Happy 4th of July!
So this holiday has me wondering what it means to be American. I just heard the Supreme Court is having a shake up right now which is breaking news. I'm scared at the prospect of who is going where. It seems our government is a living breathing and ever changing entity and that is beautiful. Hopefully we will work towards changes for the better. In America, if we don’t like how things are going, we vote, we protest and we demand change and hopefully that spirit is not slowly dying before our eyes. That is what being an American is all about. We have a say in our government like few other places on this planet and most of those modeled their own government after our’s.
I think our voice above and beyond everything is what I, and presumably many others, love about being an American. Yet we have to remember our obligations. As the biggest kid on the playground, we serve as the ultimate role model. Sometimes we have to step in and help the smaller kids when they are getting beat up. Unfortunately, it seems lately we are spending less time defending the weak and more time taking other’s lunch money. Joey might be the meanest and nastiest kid on the playground, but does that mean you’re entitled to beat him up and tie him down? Not really.
It is with this sense of stewardship that our country rose to its superpower status. Try as they might, the nations of Europe can not seem to unite and form the perfect union we have. Our slave splakin dope token forefathers knew that only in making a nation where everyone is free and equal would they create the utopia that they sought. Over time, that blanket of equality has grown to include people of all colors and genders. Someday soon it will grow even more and there will come a day when a legal gay marriage raises not an eyebrow among the masses. This nation once saw brown people as property and women as incapable of voting. So we haven’t exactly been perfect and with hindsight the way things are now will be comical to our grandchildren.
At this time in history, perhaps now more than ever, we are at a cross road. I’m not going to tell you I want feltching taught to public school kids by transvestites but we do need to start examining what we value. We live in a world of dichotomy were the worst qualities are rising to the top. Kids are taught an inherent sense of self worth that has made them all be beautiful and unique snowflakes. In so doing, the dumbest and most profane aspects of youth culture have risen to the top and kids are walking around doing whatever they want without any concept of consequences. We are letting them run amuck, because we are too afraid to tell them they are not infallible. How can we when our own national leaders behave with the same reckless abandon?
While individual rights are going ape$h1t in the school system, our crazy government is doing anything it can to bring an end to them surreptitiously. Laws are being passed that restrict our rights constantly. While there should be laws that prevent me from walking to my neighbor’s house, shooting him and dragging his wife over to my place, there really don’t need to be laws enabling Wal-Mart to forcefully seize my family farm in the name of progress. Individually we tell our kids they are all perfect only to then send them out into a society that teaches them they have no rights. What will become of a generation that has no rights AND can do no wrong? The answer can be found in history. Look at the Romans. It wasn’t the orgies and bath houses that brought them down, but instead a sense that the entitled class ran the show. The law makers invaded territories and ruled the people with an iron fist. In the meantime, the masses were so preoccupied with satisfying their own lusts that they turned a blind eye to a self destructive government. Their inflated sense of self worth meant that they forgot to think about things like the future or how recklessly feeding their personal desires would eventually leave them ignorant, fat and broke. In the meantime, their emperor was making decisions to serve his own desires in the name of Zeus. Sound familiar?
I’ve been feeling guilty myself lately when I gas up. I had to trade in my SUV. Say what you want, but we are sending kids over to die for these oil reserves. If you don’t believe this war is about oil, then ask yourself why Africa, which is crocked full of genocide and evil dictators has gotten zero military assistance. Why you ask? No gas. Hungry and miserable people, but no gas. Maybe it is because they are brown, but I’d like to think we are a little less discriminatory than that, so I’ll go with gas. Then you have North Korea. Give a guy who wears elevator shoes and is probably hung like a hamster access to the bomb and you are just asking for trouble.
So next time you think a liberal hates their country, perhaps you should think about what this nation was founded on. America was meant to be a land were we worked together to defend our freedom. Individuals had equal rights and would gladly band together to defend those rights and each other. What you didn’t have was a sense of entitlement that is so much a part of our culture today and gets blamed on us “liberals.” Truth is, nothing screams entitlement more than a leader left unchecked. In the past, we policed ourselves and stood up to each other and our own government when one man’s desires were hurting everyone else. Our forefathers framed a constitution built around true Christian values and didn’t lightly toss around words like “God” without considering the weight of their actions. The true genius of the men who founded this country rested in the fact they were intelligent enough to admit that they knew very little. As we grow in knowledge and power, we should never forget that in the grand scheme of things, we still know very little. Only then will we be able to ensure the future of our people and our country.
"Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's" -Jesus Christ
That sure sounds like seperation of church and state to me.
