Today’s speech noted the distinction between those who were for Bush and those who, believing in the mission in Iraq, were willing to give up not only life on the fast track but life itself:
One of these men was a Marine lieutenant named Ryan McGlothlin, from Lebanon, Virginia. Ryan was a bright young man who had everything going for him and he always wanted to serve our nation. He was a valedictorian of his high school class. He graduated from William & Mary with near-perfect grade averages, and he was on a full scholarship at Stanford, where he was working toward a doctorate in chemistry.
Two years after the attacks of September the 11th, the young man who had the world at his feet came home from Stanford for a visit. He told his dad, “I just don’t feel like I’m doing something that matters. I want to serve my country. I want to protect our lands from terrorists, so I joined the Marines.” When his father asked him if there was some other way to serve, Ryan replied that he felt a special obligation to step up because he had been given so much. Ryan didn’t support me in the last election, but he supported our mission in Iraq. And he supported his fellow Marines.
Ryan was killed last month fighting the terrorists near the — Iraq’s Syrian border. In his pocket was a poem that Ryan had read at his high school graduation, and it represented the spirit of this fine Marine. The poem was called “Don’t Quit.”
We need to remember – indeed, so do others – that such people see something bigger than Bush. (And what they share with him is that he, too, sees that.)