In Part 1 of this series I asked you to guess what the single greatest threat to the United States of America is and gave you three chances to try and get it right. I also bet you that you would get it wrong.
I even helped you narrow your choices by providing a long list of potential threats that I stated are NOT the single greatest threat to the United States. And I asked you to leave a comment on our Facebook page and let me know what YOU thought the single greatest threat is, and many of you did (thank you). Today you get to find out if you were right or not.
If you haven’t made your three guesses yet, do so now before you read the rest of this post.
Are you ready for it? (Drum roll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . .)
The single greatest threat to the United States of America is:
APATHY!
That's right. The single greatest threat to the United States of America is APATHY!
Are you surprised by the answer? Did you guess correctly? Do you even care? Just kidding—but then, isn’t that what apathy is, anyway?
Webster’s dictionary provides two definitions for Apathy: (1) a lack of feeling or emotion; (2) a lack of interest or concern. It is the second definition that I am referring to – a lack of interest or concern.
While Apathy by itself is completely passive and in a perfect world would cause no harm on its own, we unfortunately live in an imperfect world in which Evil lurks around every corner, and if left unchecked because of Apathy, will take root, grow, and spread and conquer everything in its path.
It is Apathy—apathy on the part of millions upon millions of Americans who, for whatever reason don’t bother to vote; or vote but haven’t bothered to learn anything about the candidates or issues they are voting for; or aren’t engaged in federal, state or local government affairs; or don’t know, or even worse, don’t care about government activities or events that may adversely affect our way of life as long as it isn’t affecting them right now—that is the greatest threat to the United States.
So let me give you a few examples and statistics (I just can’t seem to get away from those darned statistics) of why I believe Apathy is the single greatest threat to the United States of America.
In the 2016 U.S. presidential election, just 55.7% of eligible voters (persons of voting age) participated. When compared to the latest voting records of 31 other developed countries, the United States finished in 26th place (bottom 25%) out of 32 while the top 8 countries (top 25%) had voter participation rates greater than 75%, with Belgium in 1st place with a voter participation rate of 87.2%.
U.S. mid-term (non-presidential election year) elections, such as next week's election, typically see even lower voter participation rates, often below 50%. But it gets even worse. U.S. voter participation rates for state and local elections, especially primary and run-off elections, often drop into the teens, and sometimes into single digits.
For the United States, the country that paved the way for all other developed countries, this is not only embarrassing, it is unacceptable.
In contrast, all of the threats and potential threats I named in Part 1 of this post are constantly engaged, constantly trying to find a weakness in our defenses, constantly trying to impose their ideas and ideals on us, constantly emboldened by our lack of interest and concern—our Apathy. While we bury our heads in the sand, Evil sets up the chopping block and sharpens its axe.
It is our Apathy that is the problem. It is our Apathy that allows these threats to exist, to fester and grow like a cancer on the rights and freedoms that most Americans sadly take for granted. It is our Apathy that is the real threat to our way of life!
So let me ask you a few questions:
Did you vote in the 2016 presidential election?
Did you vote in your state primaries or runoff elections?
Have you ever called, e-mailed or written your U.S. Congressman/woman or US Senator?
Do you know who your US Congressman/woman and U.S. Senator are?
Do you know who the Vice-President of the United States is?
Can you name all nine of the current U.S. Supreme Court Justices? At least three Justices? One Justice?
Do you know who the Speaker of the US House of Representatives is?
Do you know who the Secretary of Education is?
Do you know who the head of the Federal Reserve System is?
Do you know who the Governor of your state is? The Lt. Governor?
Do you know who your State Congressman/woman and State Senator are?
Do you know who your City Councilman/woman is?
Do you know who your County Sheriff is?
Do you know who the members of your local School Board are?
Do you know who the head of your Home Owners Association is?
Now let me ask you a few different questions:
Do you know who the latest winner of “American Idol” is?
Do you know who the latest winner of “The Voice” is?
Do you know who the latest winner of “America’s Got Talent” is?
I could go on and on but I think I've asked enough questions to make my point. You might be surprised to learn that there are many Americans that if asked these questions would answer NO to every question in the first group, but answer YES to all three questions in the second group.
We Americans tend to know a lot about things that interest us but in the grand scheme of things don’t really matter, while we tend to be uninterested in or unconcerned about many of the things that are important and do matter. It is this lack of interest and concern, this Apathy on the part of so many Americans, that frightens me the most.
If you are unhappy with the current state of affairs, if you are concerned about the direction our country is headed, if you are worried about your future and the future of your children and grandchildren, and you are not actively engaged in doing something about it, YOU are part of the problem. YOUR Apathy, along with the Apathy of millions of other Americans, IS the single greatest threat to the United States of America!
Below is a poem I learned in elementary school that hits the nail squarely on the head (pun intended) with respect to Apathy, and simply and succinctly describes how Apathy at its most basic level, how inattention to the smallest of things, can have large and sometimes devastating consequences.
For Want of a Nail
For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
Now that you know what the single greatest threat to the United States of America is, what can you do about it? Read Part 3 of this series on Friday to find out.
P.S Please leave a comment on our Facebook page and let me know if you agree with my assessment of what the single greatest threat to the United States of America is and let me know what YOU think WE can do about it.
