A beautiful Indian summer day greeted the veterans of Alpha bus Sunday morning. We left the hotel in Roanoke early to meet a Roanoke Times reporter for an interview.

"I remember the oil embargoes of the 70s," said Ed May, an Army veteran of Desert Storm in Kuwait and Iraq. "Everyone said we needed to get off oil and find another source of energy. Then I went and served in the Gulf War, and after that they said the same thing. It's time to get something done now, for our nation's security sake."

Then we fired up the bus and headed north to Charlottesville, the home of Thomas Jefferson. But within minutes of leaving Roanoke, the bus blew a hose and we were forced to pull over.  Ellis, our veteran pilot, guided the wounded blue bus to a nearby service station for repairs.  The breakdown forced us to cancel our appearance in Charlottesville, where the mayor and other dignitaries awaited us.

But by mid-afternoon we were back cruising through the green hills of Virginia for an interview with BBC America television at the Iwo Jima memorial in Arlington, a stones throw across the Potomac from DC. The setting sun painted a rosy glow on the famous military flag raising statue while the veterans conducted their interviews on the bus.

"Our dependence on foreign oil weakens our national security," said Ashkan After the interview we motored across Memorial bridge toward Washington. Ashkan Bayatpour, a former Marine who served in Iraq. "Never in American history have we been challenged in so many ways. By solving our dependence on fossil fuels we can create more jobs, cut pollution and make America stronger."BC cameraman rode shotgun in the front of the bus, filming the white columns of the Lincoln memorial lit up against the dark sky. Washington was an inspiring thing to see, a place where men like Lincoln led the country into a new era of freedom.

This band of veterans was hoping to help move the country in a better, more secure direction as well. Like the fight that Lincoln waged for freedom, finding solutions to oil dependence and building a cleaner, safer energy economy is a battle well worth fighting for.