"Do not squander the time given to you by God or the freedom preserved by this Marine's life."

Thoughts on Memorial Day:

"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
--John Stuart Mill

To the congregation's strains of "America the Beautiful," the casket of Marine Cpl. Stephen R. Bixler was carried last week from his family church in Suffield, Connecticut, en route to his final resting place at Arlington National Cemetery.

Steve Bixler was an all-American kid. He was a model son to parents Richard and Linda. He was an Eagle Scout. He was a good athlete. After graduating high school, he became one of the few, the proud.


Bixler was assigned to the 2nd Reconnaissance Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. When his battalion called for volunteers to man a Provisional Rifle Platoon, Stephen stepped forward. His platoon commander, 1st Lt. Nicholas Lodestro, says Stephen was "loyal, knowledgeable and dedicated. He was a warrior I felt comfortable to serve with. He was the man in front protecting us. He was a dedicated, unselfish, charismatic warrior."

Cpl. Bixler, age 20, was killed on 4 May while conducting combat operations against enemy forces in Al Anbar province, Iraq. His battalion commander, Lt. Col. James Bright, said of this young Marine, "He died fearlessly leading and willingly sacrificing his own safety for those around him."

Stephen Bixler is one of 2,738 uniformed Patriots who have died on the joint warfronts with Jihadistan -- Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, most of them killed in combat operations.

This week, in advance of Memorial Day, we recognize Cpl. Bixler, not because he is more noteworthy than the more than eight-hundred-thousand American Patriots who have, since our nation's inception, made the ultimate sacrifice in defense of our liberty, but because he is, in many ways, representative of all those who have fallen before him.

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