Patriotism
I consider myself a patriot. Not in the sense the right-wingers want us to think it. I do not wear American Flag pins, I don’t blindly follow the President, and I don’t see America as flawless. I am a Patriot by the true American sense, by the founding fathers sense. I believe in the rule of law and that the Government rules under the law, not above it. I believe in rationality guiding our decisions. I believe in supporting countries who share our principles of rule by the people under the law. I think Jefferson’s advocacy of continuing revolution was correct and I believe the American culture should be a protest culture as loud as the Pakistani or Korean protest cultures. I believe that Americans should be free to make choices about their own lives as long as it doesn’t harm others. I see the Christian conservatives as neither good Christians nor conservatives. They betray the message of love and brotherhood, the claim that God does make mistakes, and they reject the notion of Free Will. Conversely, the left-wing is too quick to make the logical error of believing that lack of proof is disproof and often approach easily solved problems through sound economic reasoning with hand-tying regulation. Not that I am a Libertarian either, they make the same error as the Communists by substituting common sense and rationality for wishful thinking about the supreme goodness of man. This again places me in the same position as the Founding Fathers, I am suspicious of extremism and factionalism. I am proud to be an American, I believe that we have found one of the least bad forms of Government and that we can and should improve on our system through rational introspection and not blind extremism.
Filed under: General on July 22nd, 2008 | No Comments »
