We Should Never Take Our Freedom for Granted

Across America, we celebrate this day as our nation's 233rd birthday, and what a wonderful country! We should never take our freedom for granted, nor forget the depth of sacrifice of those who gave it to us. Just watch the events in Iran and breathe deep the air of freedom that you have.

The shot that murdered 26-year-old Neda Agha Soltan in Iran has been called "the shot heard round the world." That of course is a reference to Ralph Waldo Emerson's poem commemorating the Battle at the Concord Bridge in 1775, which begins:

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.

But there is a huge difference between these two shots, a difference not just in hundreds of years and thousands of miles. The shot that took Neda was for brutality and darkness. It was fired not just to stop her young heart, but to destroy the demand for dignity and fairness.

The Battle of Concord ended very differently from the event five years earlier when Americans had thrown snowballs at the British, and five Americans ended up dead. That confrontation became known as the Boston Massacre.

What's the difference between a massacre and a battle? Guns.

Some of us fail to understand that our First Amendment right to speak and assemble is meaningless without our Second Amendment right to bear arms, we don't make the connection. Without the Second Amendment there are no battles, just massacres. That's why I don't understand some people and groups, who are so gung ho on the First Amendment; the Second Amendment? Not so much. Some don't believe that we have an individual right to bear arms. The Founding Fathers wanted to make certain that whatever happened in this country, we would be prepared to protect our freedom like the Minutemen, and not be reduced to pathetic victims throwing snowballs, or chunks of cement like the poor souls in Iran.

Forewarned about the danger of tyranny is forearmed against it. Unarmed is simply dead.
As long as evil exists, shots will continue to be heard round the world. As free men and women, we must do everything we can to ensure that they echo the Battle of Concord and not the Massacre of Tehran.

That's my view, I welcome yours. E-mail your comments to: huckmail@foxnews.com