Anyone familiar with my posting history know that I post in outlines, rather than essays. This limited outline will follow my nature. Sorry. The state of the union is not strong. President Trump should not lead with the old trite platitude. The state of the nation is strong. Trump should elaborate on this fact. He should, however, first describe the reasons why the state of the union is on tenuous grounds. Somehow, we have to restore legitimacy to the press. The government cannot do this. We The People must rise above our partisan cheering and demand truth from them. We must demand the truth even when it goes against our goals. Propaganda contributes to the weakness of the state of our union. The ideologies of hard-core anti-Americans have infused nearly all aspects of our media and culture. It is now the norm to accept the propriety of hating the other. This has reached the point where public persons promote the harassment and even physical assault of those who hold different opinions. So much for the "melting pot". We are now being pushed into disparate factions. We are being, intentionally separated because of our differences, rather than being united by our commonalities. People who agreed with, or accepted, the actions of the Obama administration, now claim to be convinced that those same actions are evil under Trump. It's insane. Can we not save ourselves? Can we pull back from this precipice? Can we stop allowing the elites to manipulate us? I doubt it, but the question is for each of us to decide.
TC, I think that is very well said. Too many people think of government as small kids think of parents. They need to think as adults, accept individual responsibility and maintain integrity. The government can be no more than the sum of it's people. It can't grant them what they don't have in terms of character and can't run interference for them. It's the people who have changed, and I say that comes from the abandoning of values, of family and the structures that made us see each others as partners to work with instead of adversaries to beat. The real answers are in the strength of character and values that we as citizens hold- and live by. When we put people in positions of leadership that endorse discarding the values that made America great and want to replace them with garbage- we are also responsible for the damage they do to the nation, because we chose to empower them. When we start thinking more about the nation's future and less about our emotions of the moment- things will change. The time is now.
I'm afraid we are more on the course of the Klingons at the beginning of star trek 4. " there will be no peace as long as Kirk lives" Apart from that my perspective is this. Conservatives have been rolling over to give liberals everything they want since the 1960s. Republicans suddenly stop rolling over suddenly Democrats can't stand it.. My opinion now. Is tough Shiit. Conservatives have nothing left to give.
And the other thing I think we need to do a lot more of is looking back. We need to look back with some reverence at all of those Americans who came before us who fought for this country and who built it into the greatest country in the world. For the freedoms we enjoy and the material wealth we possess, we owe thanks to those who came before us. They gave this to us. Every time I look at the flag, I think of them. Seth
And you are exactly right. The worlds best teacher is experience- and school is open 24/7. If you can't learn from those who came before and built what is being passed along to the next generation, you will make all the fundamental mistakes again. While every generation has flaws, it's the work in progress that counts. We should be improving it, not throwing it out and starting over.
