Well, today is that day, so I suppose it only makes sense to talk a little bit about veterans and the American armed forces.  It's really surreal to think that when Mike gets back from his deployment, he'll officially be a veteran of a foreign war, lumped into a group with my nearly 67 year old father.  These two men in my life in quite the same way fought/ are fighting in rather pointless wars.  Now before you lose your cool over what I will go on to say, just hear me out and read to the end.  What starts with a bold statement ends with respect.

America seems to have a long history of provocation, media glossing, history book rewriting, rash actions, and just plain blatant venturism.  Under the guise of noble intentions like "stopping crimes against humanity," "overthrowing evil dictatorships," "stopping terrorism," and even "bringing peace to the middle east," this country has bullied its way into foreign lands and stamped on seeds of change that might bring one nation hope while setting the U.S. at a disadvantage.  It continuously thrusts its nose into other people's wars and acts surprised and innocent when there is retaliation.

Pearl Harbor was a tragedy, but it was a provoked tragedy, brought on by our fuel blockade on Japan.  They had two choices: use the last of their fuel to launch an attack against the overwhelming naval forces blocking their resources or use the last of their fuel to launch an attack against the nearest and most strategic part of the U.S. they could find, Pearl Harbor.

Fidel Castro is made out to be an evil villain, but he was just a revolutionary that wanted a better life for his people.  Sound familiar?  Also, for all of you with a Che poster on your wall that respect him for any of many reasons, I hope you realize he was Castro's close ally, practically his second in command, during the revolution.  You may be wondering why we get so many refugees from Cuba if Castro is so grand and all the little farmers cheer when they receive his grain to plant, and that is because of America's vicious embargo on the entire country that prevents any of America's allies from trading with Cuba.  While a handful of smaller countries honor and respect the effort port forth by this country, particularly in the tumultuous areas of Africa where the people want to be free of opression, it is not enough to keep a starving, crumbling economy alive.  The embargo is a terrible crime against what might have been a steady emerging nation, and yet so many young people aren't even properly aware of it.

The U.S. is the last super power (excluding emerging China), and it is a dying breed, the last of its kind.  It's scary to be the one and only elephant in a world full of mice: on one hand, we have the unfettered power of near global and economic domination, on the other we have the fear of sinking into quiet existence while other countries shoot to the top.  To be less than number one is not a feeling we're used to, and we must push like a blood-soaked minuteman to the top of a corpse mountain and plant our flag.

I'm hoping this latest presidency will bring about the promised change; so far, we've seen results, but with unreal amounts of resistance to real, true change.  America is a culture with a weak tolerance for change, so each citizen becomes each unruly crowd, like a swarm of locusts, wings brushing, dissent brewing, until finally, we bite off our swarm-mate's head to spite the perceived danger.  Why?  Who could really say outside of quoting a little of this and that from the media.  It's a frenzy that stops change, plain an simple, the brushing of the wings, the seeds of dissent.  And yet somehow, we're moving forward, slowly but surely, like a turtle tied to a rock, pushing through yet more rocks, nosing along and doing his best for the sake of his little life.  I have high hopes for our future and high hopes for the end to this cycle.

However, as we stand now, we're still struggling out of it.  Our armed forces are continually shipped overseas to occupy other countries, while as far as I know, no foreign country retains a military base or collection of military force on our own soil.  Sure, we have embassies, but we don't have forces of thousands of any foreigner occupying us.

 There are just so, so many reasons to disagree with where the leadership of this nation has taken us, with where the fear of our own citizenry has taken us, but there is one thing that I know that most people can agree on, even without supporting war or the handling of our armed forces or politicians, and that's respect for the troops, the people that comprise the phalanx that, on order from above, moves solemnly into danger.  While they are taught to view themselves as separate from civilian life, there isn't really a true separation.  They are tied to all of us, they are part of our families, part of our lives; they are people with a job, a very dangerous job, that they must do.  Like us, they must obey their boss, who obeys his boss, who obeys his boss, right to the top, right to the root of pointless wars.  Offering them our respect is not offering the war our respect, it is respecting the sacrifice they've made to move forward in life, to do what most people would naturally shun in order to protect the values as dictated from above, whatever they may be this season.

While I know many people plunge into the Army, Navy, or National Guard for various reasons, some being school, some being tradition, and some being just plain confusion about where life will take them, I know that no matter what the reason was for them entering this service, it puts a concrete permanence in these people, a career, a purpose, and a drive.  I've learned so much from having Mike in my life, and one of the things I've learned is to respect the Army is a relevant career choice.  While it is something I would never pick for myself or many of the people I know, it fits some people, and these have my deepest, most sincere gratitude and respect for making their personal form of sacrifice to do what must be done.

I will never think of Mike based on the war he fought in, because he's a person and someone I love.  I ask you all to do the same: recognize the effort of your loved ones as veterans, but honor them for being more than just veterans, honor them for being that important person in your life as well, for earning your admiration and respect through both service to their country and just being who they are, the person you love.

