A Growing Divide
Patriotic Americans are at a loss over what to do with fellow countrymen who refuse to listen to reason, take heed of history, or treat other citizens with civility and respect.
Those of us who revere our nation's values, traditions, religion, family life, military, capitalist system, and Constitutionally limited government cannot comprehend why members of the society we share would take on such a defeatist, contrarian, and downright anti-American point of view about this nation. The situation has gotten so dire that one wonders if it is even meaningful to refer to ourselves as a nation.
The steadily growing gap of understanding between patriots and leftists has now become a full-blown rift that threatens to tear America at its seams. It is crucial to understand what the source of our mutual misunderstanding is, and what, if anything, can be done to alleviate it.
But let me be clear: bi-partisanship, or the spirit of cooperation, should not be the American patriot's primary goal; conquering the socialist-rooted ideology that is the source of our mutual enmity should be.
The best way one might best understand the root of America's great divide is to look at the directly oppositional nature of the ideals this nation was founded on and the ideals of the modern left.
The modern left supports nearly all ideas anathema to reason, success, the good, truth, and justice. (see Evan Sayet for more on this). This profoundly corrupted worldview screams of ideological subversion, as America's destroyers are not coming from barbarians at the gates, but from subverters within. One can best appreciate this by taking a thematic look at the left's positions on American politics and culture.
The United States, as carefully designed by its founders and framers of its Constitution, was an undeniably successful experiment. But its success was not due to it being an experiment, its precepts of life, liberty, and property and its republican form of government were crucial aspects of its constitution arrived at after serious historical and philosophical deliberation. The lend that came to be known as America grew from humble beginnings to straddle a continent contested by colonialist powers, and both outlawed the importation of slaves from the outset and abolished the institution within a hundred years. This is not to suggest the nation was without its flaws or its injustices to overcome, but the justice that was accomplished in the long-run, at great cost, owe to the legacy of the founding, and not to any so-called "social justice" movement.
We should note that America's values were undermined by Federalist usurpations almost from the outset. The central banks, the Alien and Sedition Act, and the extra-juridical assertion of Supreme Court authority make it clear that the battle with statism began early in our nation's history, and modern patriots tend to be somewhat late to the party acknowledging this fact. But conservatives are much more advanced in knowing the criticisms of their point of view than the left respectively. Thus we will proceed to critiquing the left.
The Anti-American Ideology of the Modern Left
To appreciate just how far from our founding America has come, and just how anti-American the Democrat Party has become, consider the following.
Anti-American Values
The Democrat Party refuses to view the nation in exceptionalist terms. It promotes multi-culturalism, diversity, and lawless open borders (along with the Republicans, it should be added). President Barack Obama, the party leader, has dismissed the idea of American exceptionalism (the concept) and has been seen on multiple occasions refusing to salute the flag. They thus fracture the shared value system that is the essential cohesive of a free nation.
Anti-American Principles
The Democrat Party, which can now be safely deemed the party of leftists, through its actions and policy positions, stands in direct opposition to freedom, liberty, life, and even equality. Leftists constantly seek to undercut free speech through political correctness and bullying conservatives and libertarians in institutions where they control the rules. They promote every policy that facilitates death, though they stand opposed to individual choice. They are elitists and treat the American citizenry as a whole with disdain.
Anti-American Traditions
Those on the left seek to blur or replace our traditions with their own. They replace the birthdays of Washington and Lincoln with "President's Day," though FDR and Wilson have no right to be mentioned with these widely esteemed presidents (for better or for worse). They transform Christmas into "Happy Holidays" or most tellingly, "X-mas." They introduce pointless holidays like Earth Day and play up the socialist holidays May Day and Labor Day. They have turned the Fourth of July, better known as Independence Day, into local community fireworks shows and not much more.
Anti-American Prosperity
Democrats expand government with sheer abandon when in power, disregarding all dictates of prudence and dignity. They flood the market with countless taxes, constrictive regulations, and unwieldy and self-defeating welfare programs. They are so unabashed in their lust for spending the public treasury that the once "fringe" idea that leftists seek to "overwhelm the system" with debt and by running the monetary printing presses has almost become a mainstream acknowledgment. Ultimately, leftists undermine self-reliance and thus, self-government, which is the only sustainable way freedom can survive in a republic.
Anti-American Religion
Leftists accord religious freedom to nearly every religious sect, except those based in Judaeo-Christianity. If you are Buddhist, Hindu, or Muslim, you are a "protected minority"; but if you are a Christian, you better sit down and shut up. The left takes this attitude despite the tolerant nature of Judaism and Christianity worldwide, according to openly available statistics, and the malevolent nature of (radicalized) Islam.
The left's reaching out towards Islam appears to be a strategic move, inviting in more enemies to help them achieve their anti-American goals. Refusing to criticize Islam for atrocities against women, playing politically correct games with our national security in the wars overseas and the war against terrorists, and even supporting the outrageous building of a mosque at 9/11's ground zero by an anti-American imam are but a few examples of how the left is anti-American in its religious preferences. (But it should be noted that the left may be seeking a rapprochement with Christianity in order to draw on certain anti-capitalist strains in Biblical thought.)
Anti-American Families
The left attacks the American "nuclear" family (one is a bit suspicious of the militant connotation here) from a number of angles: Economically, socially, and politically. Economically, it cannot be emphasized enough that the central bank's devaluation of the currency, and the undercutting of manufacturing and other "manly" jobs from a number of angles (corporate taxes, regulations, illegal immigration), feeds the need for two-income families (along with income taxes), as well as privileging women's work (primarily service jobs) both in the private and public sector. From a politico-economic and a sociological standpoint, this model is unsustainable and indeed, volatile. One must add the the need for a two-income family outsources child-rearing to the oh-so-trustworthy and competent hands of the state.
Anti-American Defense
Leftists are notorious for protesting wars, but seemingly for its own sake. Whether a war is just or unjust, whether the mission is noble or ill-considered, the left is against it. Korea, "the forgotten war," clearly shows the consequences of opposing communism: On one side of the DMZ is misery and immense human suffering, on the other is productivity and increased human happiness. Korea is what Vietnam might have been given a more concerted effort and the backing of all Americans. The Gulf Wars were carried out against a genocidal madman, but as a socialist-cum-Ba'athist, he was the left's kind of madman. Whether it was wise or not to try to nation-build Iraq is a question for another time, since the rationale for such an endeavor is almost quintessentially Wilsonian. The Afghanistan War is a war of self-defense, but to most leftists, it is, as all wars are for the U.S. regardless of merit or results, "imperialist."
Anti-American Politics
The left does not seek a political landscape where ideas are debated openly and honestly, though I don't pretend that politics is inherently conducive to Harvard-debate team style policy-vetting. But the Alinskyite politics-as-war, ends-justify-the-means demonization of any and all ideological opponents of the left makes "going along to get along" increasingly difficult for liberty-loving American who, as Rodney King admonished us, "just want to get along." We have to realize, in light of much more than can be put in the space of a short article, that the left is anti-American in almost every respect. One might see their utopia as a world where the United States did not even exist.
Conclusion
Fortunately for us, although many Americans are ill-informed, miseducated, or both, most are not leftists by ideological disposition. The left's many clients have been incubated in a world of left-wing "mainstream" media that is crumbling. The word is getting out on the leftists' goals, in dribs and drabs, and made plausible by the deteriorating social and economic situation. The failed promises of Obama has made our job easier and we can replenish the American patriot message if we are historically aware and ideologically sound in our views. This is the formula for winning over "the great middle" and vanquishing our anti-American enemy. Our founding fathers would demand no less; and we pray, no more.
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