“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these:
First a right to Life, secondly to liberty, thirdly to property;
together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can….”
(Samuel Adams)
“We must stop talking about “The American dream” and
start listening to the dreams of Americans….”
(Reubin Askew)
“i like to see a man proud of the place in which he Lives.
i like to see a man Live so that his place will be proud of him….”
(Abraham Lincoln)
(Abraham Lincoln)
As the 2012 Presidential election cycle winds up in the next few months amidst the clamoring, feuding, & jockeying that will be occurring in the new Congress, it is likely that You will witness a national conversation and public debate unlike anything You have witnessed in Your Lifetime (unless You happen to have been around when FDR was passing The New Deal, but – even then – it won’t be apples-to-apples due to the immeasurable media differences). The conversation & debate – as it is beginning to already take shape – is the issue of what is the right “balance” or calibration between what government should or shouldn’t do in the Lives of its citizens (those who want a more active government would say “for” its citizens). Some will split hairs and say that it isn’t so much about the balance of government’s role as much as it is about the actual role itself that government should play. Then, there will be those who think the argument should focus more on what the citizenry can do, should do, or should expect from government, and this is one of the problems with anyone from either side trying to “frame” this debate – there are simply too many foci regarding which to get distracted, and even having a coherent conversation with one mobile-phone addicted American today is almost impossible. Good luck trying to have a cogent conversation with an entire nation of them.
Personally, i think all or any of these discussions are a little off the mark, but that’s typical of both me and the U.S. national political conversation. The conversation intellectuals want to have (some form of the one aforementioned in the previous paragraph) is interesting, but it doesn’t really fix anything.
So, what? What is the proper conversation to be having? Should we dive more deeply into the American ethos and talk of colonial and revolutionary topics such as autonomy and natural rights and liberty? Or maybe even move beyond the American experience and go even further back into an Enlightenment-era broach of civilization and progress and stewardship. Why stop there? Why not continue the backwards reckoning toward the Greco-Roman philosophical conjectures about character, integrity, equality, justice, fairness, etc.? i mean, seriously, do political types really think You can discuss “sacrifice” regarding a nation at war and the voluntary contributions of citizens alongside the mandated contributions of soldiers or regarding a nation engrossed in the generational debauchery of excess that equals the stealing of resources, opportunity, & hope from the future citizens’ needs to placate the current generation’s whims without first having any of these discussions? Really?
To hope that the general American population is even equipped – given the unbelievably sad state of education in this country – to understand these conversations is a real over-reach. The problems with which we contend currently are not the result of bad policies – they are the result of imperfect people. Every problem we currently have can be traced to leadership that was either incompetent, naïve, corrupt, ignorant, greedy, dysfunctional, or immoral. Seriously, every problem can be traced directly back to one of those postures, and neither side has a monopoly on any of them.
Don’t try to argue that Repugnicans are more responsible than Demoncrats. Do You remember how many southerners (of both parties) were against civil rights and especially the Repugnicans? Do You remember how George W. Bush entered two wars – neither for the right reasons and neither with an end-game? Do You remember how the Repugnican-controlled congress from the early 2000s (after years & years of promoting themselves as the fiscally responsible adults in the room) passed a new entitlement program (prescription drug coverage in Medicare) without paying for it, ran up massive debts in response to 9/11 with wars that weren’t effective and without a financial plan for a changing economy & evolving world, and passed tax cuts during all of that? Do You remember any of that?
And don’t try to argue that Demoncrats are more moral than Repugnicans. Do You remember how the New Deal was more a cheap political play for votes (very similar to the current hopes of Demoncrats to win over the Hispanic voters-to-be with an immigration doctrine that essentially grants amnesty to illegal aliens) by increasing government’s role in the Lives of Americans? Do You remember how the Demoncrats re-enslaved minority groups via the creation and implementation of social engineering like welfare, food stamps, etc. and encouraging – as just one example among too many to count – unwed mothers to have more children to get more government money, and, thereby, reinforcing the corrupt voting imbalance? Do You remember how Bill Clinton dishonored our country and shamed himself? Does any of that ring a bell?
Well, if not, then You shouldn’t be allowed to vote. No, seriously.
But, if it does, then stop the incessant personal attacks against the flavor-of-the-month politician and try and get beyond party politics. It doesn’t become You. You are better than that, even if Your last name is Hitler….
The proper conversation to be having is the one that would also, by pure chance, benefit us the most at this point in our country’s much-more-fragile-than-anyone-imagines development. That conversation would be about something we used to discuss all the time: The American Dream.
