Get Involved, Veterans Told Commissioner Asks Memorial Day Audience To Wage War As Nation Goes ‘Morally Adrift’

The United States is at war again, but this time with its most “insidious” enemy, Ron Rankin said during a Memorial Day service Monday.

“We have become a nation morally adrift,” Rankin told a gathering of about 60 people at Forest Cemetery on Government Way.

But residents can fight the war with the proper ammunition, he said. The ammunition: knowledge and civic action.

Rankin, a Kootenai County commissioner and Korean War combat veteran, urged other veterans not to grieve for fallen soldiers but to take part in the freedom their deaths helped make possible.

“This is not a day of mourning or of sorrow,” he said. “It is a day to say thank you to them.”

During the short service, one-time soldiers fired a 21-gun salute while a trio of teenage girls led the assembly in singing the national anthem.

Veterans and family members placed wreaths in remembrance of soldiers who have died “from the bridge at Concord to the Persian Gulf.”

Rankin said their memories would best be served if people were to get involved in their communities and actively participate in their government.

“Freedom is not free,” Rankin said. “The price is always measured in blood and sweat and tears.”

But there is a reward, he said.

“Today, more people live in peace and freedom than ever before,” he said.

Armed forces veterans also remembered sailors with an earlier service in Veterans Park. Memorial Day services also were held in Post Falls.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo