Thursday, August 13, 2009

Anti-Progress

Progress in the United States has its counterpart and it is Anti-Progress. The choice of the Founding Fathers to rebel against King George III is the first strike for progress of the young nation. The Founders chose to become a separate government and one where the people rule. Shocking thing for the humans on Earth in the late 18th Century. The idea of more freedom appealed to the Founders and they wanted it to be part of the country they were creating.

The first signs of Anti-Progress appeared when it became clear that not all men are created equal. To include non-white males in this new government was too much progress for the collective States calling themselves a nation. One have of the nation relied heavily on the enslavement of blacks, and this peculiar institution needed to be maintained. Compromises were made in the drafting of our nation's second Constitution in 1787. Freedom for some, about zero to three-fifths for others. Major progress was averted.

The progress for blacks to be equal to whites would take time. Those demanding abolition were unable to end slavery in the United States peacefully, and after over 80 years of boiling up civil war erupted. While President Abraham Lincoln offered a peaceful resolution to succession he vowed to preserve the Union. The South chose war. And it became a war to free the slave and progress the nation toward that freedom our Founding Fathers sought in 1776.

Believing that progress won after the Civil War ended in 1865 is wrong. The supporters of an Anti-Progress mindset would be the true victors. The failure of Reconstruction in the South by both President Andrew Johnson from 1865-67 and the Radical Republicans from 1867 until 1877, contributed a lot to the success the Anti-Progress movement would have over the next ninety years. Presidential Reconstruction and Congressional, or Radical, Reconstruction both failed to live up to Lincoln's wish of malice toward none. Segregation and lynchings would leave the supporters of Anti-Progress as the victors in the 20th Century.

Sure the supporters of progress had some victories with women suffrage granted early in the century. As our history has shown progress takes time and the reason that is true is because of Anti-Progress and its followers. With the victories in the Civil Rights Movements of the 1950s and 1960s led by Martin Luther King Jr. and President Lyndon Johnson, to name two of the many, progress was taking place. Anti-Progress was hit hard and they adapted to the times. The spirit of 1776 was making its way through the country's growth.

The Minority Majority, the small portion of Americans supporting Anti-Progress have made a push for Anti-Progress since President Barack Obama's inauguration in 2009. Their presence was made known when same-sex marriage started appearing on the ballot, at City Hall, and before State Supreme Courts. They are the descendants of those that bonded and sold human beings, treated women as second class citizens, segregated society, happily and freely kill the innocent. The reason they support these Anti-Progress and not the freedom sought by the Founders in 1776, is because they the Minority Majority are misinformed and show no signs of intelligence.

The progress of our nation is something that bothers these people so they accept what they are told about legitimate birth certificate of Barack Obama or screaming while spreading the falsehoods of the health care debate. Anti-Progress is fueled by the misinformed and contribute to the explanation why progress takes time.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Now I'm an Unbeliever

The unbeliever is a misleading name, but it is perfect since their mission is unbelievable. Their mission is to show their love of country through protest backed with misinformation. The dispensing of this lack-of-knowledge encourages near-terrorist-like actions at simple town hall meetings. It is fine to disagree and not want to want what the majority voted for in November, but the behavior is not an example of an educated democracy. The United States is just a democracy.

People at these town hall meetings scream and holler fictitious claims with as much passion as a Trekker dressed up as a Klingon warrior at a "Star Trek" convention roaming around spouting Klingonese. These people are believing the misinformation spread and without checking the validity of such outlandish, no medieval-like, claims like the "death panel" spread it further unleashing them on their representative or senator in the Congress.

We the people...can't we be nicer employers to our employees, those representing us nationally? These senators and representatives are getting yelled at about things that aren't part of and should not be part of the health care debate. It's like the hardcore misinformed anti-health carers are reading from a different script than the sane portion of the country. My script has a written by credit with common sense listed.

Those people have the right to free speech, but that speech should not be filled with such hatred and disgust. However they should speak when understanding special interests encourage their spread of the misinformation which rip the political seams of the United States. A respectful opposition to health care, rather than a disrespectful and disgraceful one. This is a discussion on health care and not a debate whether or not the president should send U.S. soldiers, men and women, to invade a country with no threat to our national security.

If you believe the United States is going down the wrong path you have ever right to believe that. When not respectfully protesting, the remedy is at the ballot box. You hate what your senator is doing with health care, then vote him or her out! Same with your representative. But understand that in the last federal election, which was November 4, 2008, the Democratic Party's presidential ticket received 53% of the popular vote, rounding up of course. No landslide. Sure the popular vote means nothing, except gives a percentage representation of the nation's pulse since four years past. The Electoral College, which does mean something, shows a landslide of 67% for then-Senator Barack Obama to Senator John McCain's 32%.

The rounded 53% is important. While George W. Bush did received 50% in 2004 and claimed a mandate and political capital to spend, he was far from it. President Obama has both political capital and more of a mandate than Bush had in either 2000 or 2004. Let the will of the majority play out. The election showed less division, but the health care debate did what misleading a nation to war could not do and that is wake the unbeliever to preach the falsehoods and feed the stereotype of American stupidity.