I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy," or so the saying goes.
I am something of a centrist on many issues, a liberal on a few others, to the right on some. It used to be that once a presidential election was over, most Americans rallied behind the winner, trusting our fellow citizens' majority vote in the Electoral College. There have been times when we have elected crooks, ineffective individuals, or those of low moral character. When I was in the military, I was bound by my oath under the Constitution to support my Commander in Chief and I did so, even if I had reservations about my nation's choice. But even out of the military, I did not actively seek to destroy the efforts of the majority when I hadn't voted for the winner.
Trump's victory in the election really was "too big to rig," and can be properly viewed as a mandate, and even a landslide. But there are those on the far left who are acting as if they'd had a frontal lobotomy. The frontal lobe is the front one third part of the brain and controls thinking, emotions, personality, judgment, self-control, muscles, and memory. A lobotomy is brain surgery that severs the connection between the frontal lobe and the rest of the brain. Haven't the elitists on the left severed themselves from the rest of the country that refuses to bow down to their control, what one incisive individual has described as a political lobotomy?
Today there is a sizable destructive resistance after an election, fueled by the luxury of our wealth. Being the planet's consummate capitalists and the only economy left standing after World War II, we went on a rampage of licentiousness, unfettered by our historic humility and unity (except for the Civil War). Although we were instrumental in rebuilding Europe and Japan (and later China), we were often viewed by the rest of the world as smug, arrogant and imperialistic.
Our world leading capitalism has made us the leading technologists (the world runs on Windows), although the rest of the world is catching up due to our historic unease and discomfort as the world's leader and policeman. This has allowed for the accumulation of an obscene amount of wealth in our country sucked from the rest of the world by a few individuals in unprecedented amounts. And that wealth gives those individuals the power to control our fourth estate (the communication companies), which dictates the data we use to make our votes.
Freedom requires that those who control our communication companies, the fourth estate, be impartial and truly factual, at least to a great extent. That has not been the case for the last several elections. Almost all of the mainstream media has been the mere mouthpiece for one side, but the other side has taken to using the new technologies of communication. I listen to both sides, using old and new technologies, and it is maddening. Both sides claim to "fact check" the other side, so today one has to do one's own "fact checking." But who has the time? Having spent half my adult life as a lawyer and the other half as a public school teacher, I view things with an objective eye, as a judge is supposed to do. What are the facts in a given situation? A judge relies upon each side on an issue to present their version of the facts, and then has to decide which side has the "true" facts. In our latest election, the majority of voting Americans found the "true" facts, the real truth.
But wealth doesn't bring wisdom, and often brings the opposite. In history, a dominant country's downfall comes when its power is concentrated in the few (the frontal lobe of the country) and those few elevate themselves beyond the hoi polloi, becoming fat, lazy and elitist. After a few generations of their progeny being taught by sycophants, their governments usually crumble. For our country to not reach that point today, we have to reform our education system. A good place to start is to analyze what few appropriate parts of the Department of Education (DOE) should be transferred to other Departments (Interior, e.g.) and eliminate the rest, abolishing the DOE, which has been around only since 1980. Education of its citizenry is predominantly a function for the states, historically and properly. For a country to endure, it must train its children to be practical but intellectual, respectful of history but innovative, curious but disciplined, and in the United States that is up to each state. Let us not forget that Biden's Attorney General early in that administration sent a letter to all of the 93 United States District Attorneys nationwide to start "cracking down" on parents who attended their local school boards to voice their First Amendment rights.
Historians are wont to dwell on how civilizations (must inevitably?) decline and die, especially democracies and republics. Greece's representative democracy, starting in Athens, was short-lived, and had to compete with authoritarian governments in other Greek city states. Rome was a republic for a relatively short period of time before it became a dictatorship. There have been, and are now, many civilizations on Earth. Earth viewed from above is a civilization, an often uncivilized one, just so many modern day Greek city states. If you were viewing Earth from a moon colony, it might strike you that it was once two worlds (geographically), Eurasia and the Americas. When Columbus lept off the west side of the Old World to find a shortcut to its east side, he ran into a New World. He might as well have been leaping off into space, and there were those who thought that he was.
In about a year and a half, our country will be celebrating its 250th year of existence. The rest of the (enlightened) world still sees us as the great hope for humankind, even our "mother country/ies." If our country fails, the Earth will enter into another time of "Dark Ages." What steps do we need to take in our country to help humanity survive long enough to get off of this Earth and colonize other space bodies? We are the Columbus of today. We are the ones who are talking about colonizing Mars, and we are the ones who can do it.
If the historians' view that the inevitable decline of governments is accurate, ask yourself, "What can we do now to perpetuate this greatest hope of humankind, our Republic?" Does a quarter of a millennium seem about the right time to check a bloated out of control federal government ? If you agree, or are at least willing to learn more www.conventionofstates.com , consider a convention as envisioned by COS, limited to three objectives- impose fiscal restraints on the federal government, term limits on Congress and federal officials and Limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government. Join us and sign the petition today.
