payable to 'The United States of America ' for an
amount of 'up to and including my life.' That is Honor, and there are
way too many people in This country who no longer understand it.'

The Stealing of America - by Charlie Daniels

The Stealing of America

Lest you cherry pickers accuse me of developing a Johnny-come-lately idea due to the political climate, let me say that if you'd care to peruse my soapbox columns of several years ago you'd find that I was saying the same thing.

I have for many years felt that there is a movement afoot in this nation for a handful of elitist left-wing political groups to seize power over every aspect of American life.

Now I know this is not news to you levelheaded thinking people, but the rest of my opinion may be. You see, I think they not only plan on seizing power but keeping it permanently.

Impossible you say with our system of checks and balances and our free election process?

Well let's take a look.

For the last several decades we have had what is basically an open border with Mexico and politicians from both sides of the aisle have done their best to shove amnesty programs down the throats of a protesting American public.

They absolutely refuse to do anything meaningful to stop the dangerous flow of illegals, under the guise of human decency and wanting everybody to have a shot at the American dream.

This claim, for the most part is composed of the same stuff we dig out of the lot where we keep our bulls. In my humble opinion the reason for laxity on the border is not concern or compassion but a political fallacy being purported on the American public by power-hungry politicians who had no business in Washington in the first place.

Can't you see what's happening here folks? The Democrats and moderates aided by wimpy, spineless Republicans in Congress are creating their own voting block, an alliance of undereducated immigrants, welfare families and fanatical fringe groups that seek to change the face of America forever.

We in America are lazy when it comes to taking the time to vote but you'd better believe that these people won't be lazy. They'll go to the polls every time they open and vote for the candidate and the party who promises to give them the most.

These people don't care about democracy. Did Congress listen to the overwhelming opinion of the American people who didn't want a seven hundred billion dollar government bailout of the banks? They care about power, and if they pull this off I believe we'll see America fall into a cycle of government entitlements and vote buying that we have never had in our history.

Look around you at the voter fraud going on in this country. ACORN currently has allegations of voter fraud in at least 15 states, and many of those are considered battleground states. Do you think the Democratic-controlled Congress is going to do anything meaningful about it? No, because the illegally registered voters would all be voting for them and their party.

Look at the opaque wall that has been built up around Barack Obama. To mention his hate-spewing pastor of twenty years, his friendship with unrepentant terrorist, Bill Ayers, his association with convicted Chicago slumlord, Tony Rezko, his shady association with Khalid Rashidi - a man who has ties to the PLO, or Obama's own reluctance to release his college history, the doubt about the validity of his birth certificate and all the other things including his full name are forbidden and any one who tries to do so is branded a racist.

What Obama wants appears to be the Socialist States of America. He says that 95% of Americans will get a tax cut, but I don't see any way he can keep that promise considering the trillion dollars in new spending he wants. Bill Clinton promised a middle class tax cut too, and how did that work out?

Obama is the purest example of a silver-tongued charlatan. When Obama says he's not raising taxes on the middle class, what he neglects to tell you is that he and the other Democrats will allow the Bush tax cuts to expire which will result in your taxes going up while promising all along that he won't be raising taxes. That's what I call speaking with a forked tongue.

Under Obama's plan, any person or business making more than $250,000 a year will end up with massive tax increases. The problem is that Obama won't say if that $250,000 is the gross, net, or profit or personal. He also says that very few small businesses make more that $250,000, but that isn't the case.

According to a recent report, 70% of small business with more than 10 employees DO make more than $250,000 a year, and not too long ago, in a year when major corporations were downsizing, small business created close to 100% of all new jobs.

In their last debate, both McCain and Obama talked a lot about Joe Wurzelbacher, the plumber from Holland, Ohio who challenged Obama on his tax policies. Joe wants to buy the plumbing company he works for, but that will automatically push him into the over $250,000 bracket, and when Obama knocked on Joe's door this week in Ohio, Joe confronted him with his tax situation.

He asked Obama, "Do you believe in the American dream? I'm being taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream.'' Obama said that he didn't want to punish him for his success, but he thought that it was important to "spread the wealth around", and God bless him, Joe told him how he felt about that.

John McCain needs to put Joe the Plumber on the campaign trail to stump for him, because Joe's not afraid to call Obama what he really is, a socialist.

With Obama's "Hope and Change", people will hope they have some change left in their pockets.

This is one big socialistic power-grab, and in my opinion Barack Obama is going to tear this country apart whether he is elected or not.

After all these years I'll finally have to agree with James Carville on something. If the vote is close but Obama is not elected, I believe we'll see riots in the inner city streets of America.

If he is elected I believe that on his inauguration day, America will go into what could well be an irreversible tailspin and armed with a Democrat Congress and Senate the damage done to this country could well topple America from it's long held place as number one on the planet.

The really maddening thing about it is going to be that after their voting block is established there won't be a single thing Americans who disagree with their policies can do about it.

This situation has been developing over many years and has reached an exponential rate of progress and the America we know and love hangs in the balance.

Louis Farrakhan actually called Barack Hussein Obama "the Messiah".

But let not your heart be troubled. The real Messiah is still in charge and in a time like this it is so comforting to know that no matter what, God will take care of His own.

What do you think?

Pray for our troops

God Bless America

Charlie Daniels

October 17, 2008