America, the Inspirational
There is nothing wrong with America. Yes, unemployment is the highest it’s been in decades. We’re quagmired in not one but two wars. Partisan politics is more polemic than ever before. And discontent amongst the citizenry is at record high levels. And then there’s the general furor over a financial system that regards its own wealth and well-being a God-given right, protecting it at all costs – especially that of its tax-paying clientele.
Yet the opening line still bears repeating: There is nothing wrong with America…because America is much more than a mere country. America is an idea, a belief. America, above all, is the land of opportunity…because at its heart are three inalienable rights: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
America, as these rights attest, is all about the individual. She is empowerment. She is the “Land of Dreams Fulfilled”. This is what makes her stand as a beacon of hope amidst her sister nations. This is what sets her apart.
America is about freedom – freedom to speak your mind, freedom to pursue your own course, freedom to make your mark, or not.
Yet America has lost her way of late. Special interests have created special rules, benefiting the few at the expense of the many.
Soybean farmers are no longer free to purchase whatever seed they favor. Monsanto Corp now has a patent on genetically engineered soybeans. And they consider the use of any non-Monsanto soybean an infringement on their patent. They vigorously prosecute to protect that patent. They sue farmers for planting non-Monsanto seed. Their deep pockets make legal challenges the kiss of bankruptcy.
Our food supply is being based more and more on corn and corn-extracts -- not because it is healthier for us, but because it is cost-effective and profit enriching for the Corporations that control the majority of food production. Obesity is up because of this focus on corn. And E-coli infestations are on the raise because of cost-effective, mass-production techniques – from the way we feed and raise cattle to the way poultry and meat products are processed.
Corporations get richer. Americans get sicker.
Free trade has been replaced with regulations and legislative advantages. The needs of the Corporation have risen above those of the people. Bottom line returns have been placed above the needs and well being of people.
This is not America.
In America, people are first. All else is in service to that fact.
Who says?
Our Constitution.
Remember, the first three words of that esteemed document are not “This Governmental Body,” or “We the Corporation,” but “We the People…”
This is what makes America, America.
Yes, she has wandered. She has been misled. She has been ill advised.
But she still is. And we must allow her to become what our Founding Fathers intended:
“…a more perfect Union that establishes justice, insures domestic tranquility, provides for the common defense, promotes the general welfare and secures the blessings of liberty to our selves and our posterity.”
There is nothing wrong with America.
She doesn’t need to change.
She just needs to “Be”.