So this holiday has me wondering what it means to be American. I just heard the Supreme Court is having a shake up right now which is breaking news. I'm scared at the prospect of who is going where. It seems our government is a living breathing and ever changing entity and that is beautiful. Hopefully we will work towards changes for the better. In America, if we don’t like how things are going, we vote, we protest and we demand change and hopefully that spirit is not slowly dying before our eyes. That is what being an American is all about. We have a say in our government like few other places on this planet and most of those modeled their own government after our’s.
I think our voice above and beyond everything is what I, and presumably many others, love about being an American. Yet we have to remember our obligations. As the biggest kid on the playground, we serve as the ultimate role model. Sometimes we have to step in and help the smaller kids when they are getting beat up. Unfortunately, it seems lately we are spending less time defending the weak and more time taking other’s lunch money. Joey might be the meanest and nastiest kid on the playground, but does that mean you’re entitled to beat him up and tie him down? Not really.
It is with this sense of stewardship that our country rose to its superpower status. Try as they might, the nations of Europe can not seem to unite and form the perfect union we have. Our slave splakin dope token forefathers knew that only in making a nation where everyone is free and equal would they create the utopia that they sought. Over time, that blanket of equality has grown to include people of all colors and genders. Someday soon it will grow even more and there will come a day when a legal gay marriage raises not an eyebrow among the masses. This nation once saw brown people as property and women as incapable of voting. So we haven’t exactly been perfect and with hindsight the way things are now will be comical to our grandchildren.
At this time in history, perhaps now more than ever, we are at a cross road. I’m not going to tell you I want feltching taught to public school kids by transvestites but we do need to start examining what we value. We live in a world of dichotomy were the worst qualities are rising to the top. Kids are taught an inherent sense of self worth that has made them all be beautiful and unique snowflakes. In so doing, the dumbest and most profane aspects of youth culture have risen to the top and kids are walking around doing whatever they want without any concept of consequences. We are letting them run amuck, because we are too afraid to tell them they are not infallible. How can we when our own national leaders behave with the same reckless abandon?
While individual rights are going ape$h1t in the school system, our crazy government is doing anything it can to bring an end to them surreptitiously. Laws are being passed that restrict our rights constantly. While there should be laws that prevent me from walking to my neighbor’s house, shooting him and dragging his wife over to my place, there really don’t need to be laws enabling Wal-Mart to forcefully seize my family farm in the name of progress. Individually we tell our kids they are all perfect only to then send them out into a society that teaches them they have no rights. What will become of a generation that has no rights AND can do no wrong? The answer can be found in history. Look at the Romans. It wasn’t the orgies and bath houses that brought them down, but instead a sense that the entitled class ran the show. The law makers invaded territories and ruled the people with an iron fist. In the meantime, the masses were so preoccupied with satisfying their own lusts that they turned a blind eye to a self destructive government. Their inflated sense of self worth meant that they forgot to think about things like the future or how recklessly feeding their personal desires would eventually leave them ignorant, fat and broke. In the meantime, their emperor was making decisions to serve his own desires in the name of Zeus. Sound familiar?
I’ve been feeling guilty myself lately when I gas up. I had to trade in my SUV. Say what you want, but we are sending kids over to die for these oil reserves. If you don’t believe this war is about oil, then ask yourself why Africa, which is crocked full of genocide and evil dictators has gotten zero military assistance. Why you ask? No gas. Hungry and miserable people, but no gas. Maybe it is because they are brown, but I’d like to think we are a little less discriminatory than that, so I’ll go with gas. Then you have North Korea. Give a guy who wears elevator shoes and is probably hung like a hamster access to the bomb and you are just asking for trouble.
So next time you think a liberal hates their country, perhaps you should think about what this nation was founded on. America was meant to be a land were we worked together to defend our freedom. Individuals had equal rights and would gladly band together to defend those rights and each other. What you didn’t have was a sense of entitlement that is so much a part of our culture today and gets blamed on us “liberals.” Truth is, nothing screams entitlement more than a leader left unchecked. In the past, we policed ourselves and stood up to each other and our own government when one man’s desires were hurting everyone else. Our forefathers framed a constitution built around true Christian values and didn’t lightly toss around words like “God” without considering the weight of their actions. The true genius of the men who founded this country rested in the fact they were intelligent enough to admit that they knew very little. As we grow in knowledge and power, we should never forget that in the grand scheme of things, we still know very little. Only then will we be able to ensure the future of our people and our country.
"Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's" -Jesus Christ
That sure sounds like seperation of church and state to me.
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