Could the people who thought up and then made America soon find
their thoughts put to a new use?
We’re in trouble up to
our noses. It’s not trump or Moscow Mitch. They’re just the byproducts.
Maybe the end products. We put ourselves in this muck by being what most of us
are: Good Americans.
What’s that? For
the most part, we are generous of spirit. We have a feeling -- sometimes
faint -- for the other guy’s point of view. We are willing to say that
people will do what they believe is right and won’t do what they believe is
wrong. And often, when we’re wrong about something, we admit it.
And we respect
authority, at least with our mouths if not our hearts. And sometimes, we
respect too much.
The seeds of our current
crises were sewn in the 19th century, then grew -- slowly at first -- but
steadily. When the Robber Barons were in their prime we listened to them.
They fed us 19th century junk food. But,
look, they’re rich and powerful. Those are good things to be, right?
Let’s try to be Jay Gould or JP Morgan or at least Astor’s pet horse.
People of deep
perception took note. And basically, they reigned in the financial terrorists
of the Standard Oil era. Most of us alive today don’t remember when
people fought the creation of regulatory agencies as “socialist.” Also
“socialist?” Social Security. Voting rights. The war on poverty.
Desegregation. Medicare. Medicaid. Unions.
None of that was even
close to socialism. It was simply American institutionalizing helping hands.
But we’re also bent
toward letting things go too long in the wrong direction. After what Tom
Brokaw calls the “Greatest Generation,” we got soft. Consumerism was on the
rise. The Saturday Evening Post told us it was a big, wide, white and wonderful
world. We believed the Dulles brothers -- there were commies at every bus stop
waiting to sell us into wage slavery.
Then came William F.
Buckley, a fabulous recontour with an agenda. He was essentially an apologist
for Pope Pius XII, but an amusing one.
Then came Ayn Rand with
her combination of individual “rights,” and “rational self-interest.”
Then it was the John
Birch Society, with guns and ammo for the oppressed white majority. And
the anti-Semites and the George Wallaces and the countervailing Black
Power-ites and Nation of Islam and the most violent of violent groups the
Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. (My mom was Stokely Carmichael’s
homeroom teacher.)
Now we have the
remaining Koch, Rush Limbaugh, Moscow Mitch and the puppet, trump. They
are anti-reason, they are anti-intellectuals, they ignore facts. They ignore
science and they ignore -- the rest of us.
Their central premise is
that America has “always” survived and prospers and “always will,” no matter
our greed, our excesses and our ignoring of or hostility toward facts, reason
and situational awareness.
That’s wrong. And if you
don’t stop it, we will implode. The dynamite for that already is in
place. All that’s left is to light the fuse.
It’s too windy for the
Bic lighter. Anyone have a Zippo?
I’m Wes Richards. My
opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Comments? Send to wesrichards@gmail.com
© WJR 2019
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