Truths, Half-truths, and Sea Stories

a tale of three citizens

“A house divided against itself cannot stand.” I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other.” Abraham Lincoln

https://www.goodreads.com

Allen

As you sip a latte at Starbucks, feeling outraged by a President who apparently does not share your social conscience, you wonder how the country has become so brazenly racist and homophobic. While you have not seen any negative impact to your paycheck nor fewer clients to your business, the economy is horribly worse because others are earning significantly more. You did not vote in the Presidential election, though you like what you hear about the new Congress: a Muslim woman and a Green social media-savvy gadfly. When not supporting gender-equality pastry shops, you purchase organic, locally-grown produce at Trader Joe’s. You buy Emerging Markets coffee beans online from a group that supports Guatemalan children. And you truly believe your Tesla, Prius, or Audi lessens your carbon footprint.

Yrena

As an immigrant who saved up the required fees, filed for the visas and immigration forms, and emigrated to her new country according to the laws and practices of each nation, you are diligently working to learn the language, customs and history of your new home. You know your ethnic community in the area you have settled have members – family and extended family perhaps- who live in violation of the law. Some overstayed their student visas, and other came across hiding in a van or in leaky boats that beached one moonless night. You are working two jobs to pay for your daughter to attend community college. She will become the first college-educated member of your family. Your son is learning to be a mechanic after school. When the television, newspapers and the Internet declare that you support wholeheartedly the new ‘migrants’ and see them being pandered to by politicians and journalists, you are conflicted, upset, or angry. And your family are not “hyphen” Americans. You are American.

Cole

As an Iraq War veteran, you do not understand people who hate you sharing your opinions, and do not financially support veteran suicide-prevention projects but pay to hear activists demean America at college campuses. You are irritated by people who do not remember what happened on 9/11 or tell you how the current Administration is working with the Russians. Like your father before you, you are teaching your son or daughter firearm safety and how to hunt for deer, elk, or boar. You may not be religious, yet you assert your rights as parents to approve what they are taught as curriculum. You know when you are being played by b.s. artists in government, the media and education – that was one of the skills learned from military service and especially from time in a war zone. You don’t trust politicians or bureaucrats. Not from any party.

Politics and personal loyalties based on ideology fluctuate over time. Human nature is flawed and subject to the same weaknesses. Politicians acquire power from citizens, and get more corrupt as the citizens get more aloof. Without unity, a house divided cannot stand. And observing all the past civilizations collapsed in the dust of history, the lack of unity of a people accelerate the incoming tide.