This weekend, amidst the picnics and parades, take a moment to reflect that your social and political freedom came at great cost.

The moment that our forefathers chose to break away from the tyranny and oppression of their homelands, they volunteered to do anything to protect their beliefs. That "anything" included the deaths of men and women willing to serve an ideal. It also included the deaths of men, women and children who themselves were oppressed by those same freedom-seekers in pursuit of that ideal.

So, as you are standing on a street corner watching a parade, or relaxing at a ball game this weekend, take a moment to appreciate that the reason you can openly debate whether our next President will be an African American, a woman or a (technically) non-U.S. citizen -- and that the reason that any of those potentials are even possible -- is because someone in uniform died for it, and someone supporting that someone in uniform made a great sacrifice, or possible even died themselves.

Remember the soldiers, and the volunteers. Remember the slaves who built this country, and the First Nation peoples who lost theirs to it.