By Mark R. Bradbury, The Watchman
It is has been 16 score and 19 years since the
founding of our nation on July 4, 1776. The men who met in Philadelphia's
Independence Hall on those hot muggy May and June days could never have
imagined how different the country they founded and pledged their sacred honor
to would change in the intervening 339 years. Very much gone is their idea of
liberty, justice, and the pursuit of happiness that once burned within their
patriot souls. The old America is gone. The New America has come.
What is this New America espousing so radically
different than the Old? First and foremost is the loss of liberty.
In the Old America, one could freely believe, as he or she desired as
moved by their creator. Their faith led them to flee from the religious tyranny
of Europe, to find safe haven in a new and challenging world. Except for
a very small minority, most faithful were tolerant, loving the sinner, but
hating the sin, attempting to live within the broad bounds that God set for
humans. In the New America, all this has changed. President
Obama in his second inaugural address said,
“Being true to our founding documents does not require us to
agree on every contour of life; it does not mean we will all define liberty in
exactly the same way…”
Today, in the New America, liberty
means suppression. Citizens of faith can no longer state in good
conscious, that they cannot perform acts they consider to be antithetical to
their faith values. Rather, they are now forced by the long arm of the
law to do that which offends their sincerely held faith values. In the
New America, the slightest sense of offense of one group is grounds for
squashing the liberty of others. University speech codes and the plethora of
victim identification courses crush objective discourse. Many residents
of New America do not want to hear/read words of an opposing paradigm, but only
what tickles their own ears and makes them feel loved. Thus the
First Amendment's liberty of speech, religion, and press is nullified by
political correctness run amuck.
The New America is experiencing rabid
redistribution of wealth, from those who have to those who have not. The
Old America could not envision laws that dispensed with the rights of accused
nor the taking of property as in the days of British Colonial Royal decrees.
As just one example, the New America has such a law, Civil Forfeiture
Act, in which innocent citizens are deprived of trial, seizure of property, and
must prove their innocence to a non-judicial IRS, a la the French approach to
justice. Added to these egregious actions, the tax system created is used to
perpetuate the division of classes in such a manner that one born at one level
has little hope of rising to a higher level. And even more appalling, the
system is set so as to ensure a lifetime of subservience to the state, else
lose the 'support' needed for 'life'. Old America rejoiced at John F.
Kennedy’s call for patriotic service to the nation. New America
celebrates what can be gotten from the state. The Old America of self-determination
is buried under the weight of the government handout in the New America.
New America is for the here and now.
Consumption and lust for the material goods of what makes life good is
the driving force behind the New America. Rather than 'build' it our
selves as of old, we just buy it from foreign nations, driving up our debt and
in some cases enriching our enemies. In the Old America, the leaders of those
times were fearful of national debt, as well as the sweet promise of easy
credit. Rightfully so it now seems. In the New America, citizens think
nothing of buying stuff well beyond their need and simultaneously, and
self-righteously, brag about their recycle tote they wheel out to the curb on
trash days. The Old America really did know how to 'make-do', 'reinvent',
'reuse', and dare we say, 'share'. In the Old America, if a neighboring
farmer's bailer broke down, he could count on help from the fellow down the
road. In the New America, we just go to the bank, take out an equity
loan, and buy new equipment made in China.
In the New America, humor is thought to be a
string of four letter words. In the Old America there was Bob Hope, Red
Skelton, Jack Parr, Jack Bennie, Lucile Ball, Carol Burnett, Tim Conway, Johnny
Carson and so many other great, clean mouthed, and brilliant humorists.
The New America is a humorless society of cynical drones, addicted to
their ipads, autos, and themselves. The jokes are dry and witless, couched in
political correctness that stifles the laugh reflex. The music is
soulless as well. Rock and Country is gone with songs of superficial angst of a
mean boyfriend, swinging around on a wrecking ball half naked, or consists of
repetitious shuddering of poorly laid lyrics advocating hate or death to almost
any authority. The Old America was 'This Land is my Land', 'If I had a
Hammer', 'My Coat of Many Colors', 'Okie From Muskogie', 'Why I Wear
Black', 'Hello Trouble', 'Your Cheating Heart', 'He Stopped Loving Her Today',
and hundreds of ballads about hardworking men and women who scratched out a
living from the coal mines of Kentucky to the once vibrant fruit farms of
California. Old America had a deep, earthy, soul. New America is about as
superficial as wet onion paper.
New America is not a pretty place, especially in
the urban centers. The New America says 'Why should I clean the mess
around me. That's the government's job.' The Old America took pride in
doing things its self. It did not need government to clean up the trash in
front of people's homes, they did so themselves. The Old America painted their
homes and fixed their roofs, mowed their yards and if needed helped their
neighbors. In the New America, we hire it done. Need a green lawn, hire
True-Green to spray chemicals every month. Hire a lawn care company to mow.
Hire a painter to paint. Fake a claim for insurance to fix the roof and hire
someone to do it for you. In the New America we change data to fit
our preconceived hypothesis of millionaire political-scientists who bluster
impending climate doom. In Old America, science upheld the integrity of
data, sought real answers to real problems. Old America solved complex
challenges. In New America when facts don’t fit the line, we simply ignore or
change the facts. In New America words no longer mean what they mean, but what
the elite want them to mean to fit the politically correct narrative.
In the New America, we want it now. We want it
big. We want it better. We want it safe. In the New America we want
no risks. In the old America we wanted liberty. So we took risks. We didn't
take out wagon insurance before leaving Westport, Missouri on the Oregon Trail.
We knew it would take months to arrive on the west coast and there was no
guarantee we'd get there in one piece. In Old America the achievement was not
placing a man on the moon, it was devising a way to get Apollo 13’s crew back
with untried solutions and seat of the pants flying. In Old
America, we wanted better, but willing to work for it our selves. We
wanted more, but always willing to give. Big to the Old America was just enough
to keep it simple and affordable. In Old America an open space concept was
considered the great outdoors. In New America open space is the view from
a granite topped counter into the vaulted spacious living room with a fake
fireplace, LCD TV, connected to the family room and wet bar, leading to the
attached three car garage protecting autos mostly not made in America along
with staggering debt payments for all the above.
In the Old America, we believed in our selves
and our country. We knew we had warts, blemishes and hideous birthmarks. Things we're not always
perfect with harmonious relations. But for the most part and for most Old
American's we trusted one another and shared our hopes and dreams for a better
tomorrow, both for our selves as well as our children and grandchildren. Dr. King gave us a vision of what could be, not the nightmare of what was past. In the New America, we hardly lift our heads from the latest game app on
our iPhone as the TV blares out a scene that our grandmothers would have
blushed over. Restaurants are filled with families for a night out together,
but each person self absorbed by their iPhone mobile FaceBook/Twitter action.
In New America we talk more and communicate less. In the New
America it is about ultra-sensitivity of person, correctness of speech, safety
from uncomfortable truths, trigger words of implied micro-aggressions, and
crippling narcissism where my right trumps your right, my hate trumps your
hate. The Old America embraced tolerance and real innovative, critical, thinking. The New America asserts
repression and ditches tried and true values.
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