COTTonLINE takes a backseat to nobody in honoring our veterans. Freedom isn't free now, and wasn't in our past.
Today is Memorial Day, honoring America's war dead. Drudge Report links to a CBS Dallas story reporting a decline in memberships of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legion.
The VFW and Legion are largely fraternal organizations for service members who mustered out in good standing. While they also advocate for veterans benefits, mostly they fill the same social niche as the Lions, Elks, Masons, or Rotary.
What makes the CBS piece a non-story is all such organizations have suffered membership declines in the past couple of decades, not just those for veterans. Fewer people go to church, too.
Social scientists have offered various theories for this decline: two-earner couples' time constraints, online entertainment, a change in the zeitgeist. My understanding is we don't know a precise explanation. For whatever reason, we aren't the "joiners" our parents and grandparents were.
