Its as if one is standing on a hill watching a train barrel down the tracks at a high rate of speed. You look further down the tracks and in the path of the oncoming train, you notice a car stalled and sitting in its path. You are very much aware of the outcome of the situation and no matter how loud your scream, or how frantic you wave your arms and jump up and down, nothing can get the attention of the engineer to stop the collision. But what if there was more than just you standing on that hill. What if there were thousands of people screaming, jumping, and waving? The engineer may not notice one soul....but he cannot ignore the pleading of thousands.
Ask anyone not of this country to define an American. They will probably tell you that Americans are loud, patriotic, think their country is the best in the world. Damn straight! We earned that right. We fought tooth and nail to become what and who we are. No one told us or gave us permission to be our own country and not a single soul made us what we are. Not a single soul, but thousands. A group of people drew a line in the sand and said NO MORE. They rallied together and defeated a world superpower improvising, adapting, and overcoming great odds along the way. They also laid the foundation for a great democratic, capitalistic, republic.
When the Continental Congress met to decide exactly what type of government we were going to have, and of course like most governmental decisions, it took many days of debate and compromise to reach a decision. Benjamin Franklin emerged and someone asked him what kind of government were we going to have. His reply was, "We have given you a republic...if you can keep it." That statement rings with prophecy.
We have lost our identity. Americans have compromised ourselves to the point that trying to read the mere definition of "American" is like looking through your grandma's bifocal glasses; completely blurry and staring at it too long will make you dizzy.
The Constitution, like the Bible, has been manipulated and interpreted to support or damn any argument for the sake of winning said argument. All of the power that was given to the states so they could govern themselves, has been taken away piece by piece. Which is exactly what our founding fathers didn't want. The federal government was suppose to be a guide for the states, not a sole ruling power. Ya know..."checks and balances." The term itself is an illusion. Whatever the political party the president is...the congressional majority will be the opposite. So no decisions ever get made, they just keep getting bounced from the house to the senate like ping pong balls. The people that we elect to represent us in the federal government have made it a life long career. Example of this is Senator Strom Thurmond who served 48 years as a senator. Hell the president can only serve 8 years at the most because we are afraid they will become a dictator. I believe that our fear is misplaced. After awhile, they become more focused on how to get re-elected than actually helping the people that put them there. They're maybe only a handful that actually represent their people. Corruption, selfishness, and the appetite for power is rampant like a cancer and the American people have such a low approval rating for congress...its as if they are almost obsolete.
If you think about it, Benjamin Franklin was right..."if we can keep it."
The parallels between present day America and ancient Rome are scary. The Roman senate ended up being obsolete and then being ruled by a dictatorship. Caesar made it so the people were almost totally reliant on their government to provide for them. Roman government was slowly chipped away, until it imploded on itself. That's exactly what is happening to us. Kind of like watching a train wreck.
We compromise who we are constantly. Sure we will stand up and draw a line in the sand. However, if that line upsets a small group, we erase the line, and then ask where they would like for it to be. A good example of this is when certain states vote every year on what their official language is going to be...English or Spanish. Really?? Americans speak English. You want to live in this country, learn to speak the language. If I moved to Saudi Arabia, I would be expected to learn Arabic in order to communicate there. Not waiting to see if the Kingdom is going to change their language just to accommodate me.
Sometimes I feel like I am that one soul on the hill. My hope is that the majority of the United States wants to be who we were founded to be. We are a great nation, but we are a fragile one as well. The sacrifices that those who have come before us have made in order to build this amazing idea that is the United States will be for nothing if we lose who we are. There is still time to stop this train wreck.
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