“Oh, my good God in Heaven………….where has morality and fair play gone? Why are the politicians so greedy and proud? Where is common sense? The nation has gone mad. Have mercy on this nation which I dearly love. Amen”

Now we are engaged in a global war on terrorism and the state sponsors thereof, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled and continue to struggle the world over, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

We have not forgotten those trials and have committed this nation in one justified union above all else.

But its people are not free.

They are bound in chains no government can loose.

The seeds of a great people have fallen upon the stoney ground.

They are servents and slaves to fear; Beggars and bondsman to lust.

They toil their lives in persuit of the foulest of sins,

and those great seeds are tarnished by the thorns.

We have grown a nation in that same forsaken land- a nation whose god is no where to be found.

Its people are hurting- Its people are crying.

They cry to the heavens, to forces unseen- and they are not heard.

We have planted a holy union in in dishallowed ground,

and now its thorns must grow.

One day the gardener will come- pruning and pulling- preparing for Fall.

And out great nation- without fruit- will be cut at its very roots,

and will fall.

A house divided cannot stand,

and we are divided within ourselves.

A table- our republic- built with broken wood,

can withstand no weight.

First of all, it’s dark. I can’t see very much from here. It’s pretty smelly, too. Most of all, it’s cramped.

All in all, it’s a lot like being in a small wooden box under the ground for over a century.