National Perspective: Ukraine’s crisis is a tipping point for the world’s democracies

The American national anthem celebrates "the land of the free and the home of the brave." Canada's speaks of "the true north strong and free." Great Britain's pleads that the "Lord make the nations see/That men should brothers be." And Ukraine's national anthem opens with this haunting phrase: "Ukraine's glory has not perished."

In the past weeks, Ukraine's glory has done more than not perish, though the country itself is under grave threat of perishing. Its fighters have shown courage and valor, its refugees have provided an eloquent statement about the human yearning for freedom, its president has displayed remarkable audacity and fortitude, making him the video version of Louis Kossuth, the 19th-century Hungarian revolutionary hero who toured the United States trying to raise arms and support for his country's doomed war of independence.