Tomorrow, for the first time in six years, a vote concerning whether or not Cullman, AL should go wet will be on the midterm ballot.  I've got words about that, but first of all, let me say that this should not be everyone's incentive to vote in the midterms.  It's like I feel good inside that so many people are going to vote, but it's bittersweet in that most of them wouldn't have bothered if it wasn't for this momentous decision our small town faces.

For one, I'd already made my mind up that I would be voting before I knew that the wet/dry vote would even be on the ballot.  I'm a little ashamed of all of you for not making the same kind of commitment to participate in our legislative system without the temptation of booze around the corner.  This is how our government works: we go vote for the people who stand for our causes, they potentially get elected because of the support of voters, and they go on to run portions of our government at various levels.  You have no right to bitch about how the country is going down the crapper or such-and-such politician's suckery if you didn't even vote.

Alright, on to the main issue.  I just want to throw a few facts out there about the history of this sort of vote in the city of Cullman.  The entire population of Cullman is 81,778, according to the 2009 census results posted on the official Cullman website.  From what I can gather elsewhere on the internet, in 2004, we had 49,000 registered voters.  Now, I am absolutely positive that that number has gone up due to the last presidential election.  The first time Cullman voted about whether or not to go wet was in 1984, at which time it was voted down by a measly 159 votes.  In the most recent vote in 2004, the legal sale of alcohol was voted down by a majority vote of 54%, which was only 573 votes!  Those numbers are so minuscule it hurts.  I know that if people get off their duffs and vote this time, it will most definitely pass.

Well, wait... do we want it to pass?  I know everyone who knows me probably would guess that I was prepared to vote yes right away, but believe it or not, I thought long and hard about my decision.  While I decided in the affirmative, it is always good to consider what might be at stake instead of blindly charging in with torches when we hear something that rallies us (i.e. "The War on Terror").

There are a lot of reasons one might want to vote no, a lot of perfectly logical reasons, and if anyone chooses to vote no for these reasons, I do not blame them.  After all, I had a hard time deciding too.  Alcohol is inherently dangerous.  It has its benefits to communities, and it can be just fine for people who have a handle on themselves and their vices.  However, Cullman, like it or not, has a large portion of rednecks living right outside the city limits.  It's like a time machine back to domestic-violence-on-the-cow-farm-land to go past that little sign with the mansion and the German welcome.  It's spit-in-a-cup, beat-your-wife-tastic.  I know that plenty of you will agree that rednecks and uneducated hicks don't have the good common sense it takes to exercise self-control, let alone anger management.  Add bars to the mix, and all that crawls out of that human cesspool to start a bar brawl and piss on your stoop.

Yes, I've no doubt the crime rate would increase, but I must say that only the number of reported crimes would increase (resulting in a "crime rate increase").  This is a backwoods, hicksy place, and I know everyone that lives here knows that there are copious amounts of unreported violences perpetrated upon unlucky housewives and children by raging drunkards every day.  The only change would be that this comes out of the home a little, steps out of the kitchen and the back bedroom, if you will.

As it stands, those backwoods drunks are going to get their alcohol somewhere, and that somewhere will be either Arab or Warrior.  This forces them to drive a longer distance, potentially drinking on the way back, and to give all the cash they earned as chicken-catchers and asbestos-installers to another community.  Those kinds of people are going to drink no matter what we do.  Granted, they might not commit their crimes where we can see at the moment, but maybe this is a blessing in disguise.  Maybe if all that mess spills onto our streets something will be done, because frankly, this feigned ignorance business makes me sick.

Since we've moved toward the benefits, let's take a look at those.  Right now, a developer has approached Cullman with a proposal that will not go through until after this vote.  We're going to get a new development project with new businesses that will bring new jobs.  I've noticed that some people have seen signs that mention the businesses that hinge on this vote and said, "What in the world does Old Navy have to do with liquor?"  I wondered this myself.  Apparently, if Cullman goes wet, this development project will give us a 500,000 square foot shopping center full of businesses like Red Lobster and Old Navy.  However, if Cullman stays dry, the size of this development will be halved to 250,000 square feet.  Also, no restaurants have agreed to sign on with the development plan at all until this vote is through.  Why?  Because restaurants and grocery stores get over 20% of their profits from alcohol sales.

Also, one must think of the taxes coming from this, taxes that will help our schools and fix our crappy roads (ex. the right lane of 31 South going past Regions and Sticks n' Stuff).  Not only will we be receiving the regular 8.5% tax on alcohol sales but sin tax, or fat tax, as well.  It is estimated that in the first year alone, we would earn $4 million in additional revenue from taxes to help keep our aging infrastructure up and running and give children in Cullman county schools all the advantages.

At first, I didn't think that the county schools would benefit from any of this tax, but as it turns out, that additional $4 million would be divided evenly among all the municipalities in the county.  This means that disadvantaged county schools would get a much-needed boost from all this.

Again I say, no matter how you vote, get out and vote tomorrow.  Even though the rest of the world may not care, the future of one small town hinges on this decision.