Now, the “American Dream” is a term used normally by various people to push various agendas. So, let me describe what i think it meant most generally to past Americans and why we should try to recapture the essence of that meaning today.
When i was growing up, the essence of the American Dream to me was leaving America a better place for the generations to come than it was when we Lived. There are many good derivatives that came from that – almost none of which exist today. Allow me to point out a few….
So, what? What is the proper conversation to be having? Should we dive more deeply into the American ethos and talk of colonial and revolutionary topics such as autonomy and natural rights and liberty? Or maybe even move beyond the American experience and go even further back into an Enlightenment-era broach of civilization and progress and stewardship. Why stop there? Why not continue the backwards reckoning toward the Greco-Roman philosophical conjectures about character, integrity, equality, justice, fairness, etc.? i mean, seriously, do political types really think You can discuss “sacrifice” regarding a nation at war and the voluntary contributions of citizens alongside the mandated contributions of soldiers or regarding a nation engrossed in the generational debauchery of excess that equals the stealing of resources, opportunity, & hope from the future citizens’ needs to placate the current generation’s whims without first having any of these discussions? Really?
To hope that the general American population is even equipped – given the unbelievably sad state of education in this country – to understand these conversations is a real over-reach. The problems with which we contend currently are not the result of bad policies – they are the result of imperfect people. Every problem we currently have can be traced to leadership that was either incompetent, naïve, corrupt, ignorant, greedy, dysfunctional, or immoral. Seriously, every problem can be traced directly back to one of those postures, and neither side has a monopoly on any of them.
Don’t try to argue that Repugnicans are more responsible than Demoncrats. Do You remember how many southerners (of both parties) were against civil rights and especially the Repugnicans? Do You remember how George W. Bush entered two wars – neither for the right reasons and neither with an end-game? Do You remember how the Repugnican-controlled congress from the early 2000s (after years & years of promoting themselves as the fiscally responsible adults in the room) passed a new entitlement program (prescription drug coverage in Medicare) without paying for it, ran up massive debts in response to 9/11 with wars that weren’t effective and without a financial plan for a changing economy & evolving world, and passed tax cuts during all of that? Do You remember any of that?
And don’t try to argue that Demoncrats are more moral than Repugnicans. Do You remember how the New Deal was more a cheap political play for votes (very similar to the current hopes of Demoncrats to win over the Hispanic voters-to-be with an immigration doctrine that essentially grants amnesty to illegal aliens) by increasing government’s role in the Lives of Americans? Do You remember how the Demoncrats re-enslaved minority groups via the creation and implementation of social engineering like welfare, food stamps, etc. and encouraging – as just one example among too many to count – unwed mothers to have more children to get more government money, and, thereby, reinforcing the corrupt voting imbalance? Do You remember how Bill Clinton dishonored our country and shamed himself? Does any of that ring a bell?
Well, if not, then You shouldn’t be allowed to vote. No, seriously.
But, if it does, then stop the incessant personal attacks against the flavor-of-the-month politician and try and get beyond party politics. It doesn’t become You. You are better than that, even if Your last name is Hitler….
The proper conversation to be having is the one that would also, by pure chance, benefit us the most at this point in our country’s much-more-fragile-than-anyone-imagines development. That conversation would be about something we used to discuss all the time: The American Dream.
Now, the “American Dream” is a term used normally by various people to push various agendas. So, let me describe what i think it meant most generally to past Americans and why we should try to recapture the essence of that meaning today.
When i was growing up, the essence of the American Dream to me was leaving America a better place for the generations to come than it was when we Lived. There are many good derivatives that came from that – almost none of which exist today. Allow me to point out a few….
An institutional (read “government forced”) occurrence i remember frequently from my childhood was something i will term “Better Access.” Better Access was things like Title IX that mandated that girls have the same sports opportunities as boys, for example, or the creation (much earlier) and maintenance (during my childhood) of a National Parks system or the building / maintenance / improvement / expansion of Interstates. These kinds of things weren’t just national projects done for the activity’s sake; they were done to improve and expand access for people, businesses, and groups. In the modern era, we have very few examples of new forms of better access being accomplished by government, but i will give one example for You to ponder.
i remember watching a 60 Minutes report (i think) several years ago about a lawsuit brought against a small Texas town by AT&T and the U.S. government (i think, i’m pretty sure it was the U.S. government joining in and i’m positive it was AT&T or some affiliate/associate thereof). Seems this small town wanted to install high-speed, high-capacity internet cabling far beyond the capacity being offered by any U.S. provider to allow its town to have internet at the same speeds as already extant in Japan and other places around the world. The reason they wanted to install such high-speed cabling? To give them an advantage as a city in attracting businesses to their town. The city was going to pay for all of it, but they needed the U.S. government’s approval. AT&T opposed the city. The U.S. government sided with AT&T.
