If you spent Memorial Day as I did, outside, enjoying a three-day weekend and wearing white trousers for the first time this year, you may have missed a really important NPR story about veterans and small business.

I didn't transcribe the whole thing (why steal what you can link to?), but I did type up the segments in which Senator Kerry was interviewed. Here are his comments - and if they don't make too much sense, you really ought to listen to the whole story. This is important stuff.

"In 2005, the Defense Department awarded only .499% of contracts to service-disabled firms. It's very hard for anybody to believe that less than one-half of one percent of all the contracts is that maximum practical opportunity - which is the language of the bill - that they can fulfill….

We are not, at the federal level, seeing this administration keep faith with those who've served. It's not keeping the promise to your veterans, and on Memorial Day particularly, I think it's important for people not just to put a flag in a cemetery, not just to remember, but to make certain that we're going to live up to those promises."