By , Op-ed contributor This July 4, Americans will gather under flags, fireworks, and the sound of freedom. We should, for 250 years of freedom is worth celebrating. Yet if America’s 250th birthday is going to mean anything more than ceremony, we must be honest about the men and women who carried the cost of that freedom long after the parades ended. Our veterans do not need another slogan. They need a nation that remembers them after the music fades, and this is sadly often not the case.