Why? Because AT&T and the U.S. government are each greedy in their own respective (the U.S. government wanted more taxes and, therefore, preferred a higher-priced product), and AT&T wanted to avoid a precedent being set and to prevent cities from installing their own cabling, and, therefore, force municipalities to use providers such as AT&T. So, why would AT&T be opposed to giving customers the highest-speed cabling possible and, therefore, allow customers the best experience possible at the lowest possible price? Because AT&T wanted to arbitrarily inflate the rates and provide tiered services in order to squeeze as many dollars as possible out of Your wallet every month? Why? Because, in America, we all want jobs that pay $100,000 and require us to do very little. Why? (i could just keep peeling this onion, but – for sanity’s sake – i’m going to just stop here and move on…). This is an example of how government hasn't been doing helpful things in recent years, but - instead - doing just the opposite by doing harmful things: to consumers, to businesses, to families, to estates, to the environment, to....
A second example of my definition of The American Dream that i witnessed as a child was what i will term “Generational Accrual.” It was the idea that a family could amass wealth and property over generations. Each generation would accrue, steward, & pass on more to the next generation. Today, this notion is almost non-existent, but – where it is existent in families – it is opposed at every turn by such immoral government behavior as the Death Tax (sometimes referred to by it’s deceitful term, the Estate Tax). Demoncrats ought to cheer anyone who would be adversely affected by the Death Tax if they were True to their claimed principles, but, alas, they are neither True to their claimed principles nor able to see the logical progression of which i speak. And Repugnicans argue against the Death Tax (some of them, anyway) but for all the wrong reasons. Just incredibly sad….
A third example is what i will call “lineage.” This refers to the idea that families cultivated a culture in their own ranks of things like military / political service, marriage expectations, careers that crossed multiple generations, etc. Such notions (as in John McCain’s “Faith Of My Fathers”) was common and encouraged. Now, that has all but been lost in America.
A fourth example is Innovation. When i was young, it was a noteworthy and noble pursuit to be engaged in furthering progress through science or technology or other means. It was held up as something to be lauded and appreciated and rewarded. Innovation today has become little more than an expected contribution by the R&D division of a company to the annual shareholder’s statement. There is no longer any romance of going to the moon or danger of floating on a nuclear aircraft carrier or challenge turning Space Invaders into Super Mario into Call Of Duty or dreams of building Disneyland and watching them come.
The last example i will mention is what i will call “National Stewardship,” and, by that term, i mean the responsibility of each generation to preserve natural things, create unnatural things, and cultivate relational things. As a child, i remember Ronald Reagan arguing that peace was built on strength, and – whatever You thought or think of Reagan – i remember the hostages being released when he took office. There was a Sting song called “Russians” that talked of how he hoped the Russians Loved their children, too, because that would prevent a nuclear holocaust. i remember people listening to presidential speeches (whether by JFK or Reagan or whomever in the pre-digital and instantaneous information age) and carefully considering what the president said before deciding to throw him under the bus as the village idiot. Today, that happens before the speech is even given due to pre-published copies distributed to the media. i already know what he’s going to say before he even says it.
These examples i offer as humble fodder to say this: What happened to the American Dream? How is it possible that the Baby Boomers and their willing accomplices from generations as far as the eye can see on either side of them have ruined so much so quickly? Why don’t people care anymore about their children? Why don’t they want to be remembered as courageous people of action who addressed the hard issues instead of passing the buck to those younger, weaker, less equipped, and not as wise to struggle?
The reason that the national conversation will be about something as useless philosophically as the role/balance/nature of government rather than about something as beneficial as what legacy we are leaving our children that might impart wisdom to them regarding how to handle the future and to accompany the resources, peace, and role we have forged in the world among nations is that it is much easier to theoretically discuss the problems with government than to face up to the problems with ourselves. The Tea Party was just the beginning, and so is the pushback from the Progressives over Obama not being willing to fight for their beliefs. Note to politicians: No one likes You. But recast Yourself as a serious problem-solver (like Chris Christie) or a great communicator (like Ronald Reagan) or a daring dreamer (like JFK) or an empathetic parent (like FDR) and people will adore You. The only catch is You gotta accomplish stuff. Let the historians haggle over exactly what it was worth, but just get something done and act like it mattered to You the whole time....
Do those who went before us want us to get shorter, too? To Live less long? To know less?
Here is the conversation we ought to be having: How do we get people to Love their children more and themselves less?
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