Proud to be an American

Political discussions both anger and sicken me. Much like religion, politics require that one surrender any shred of reason one might possess, in exchange for moronic flag-waving and histrionic performances. Speciousness may not be a necessity, but it sure helps. Try as he might, however, this anarchist finds himself unable to keep quiet for long, especially given the current climate.

Assaults directed toward my ears and my intelligence demand my immediate attention almost every day. One such assault occurs when a blue-pill robot claims it is “Proud to be an American.” What does that mean? What is this person so proud of?

What, exactly, is an American? Does being an American mean you reside somewhere between the Atlantic and Pacific, north of Mexico and south of Canada? If it means something more, I’d like to know just what.

There are those who would claim, in their didactic tones, that being an American means adhering to a certain code of ethics, honoring those who fought and died in combat to make us free. When pressed for specifics regarding the code of ethics, they vomit the crap they were fed in school, and are being fed today by the media. Honor, bravery, courage, blah, blah, blah. Doesn’t every country claim such a code?

As far as honoring the war dead, let’s look at the first hostile Caucasian deaths on this continent.

Personally, I’m proud that England, France, and Spain slaughtered and enslaved the indigenous people of North America. I mean, what could those people possibly have offered the world? They couldn’t even speak our language. How dare they try and deny us America the Beautiful!

Of course, the motivation for settling the New World was greed. Pure and simple. I can understand how many people today could be very proud of this. Even though much has changed on this planet since the 15th and 16th centuries, the motivation of the human animal has not.

I don’t mean to preach the same old message about the white man screwing the Indian. In fact, I believe this was inevitable. A prime characteristic of nature is that the strong always devours the weak. Sorry, Geronimo. Should have eaten those Wheaties.

I’m also not suggesting that anybody today be held accountable for these atrocities (although I‘m sure the Bush family is in some way responsible). Nobody I know ever hunted Indians. No Indian I’ve met had to hide from Custer’s search party. Still, is this something we should be proud of?

Should we be more proud that the Southern States had the gumption to secede, or that the Union had the strength to quash their rebellion? Or maybe we should be proud of our leaders of the day for seeing the light, making it illegal to own slaves.

In our search for American Pride, perhaps we should look to WWII. FDR, quite possibly our greatest president, leading us into battle. Who can forget the “Day that will live in infamy” speech? Looking closer, though, we can see the FDR manipulated both the American people and the Japanese. The Japanese were provoked into attacking Pearl Harbor, because Roosevelt cut off their oil supply. He knew exactly when and where they would strike, and the American people were misled. This, by the way is not conspiracy theory bullshit. It’s documented. Do a google search Roosevelt + Pearl Harbor.

So, after we cut through all the myths, what’s left to be proud of? Bush lies, Kerry’s not appreciably different, and everybody on this planet knows our intentions in Iraq are anything but honorable. We want to be proud. We deserve to be proud. In all this, however, where’s the pride?

It must be remembered, that we the people are not the government. We don’t call the shots. In fact, those who seek positions of power are the slimiest of the human population. We all know this. Those who order young men and women to their deaths, ALWAYS do so out of greed, their own and their supporters. Unfortunately, their names are the ones written in the history books. Not the soldiers, not the parents of the fallen. Only the slime.

I truly am proud of this nation. Not the “leaders,” but the people. I’m proud that, even though they were misled, the soldiers of WWII had the guts to do what they did, believing their homeland was under attack. Roosevelt be damned. I’m also proud of the soldiers in Iraq. Not because I believe we belong there. I don’t, and I believe many of the soldiers feel the same as I. Much like Vietnam, most probably don’t know why they’re there. They’re doing what they’ve been trained to do, however, even if the cost is their lives. Gotta respect that.

Then you’ve got everyday people, like my dad, who worked his ass of as a prison guard to feed his family. He hated that place. I can only imagine the kind of abuse he endured. Thanks, Dad.

In regards to pride, it’s important to look beyond what the establishment tells you that you should be proud of. There are millions of things that we Americans do every day that has nothing to do with war, conquest, policies, politicians, or government.

Does this mean that America is the greatest nation on the planet? Not at all. Every nation has people with integrity who work hard, help others, and raise families. Regular people could make this world a wonderful place in which to live. If only we could rid ourselves of our leaders.