Jokes and seasonal rants aside, when you live far away from relatives, or most of them are gone, I think Christmas abandonment tends to happen. But this year I am telling my wife, Millie, AND Santa, I DO want something for Christmas…
Any measurement other than “ALL” is no more than a demand for a one party dictatorship with, at best, a two party façade.
I want my country back.
I want YOUR country back.
I want all citizen’s country back.
A country where, like we used to, our representatives discussed important issues. A country where they do what they must to pass important bills. A country where bills and appointees aren’t held hostage because they were proposed by a member of some politically incorrect party. I want the country back to where we can discuss important issues with civility, like they did in my High School classes in the 60’s. And that was during a volatile, contentious time: Vietnam. Most people, left and right, had the understanding that pouring blood over records, bombing defense contractors, shooting protesters: even if they threw rocks, WAS WRONG. They didn’t try to claim it was only the other side that did these things. They didn’t claim shooting Kent State students was all a lie, they were kissing them or hugging them instead.
If Kent State happened these days I suspect a claim would be made they shot themselves.
I want a country back where Barry Goldwater and the Buckley brothers could go to Richard Nixon and tell him he needed to resign. If you believed that demand to resign should have applied to Bill Clinton too, I don’t agree, but I understand. Certainly doing it is the prerogative of those who think they should. Joe Lieberman’s, Barry’s, the Buckley’s reaction to what a president had done? Within their rights, and a sign of a healthy nation. No politician should have to be “loyal” to their president or their party’s every position. We have a right to be the individuals we are. We shouldn’t have to be politically correct robots.
A country less eager to defend indefensible behavior would be a good thing. A country eager to find ANYTHING to bring down politically inconvenient people: bad.
It took a LOT before Nixon went down, and both sides resisted doing it at first. Now seems we go into a new administration ready to impeach even before it starts, or ready to defend no matter what. I think our John McCains, our Joe Mansions, our Jacob Javits’, our Lynne Cheneys, were and are a good sign, a healthy sign. I often don’t agree, but that’s OK too. Punishing people for not agreeing: the antithesis of a free country.
We have so much less of this now. We have dangerous competitions to say the next even more outrageous thing. We have gone from challenging elections at most up to the Supreme Court, not finishing a recount, to attempts to hang a VP deemed “disloyal” and constant recounts.
I want a country where NO party gets to decide if votes shouldn’t count. I want a country where the reaction to losing an election: no matter how wrong, how rigged you think it is, is to move on and try to fix what one thinks is broken: remembering the other side has a right to try to do that too.
Anything else would not be a Republic where all citizens can vote on who represents us. That, at best, would be an autocracy,
Do you want to live in that kind of country? I don’t.
I WANT OUR COUNTRY BACK.
Not yours.
Not mine.
OURS.
THAT’S what I want for Christmas.
I know it’s a big wish. Maybe Santa has elves who can help? Millie, I know it’s probably not in our budget.
Maybe there are some good souls out there who can help?
-30-
Inspection is a column that has been written by Ken Carman for over 40 years, first published in fall of 1972. Inspection is dedicated to looking at odd angles, under all the rocks, and into the unseen cracks and crevasses, that constitute the issues and philosophical constructs of our day: places few think, or even dare, to venture.
©Copyright 2021
Ken Carman and Cartenual Productions
all rights reserved