America has suffered its self delusion for a while now. We tell ourselves we're basically good even when we make mistakes or prove otherwise. Just take a look at the lies of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Or even Afghanistan. We created an entire generation of veterans, disgust, and rage, it came to the capitol on January 6. An entire generation of so many who said “do your own research” but believe only anonymous, or a charlatan.
We’d be Mattie Ross, except she lost an arm in a just cause. Our cause was a lie. It was lies and hubris and self deception that put us in Iraq and Afghanistan. We shouldn’t have been there. Our withdrawal, a culmination of a generation of failure, crushed Biden just out of the gate. He’s the scapegoat. The sins of a generation were laid on him. It was his fault. Covid too. It’s time we face it. We did it to ourselves. America isn’t blessed, it’s damned.
There is a wide range of possibilities between blessed and damned and I know that you were being rhetorical, I do think it is worth considering how readily we seem to fall into the "we run the world." (Did you ever think that "run" when you put "i" into it, is ruin?) I noted a comment in a new release regretting we might not be strong enough to set things right in Korea. I like the expression I learned from a former student, "aint my elephant, aint my circus." We have developed a self-image as indispensable to any successful solution to any serious problem. Let's just play our part with friends and allies and reach out to what appear to be "enemies." As Kennedy said in his inaugural, "United there is little we cannot do in a host of cooperative ventures. Divided there is little we can do--for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder."
And also, "So let us begin anew--remembering on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.
Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems which divide us."
The rage of the Iraq War is part of the American zeitgeist that one candidate tapped into while the other didn't. It's not so much that it divides us but that it is our elephant and we're all in the circus.
Can we even meet other minds? Would that help us reconnect with each other?
https://open.substack.com/pub/heyslick/p/think-like-a-jaguar-speak-like-a?r=4t921
America has suffered its self delusion for a while now. We tell ourselves we're basically good even when we make mistakes or prove otherwise. Just take a look at the lies of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Or even Afghanistan. We created an entire generation of veterans, disgust, and rage, it came to the capitol on January 6. An entire generation of so many who said “do your own research” but believe only anonymous, or a charlatan.
We’d be Mattie Ross, except she lost an arm in a just cause. Our cause was a lie. It was lies and hubris and self deception that put us in Iraq and Afghanistan. We shouldn’t have been there. Our withdrawal, a culmination of a generation of failure, crushed Biden just out of the gate. He’s the scapegoat. The sins of a generation were laid on him. It was his fault. Covid too. It’s time we face it. We did it to ourselves. America isn’t blessed, it’s damned.
There is a wide range of possibilities between blessed and damned and I know that you were being rhetorical, I do think it is worth considering how readily we seem to fall into the "we run the world." (Did you ever think that "run" when you put "i" into it, is ruin?) I noted a comment in a new release regretting we might not be strong enough to set things right in Korea. I like the expression I learned from a former student, "aint my elephant, aint my circus." We have developed a self-image as indispensable to any successful solution to any serious problem. Let's just play our part with friends and allies and reach out to what appear to be "enemies." As Kennedy said in his inaugural, "United there is little we cannot do in a host of cooperative ventures. Divided there is little we can do--for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder."
And also, "So let us begin anew--remembering on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.
Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems which divide us."
The rage of the Iraq War is part of the American zeitgeist that one candidate tapped into while the other didn't. It's not so much that it divides us but that it is our elephant and we're all in the circus.