People are short and tall, fat and skinny, old and young, sick and healthy, smart and stupid, have brown eyes and blue, blond hair and brown, white-brown-black-red-yellow skin, rich and poor, wise and reckless, good and evil, straight and LGBTQ. They were. ALL. created by the same God-Yaweh-Allah-Great Spirit.The premise of America was they’re ALL. equal; that government would treat them ALL as equals. Christ said as YOU do unto the least, YOU do it onto me.” The miracle of 1775-1791 was that humans built a government unlike any other: “a republic if YOU can keep it.” Lincoln spoke of “a government of the people, by the people, FOR the people.” King said: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.” Teddy R said: “We, here in America, hold in our hands the hope of the world..and shame and disgrace will be ours..if we trail in the dust the golden hopes of man.”
WE ARE disgraced. By our conduct these last 44 years. We HAVE dishonored the sacrifices of the Founding Fathers [AND Founding Mothers!], of Valley Forge, of Gettysburg, of Belleau Wood, of Pearl Harbor-Midway-Normandy, of the Frozen Chosin, of the Nam, of Iraq-Afghanistan; the sacrifices of ALL the men and women who built America.
We ARE disgraced. because hope-love-tolerance have been replaced by greed-hate-intolerance; because we’ve listened to false prophets spouting twisted theories; because we forgot who we’re supposed to be; because we allowed the fear of “the Other” to distract us from our REAL problems – and – the people causing the damage.
We ARE disgraced because. we’ve allowed the progressive 20th century [real] reforms based around the idea that the wealth of America should be shared by ALL – to be replaced with a ‘winner-take-all’ economy in which a small rich and connected minority enjoy truly OBSCENE wealth at the expense of the other 330 million citizens.
We ARE disgraced because. we’ve voted for the increasingly radical, reactionary, greedy charlatans who’ve violated every premise America was built upon. They’ve run up the national [tax cuts for the rich]; they’ve perverted tax laws [numerous loopholes for the rich and connected]; they’ve attacked everything that is “us” – national parks [“privatize” them]; public education [let religion run it]; courts and laws [appointed hundreds of R-w zealots, topped by a CORRUPT Roberts “supreme court”]; the notion of public service [“deep state”]; public infrastructure [underfunded and disintegrating]; the political system [a “fair” election is where they win]; basic scientific knowledge [denial of global warming, demonization of vaccines, denial-demonization of 2 plus 2 equals 4 truths].
We ARE disgraced because. people who supposedly represent us are seriously proposing we kick millions off medical care and retirement benefits so “we’ can give obscenely rich billionaires MORE tax cuts; because various tax law ‘reforms’ are DESIGNED to mainly benefit the obscenely rich; because language itself has been twisted to cover up the 44 years of R-W CORRUPTION.
We ARE disgraced because. we’ve declared war on innocent countries [based on LIES]; we’ve committed war crimes – and are NOW enabling further war crimes; our policies have led to economic repression and depression; we’ve forgotten lessons of the 1920s-1930 – and ARE, right this moment – continuing to forget the lessons of 1936-12/7/41.
We ARE disgraced because. we’re not leaving our children and grandchildren the same America our parents-grandparents [the “Greatest Generation”] trie3d to leave us; some of us arrogantly try to FORCE ALL of us to live by their religious beliefs. Mark Twain said it best: “Why can’t we just leave everybody the hell alone.”
We ARE disgraced because. we not only have “trailed in the dust the hope of the world,” but the hopes of far too many decent Americans – by design, from GREED, by people already well off.
We have a choice. We CAN be the America of “Let them eat cake;” OR, we CAN be the America of “We all do better when we ALL do better.” We CAN be the America that believes 95% of ALL people are good; OR, we can be the America that wants to build walls and believes “the Other” is out to get them. We CAN be the America that. says “Government is the problem;” OR, we CAN be the America that has the faith of our Founding Generations that government exists to provide civilization to us ALL, together. We can be the America that says “freedom” is what I say it is; OR, we CAN be the America that allows others to live their lives, within fair laws, on their own terms.
We still have time. BUT….. the shadows of authoritarian austerity. are closing in on us. “The angels of our better nature” are slowly losing out to the devils of our worst natures. When tested in the past at Valley Forge, during the Civil War, during the 1930s Great Depression, during the dark days of World War II, with positive and democratic leadership – the American people have risen to meet the challenge. Will we NOW – when we have faulty and false leadership? Barbara Streisand said it best: “People who love people are the luckiest people.”
With Justice For All 