Torn on the Fourth of July

A bit of arithmatic: 2011 - 1776 = 235. Statement of fact, two hundred thirty five years since the founding fathers told the King of England to shove it up his ass and formed the United States of America, declared themselves free men who would bend a knee to no monarch. Good job, guys. No, great job guys, truly a phenomenal work of self realization to shatter the crap and bullshit of religion empowered tyranny. Across the centuries I send you my salute, the world hasn't really seen your equal since. It is one thing to pull off a successful revolution, dislodge the tyrant by force of arms, a work of courage and dedication, but gentlemen your accomplishment goes far, far beyond that. It is one thing to pull off a successful revolution, it is another thing entirely to convert that victory into any working nation, much less a nation such as the United States of America. Yours was a magnificent work endured on a par with the run of Athens across the height of her glory, on a par with the majesty of Rome. I offer no false compliment, such is the scope of your achievement that history has rarely matched and never exceeded. I send you my salute, my forefathers. I am descended from a man who signed the Declaration with you, who helped you toss a load to tea overboard one evening. I think on your accomplishments, your wisdom and your forethought, and I stand in awe of what you showed the world.

I stand in awe of your accomplishment, and as I savor that awe I equally thank God Almighty, for your wisdom, and for the fact that you are dead and buried and beyond being compelled to see your work as it is now. So I today I will celebrate your victory, the magnificence of your accomplishment, and tomorrow I will return to the reality of my now, these days when the United States lives the passage of life that leads into the mediocrity of stagnation to await some time in the future when, God willing, it might once again arise in greatness.

The nation you nurtured so long ago is once again a nation divided in its' heart, even as the nation was in its' beginnings. The nation then was divided between the religious colonies of the north, those who braved the wilderness to the demands and consequences of conscience, and the southern colonies who tamed the wilderness as commercial ventures in vassal servitude to the King of England. A nation forged from an almost equal mix of men of God and men of the World, a nation forged from the best of both, their strengths blended, their wisdom conjoined in the dream of freedom for all. So it was in your day, my forefathers. But no more. No more.

Today the nation is again divided between those who call themselves men of God, and those who consider themselves men of the World. But these are very different men than those you knew in your day. The years have eroded away their nobility, corroded the wisdom into hypocrisy and delusion. They call themselves by different names than you knew in your day: they call themselves conservative, and liberal. But a name is just a label, no more than that. It is the same division you knew in your day, but in my day they are not allied in their strengths, but rather by their weaknesses.

Those who call themselves Liberal, those who would say they are men of the World still maintain the faded remnants of the dream, but it is faded, incomplete, and in that it is incomplete the dream has become impotent and bitter, it has become the dream of a parasite set upon the land and the people. The dream fading has given rise to all manner of perversions. Such things were known to your day, of course they were. But in your day they were known as futile and wicked perversion, not proclaimed a path to happiness and the natural state of man. Beneath the veneers of education they are a sad and lonely people, ignorant of the most primal facts of life, weakened and debilitated thereby.

Those who call themselves Conservative, those who would say they are men of God, they also maintain the remnants of the dream just as do the Liberals, and just like the Liberals the fragments they maintain are incomplete, impotent and bitter. They are addicted to the glories of the nation's past. For them history a narcotic, they live in dreams of reliving the days gone before, that they might live secure in an outcome full known. But like all addictions there is a cost associated: they suffer a loss of perspective, a distorted view of the present. They dream to restore the glories of the past in the deeds of the present and do not see the glories of the past cannot be made to fit a present so much larger and more complicated than the world they crave. Blinded by their addiction they have been seduced away from righteousness even as have the Liberals. Where the Liberals suffer the perversions of the flesh the Conservatives suffer the perversions of greed, and in their suffering afflict the land with all that greed brings into the lives of men: fear and prejudice, bigotry and violence. You would recognize them my forefathers, they would remind you instantly of the court of King George.

The United States no longer lives defined by mutual strengths, age has stolen the strength you knew. The nation now defines itself in ever more elaborate weaknesses, each weakness a claim against the charity of the land: the Liberals beg for each other, the Conservatives beg for their businesses, but both are beggars in actual fact. Gentlemen, the nature of beggars has not changed with the years, a beggar is still just that.

So extreme is the poverty of soul that is the nation now even the concept of renouncing the beggars ways has all but been lost. I talk among my fellows, I read their writings. For all of their supposed wisdom, for all of their education and experience there is one form of thought conspicuous by its' absence: the thought which sets forth a rational plan by which to elevate the nation above its' beggars stance and restore it to dignity. Such thought is all but taboo among both groups, the Conservative and the Liberal. They fear to reach beyond the known, beyond the posturings of guilt and pride. Both fear to allow such thought lest they suffer the condemnation of being the final failure that strips away the illusions and delusions and leaves only the sad truth to become a crushing weight driving the weakness into final despair.

My forefathers, I celebrate your greatness, and I am thankful you are dead and gone. I am happy you did not live to see what has become of your noble work. I would hate to be compelled to watch your eyes as you perceived the truth of the matter, and be compelled to offer this apology in person.