It was worth every penny

This post has nothing to do with horses...and everything to do with being an American.

On this date, 15 years ago, a handful of murderous demons killed thousands of my countrymen in the most  horrific way you can imagine. 

Burned alive.

Murdered solely because they were American. The murderers didn't care what religion, what color, what gender, what age, what marital or parental status, what economic level, even what amount of sympathy they may have had for murderous Islamic fundamentalists. They murdered them because they could.

It was all due to one very rich man, Osama bin Laden.

It took ten years of hunting, uncounted number of manhours, incredible technology and good ol' ground pounding spy work...and who knows how much it cost? to catch him. But we did. We got that cockroach. We got that oh.....there aren't words to describe him. 

I don't care how much it cost. It was worth it. It was worth every penny.

We got him. His death was far too quick for my tastes. Part of me wishes the Navy had lied about him being dead, they snuck him into the US and now he lives in the bowels of the Pentagon, without any sort of interaction with anyone but a Marine who shoves a plate full of pork rinds to him for his dinner. 

But he's probably dead. There wasn't a death worth more to me, other than oh, Hitler.  

I will never, ever in my life forget this day. Not ever. And don't you, whomever may be reading it. 
Don't forget. We Americans are the most forgiving people on the planet. We help our defeated enemies. We send money to people who use it to make bombs to kill us. We are the only ones who consistently send money, food, aid, help to anyone in the world who needs it. We don't get that back. Only two countries jumped to our aid on 9/11...The United Kingdom and god bless their souls,the Jamaicans. Who are still pretty British.

Despite being surrounded by my countrymen, I felt so alone..until Tony Blair said, we are with you...and I don't know who in Jamaica who said the same thing.

But then I remembered how I felt during Desert Storm...when I was in the desert, with my M16 on my side and my fellow soldiers at it. I remember seeing our might destroying the enemy. Most of all, I remember the outpouring of support from total strangers..Americans from Michigan, from South Dakota, from Florida, from New Jersey, from California..people who sent me letters and packages saying We Are Behind You. 
It was like riding an elephant amongst ants. I knew we would win. How could we not, when all of America had my back?

My flag is flying right now. So many people seem to have forgotten this day, but Do NOT.
There are people out there who still hate us, no matter what we do for them. There are countries; Russia, North Korea, China...who hate us, who would love to see us go down and are doing things to make it happen. 
Don't become complaisant. We are Americans. As one politician put it on this ugly day, "We might fight amongst ourselves, but our differences end at our shoreline."

Never forget.