Independence Day, 2011

Today is Independence Day.  The United States is 235 years old, and I have to wonder if she’s starting to show her age and there may be a bit of dementia coming out.

It’s like realizing that your elderly aunt is starting to slip a bit – putting metal pans in the microwave, setting the thermostat to 40 degrees and complaining because it’s cold, watering the artificial flower arrangement on the piano or losing her car in the parking lot and calling the fire department because it’s stolen – nothing that’s absolutely life threatening, but is somewhat cause for concern by those who care about her.

When that happens with your relative, you start looking back and seeing the signs that have been coming up for years.  Things that at the time looked like mere forgetfulness or eccentricity but you now realize that they were the early indicators of a greater problem.  As a country, we have the ability to look back to the early 1980's and see when things started to change.

In the case of the United States, we now seem to be more polarized than ever before.  Everyone is either “one of us” or “one of them”, without much opportunity for an exchange of ideas or compromise in between.  We don’t discuss, we shout over each other with the apparent belief that the loudest voice will “be right” and win.

On top of that, we have elected officials who are concerned not with furthering the legitimate business of the United States – reasonable defense, healthcare, the economy, employment and other societal concerns that affect broad sectors of the population – but rather having accepted money from what in times past would have been considered a radical fringe group are intent on pushing their social agenda in order to keep that flow of money coming to them individually.

The flash from one extreme to the other is therefore disconcerting.  Both sides not only want to hold onto the power and influence they have, but they seem to feel that they have to annihilate anyone who opposes their point of view at the same time.

You are one of us, or one of them.  If you are one of them, you must be eradicated.

I have to say here, I think that position originates largely from the conservative viewpoint since it is primarily religious based.  Extreme religions (and make no mistake, most forms of Christianity fall into that category) simply don’t tolerate either being questioned or disagreed with.  On the other hand, more liberal points of view tend to be of the “whatever you want to believe is fine, as long as you leave me alone” type.

The left is therefore precluded from reaching any type of compromise because of the right's position as holder of tactics from the Conquistadores (i.e. “Convert or die”), neither of which is a viable option from their perspectives.  The right has the religious zeal to “save the heathen” and make them see the error of their ways and change their entire way of thinking in order to reap a greater reward in the afterlife.

A position that seems somewhat antithetical to the "free will" concept to which most of Christianity  subscribes, but that's a discussion for another time.

Compromise usually happens in the areas of overlap; without some commonality between disagreeing groups, it’s hard to forge a consensus.  Right now, our country seems to be comprised of extremes at one end of the spectrum or the other.

Those in the middle – Nixon’s “silent majority” -- are either cowed into silence out of self-preservation or exhausted from all the screaming coming at them from both sides and simply don’t have the energy to sort it out for themselves between trying to make a living, keep the mortgage paid, the plumbing unstopped and the kids to soccer practice.

They leave the fighting to others and try to stay out of the line of fire as much as possible.

So the US at 235 years of age is acting a bit demented and I’m beginning to have doubts about whether or not they make a gigantic patch of the medicine to slow the progress of the societal Alzheimers from which we suffer.

Is this the end?  Will we see our nation collapse through years of demise after such a short period of productivity?

Maybe this is the natural order of things, just as humans are born, grow, age and die.  Countries rarely stay at the top of their game forever.  Countries which might now be considered as minor players – the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Egypt – were once the rulers of the world with vast empires.  Is it possible that the United States has started its own demise?  Should we follow the precepts contained in the Living Wills that many of us sign and simply allow nature to take it's course, for our government and society to end whenever things start to exceed the parameters that a caring and conscious caregiver would allow?

The signs are there – our government doesn’t have acceptable safety nets for the most vulnerable of it’s members, a wealthy minority controls those who are supposed to take care of all of the citizens and safeguards that are intended to protect our common resources and citizens are routinely disregarded for the benefit of a powerful few.  If something doesn't change soon, I suspect that we will reach a tipping point and see a new government or governments formed to accommodate specific population groups.

One of the great casualties of the current state of affairs is education and knowledge.  Basic schools are not funded to create a workforce to feed our economy with innovative products or ideas, and the media – both liberal and conservative – spews out a series of half-truths, misinformation and outright lies in 30 second sound bites that are rarely questioned or examined closely.

Our children and young adults – and by that, I mean much of the population under 50 since more and more people seem to be experiencing an extended adolescence – no longer have the intellectual backgrounds to discuss, debate and argue ideas so that they can then accept or reject concepts as legitimate and rational.  We have grown up on tests that don’t require essays, with the organization of reasoning and logic, but rather have chosen a curriculum of classes that rely on multiple-choice tests which require only that we pick A, B, C or D and color in the dot.  

The loss of those critical thinking skills is beginning to show.

In many ways, we are very similar to Europe during the dark ages, when religious institutions controlled much of the thinking and heretics were burned at the stake.

While there are admittedly few human bonfires lately, our society has developed more devious ways to eliminate those faint voices crying in the wilderness that dare to question the tumult about them.

Character Assassination.

Denial of Employment.

Hate Crimes and Violence.

Denial of basic human rights.

So what’s the outcome?  Do we see the United States separate into a variety of smaller countries, with regional ideologies more fitting to those populations?  While that may seem appealing in some regards will it lead to border wars like we see in Middle Eastern or African nations?  Let’s not forget that religious and cultural differences (some of which seem relatively minor to the western mind) are at the heart of those conflicts as well.

More pragmatically, how do we fund those big-ticket items that only a national government can handle, like defense, highway construction, utility production, or responses to natural disasters?  One reason that the US is able to bounce-back as well as it does is that we can spread the cost of a product that may not directly help a particular region out over a broad population base.  Will we loose that and an area that’s hit with an earthquake remain in ruins, with the population living in tents and without the basic necessities of shelter, clean water and adequate food simply for years? 

One need only look as far as the devastation in Haiti to see the impact of a natural disaster in a small country.

I don’t think we’re there yet.  At least, I hope not.

But if those in the middle --  those reasonable individuals who are friends and neighbors despite our differences, who borrow things back and forth, attend each other’s BBQ’s and wave at the Post Office -- don’t begin to speak up when someone from either end of the spectrum once again goes off on some radical tangent that may not impact them directly, we could get there very quickly.

There are two ways to turn the tide.  The first is to vote.  Not just a party line, but to actively learn who is behind a particular candidate and determine where they stand on a spectrum of issues, rather than just the one or two hot-buttons that appear in the television commercials.

The next is to communicate with those elected officials – whether you voted for them or not – and make your positions known, to let them know that you are interested and watching their actions, and to make it clear that their actions with regard to a number of issues will guide your voting at the next opportunity.

Inappropriate things happen because those in charge think that nobody is watching.  It’s time to let them know that we are watching and will be holding them accountable.  We can save our country and restore it to its former position as a world leader, but not if we don’t actively start working that direction right now.