Riposte:
“Our National Argument With Cain”
(February 20, 2011)
The defining issue of our generation will be our culture’s response to human forcing of the planet’s radiative balance. So far, our clumsy response to the crisis is not the fault of science, technology, or a lack of riches. Our pitiful response is the result of a societal rot fostered by a leadership that now believes Cain was correct. To achieve an effective response, we must refocus our resources in ways that support the ideals that founded this nation.
Oppression of the weak, the poor, the less educated, and the trusting–by the strong, the more sophisticated, and the more powerful, better-connected forces–was not how America was conceived. We are a civilized nation; a nation that exists under a social contract of mutual defense and support of all her citizens. As a people, we must adhere to the social contract of our nation. It is a social contract that also declares we are free–and that we will fight for our freedoms against all aggressors, foreign and domestic. Along with that, we state in our Constitution that we are an enlightened nation, a nation that cares for its people and recognizes that the use of unfair leverage by other entities against the people of the United States of America is unlawful. As citizens of a nation conceived under these high ideals, it is up to every generation to preserve and protect those ideals. And while we may not be able to live those ideals, the act of honoring those ideals strengthens those ideals and it strengthens our country. Conversely, the process of weakening those ideals weakens our country.
The challenge for us now, as a people, is to recognize that the ideals that formed our country were not just words on a piece of paper formulated by the greedy rich to control the masses. Those words that elucidate our ideals are the goals of leaders who sought to build a better nation. Now, in 2011, we are faced with the degradation of our ideals, our economy, our environment, and our place in the world. The people of the United States of America shamelessly re-embracing the ideals that formed this country can reverse this process.
We must focus on the core of our problems: A vicious infection of depravity that seeks to eradicate fair play, honesty, responsibility, integrity, freedom of choice, and decency under the guise of a more sophisticated outlook on life. A guise that says morality is foolish and unsophisticated–or a tool for the acquisition of more goods, wealth, or power. Our outlook and our awareness that the world can be unfair, or evil, is not a reason to become that way. The proof is this: We have matured as a nation but we have taken the wrong turn of embracing the evils we once sought to obliterate; and that has led us to our present sorry state. Neighbor doesn’t trust neighbor, politicians are up for sale to the highest bidder, laws are made to support the growth of multinational corporate interests–not the interests of the citizens–and we engage in aggressive wars against states that have what we want, to take what we want, rather than developing our own internal solutions to our problems.
If you don’t know in your heart what decency, responsibility, ethical behavior, or truth means then turn off your television and go find out what they mean. Discuss the words with your neighbors, with your friends, with those you do not trust. They are all you. Hate is not the answer. If you think you have found the group that is responsible for your problems then you can be sure you have the wrong answer. We are a nation and so we share the benefits of that nation, or its failures, as one people. A divided nation will not stand, someone said. Those who say another American is your enemy seek to divide you from your neighbor. We are one nation and we must again function as one nation.
To achieve this we will work for the common good of our citizens. We will work to strengthen our freedoms. We will work to strengthen our economy. We will also work to keep our environment healthy. The greatness that is the United States of America is in her ability to change without blood in the streets. We must now engage, as a nation, that ability for change. And in doing so, reconnect to the morality, the ethics, and the truths that are at our nation’s core, we are the United States of America. We are called upon, by our time, to preserve her. It is our responsibility to respond and defend her. It is our right to guard her. It is our great honor to protect our country.
There is no humor in the body of this post. I cannot find anything clownish in recent decisions–DG
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