Recent events in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, Bahrain, Iran and now Libya have dominated the news in the last month. As I watched protesters in several Middle Eastern and Northern African countries gather in public squares and proclaim a deep-seeded desire for a more democratic government, I felt thankful yet sad.
I felt thankful because Americans, whether born and breed here or legal immigrants like my Father, are taught that we live in a free and democratic society with a republican form of government. We are taught our form of government was created by revolutionary visionaries with an understanding of human nature and a desire for people to freely pursue life, liberty and happiness. We are taught the United States of America is a beacon of democracy and freedom to all other countries in the world, to all peoples of the world. I felt thankful because I was born here, because I knew these truths to be self evident, because I believe in these ideals.
I felt sad because so many Americans today have forgotten how damn lucky we are to live in the United States of America. So many of us take our democratic culture and our republican form of government for granted. Worse, some have infested our culture with the mindset that our government is somehow required to take care of people and must have a direct hand in our everyday lives or utter chaos will ensue. I felt sad because the people in countries around the world are all fighting for the type of democratic culture and government we take for granted.
For example, recently numerous Americans who were elected to hold public office in Wisconsin and Indiana, and who wear the label “Democrat,” fled from their jobs and responsibilities. They fled because they wanted to throw a wrench into their state legislative process during tumultuous debates centered on reforming public and private unions. They are cowards and should all resign their positions. They were elected to do a job, not flee from it. Heck, anyone of us would be fired by our employer if we ran away because we didn’t like a company policy or rule.
What these so called representatives are doing is in direct contravention of our country’s core principles of representative government. These representatives have left their constituents WITHOUT a representative in their state legislature. Instead of doing their jobs, they ran from it. Their actions demonstrate a lack of respect for our country’s democratic culture.
Democracy is not just a label we slap onto a country and expect the country to suddenly BE a democracy. It would be like if I proclaimed I was a giraffe – just because I say it is so, does not make it so. Similarly, just because we have a democratic culture does not mean we always will without proper maintenance. We as Americans have to choose to have a democratic culture each and every day. We need to vote in every election. We need to learn and pass down our country’s history. We need to communicate with our representatives and hold them accountable. We need to educate ourselves on the issues. We need to be productive members of our communities.
We need to do these things whether we label ourselves Republicans, Democrats, Tea-Partiers, etc., because first and foremost, we are AMERICANS.
Food for thought – note that Republicans in Congress did not flee D.C. as the Democrats worked to pass Obama’s Healthcare bill. No matter the difference in procedural rules, Republicans in D.C. stayed in town and fought for what they believed in.
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