"What's this!? You unpatriotic, Communist Socialist Muslim fascist! HOW DARE YOU!"
Roughly 240 years ago, a group of extremely intelligent and nearly selfless politicians (oxymoron, I know) drafted a series of documents, fought a long and difficult campaign against an avaricious king across the Atlantic, and successfully created the most amazing social experiment the world had ever seen. To this day, America is the only state to have freed both itself and its people from tyranny through bloodshed and to have prospered long afterward (even though I do not consider it a "revolution" by the proper definition, as the king of England at the time still sat in his ruinous throne after he left us alone).
But here's where trouble starts. The truth is, the common people during the time of the War for Independence and for a long time afterward, were the most feeble-minded sheep to ever wander the Earth. In fact, compared to the rest of the population at the time, Pat Robertson would have been inducted into MENSA.
When the Founding Fathers were busy drafting a decidedly secular system of government, the rest of the population were sitting in church listening to preachers paint the political struggle as apocalyptic in nature, about how we were New Israel.
Consider that we were the last developing democracy to abolish slavery, and we had a huge fight over it, one which continues to haunt us today. The French and the English both have had civil wars, and I'm quite certain the lines that divided them then have long since faded away, while in America, the Confederate flag--one that is both treasonous and inherently xenophobic in nature--is still flown proudly behind misplaced cries of patriotism.
Stupidity and ignorance is burned into our blood as Americans. Nowhere else on Earth, except for Uganda and maybe Russia, is religion so misused in our present age. In fact, only in the United States among all other developing democracies, homosexuality, abortion, and evolution are still hot-button issues. We rank among the bottom in such areas as:
Scientific literacy, effectiveness of education, effective use of resources, xenophobia (intolerance), and healthcare1.
Our political landscape is extremely unhealthy, and is an excellent illustration of the kind of stupidity America exudes on a regular basis. Yes, in the 1800s, we also had political slander, but nowhere near the kind of violent vitriol defecated out of our televisions today. And you know who I'm talking about.
The problem is--where America truly shows her gross ignorance and vulnerability to demagoguery--that people actually believe the stupidity that they hear. People come to believe that our President--to whom one would think, as the cornerstone of conservative ideology, they must swear their allegiance--was not born in the United States, and is working against the interests of the United States. Worse, there are elected officials who have actually endorsed anti-government violence. Granted, not everyone believes this, but the minority is still significant.
The talk of patriotism we see today is complete and utter garbage. A Marine Corps veteran who wants to close the VA hospitals because they are socialist in nature wraps himself in the American flag while trying to say that people who think differently from him should be killed indiscriminately2. Other so-called patriots seek to vindicate Joseph McCarthy, who was a figure that so damaged everything we supposedly stand for and is representative of the closest we've ever come to totalitarianism. Other figures seek to create a kind of tribalist electorate--a utopian "Real America" with Free-Market, Christian principles (no I will not explain the disparity between the two), and a "Fake America" consisting of slightly more egalitarian and secular values.
I want to like America, I really do. We have good as well as bad, but the bad is always louder. We have one Edward R Murrow for every 4 Rush Limbaughs, and the people we put in the legislature--nearly all of them--are of the most uneducated, avaricious, irresponsible, and xenophobic sort, regardless of party affiliation.
But maybe, just maybe, the fact that we can last 240+ years even as we're being dominated by The Stupid all the while is a testament to the resilience of the foundations devised all those years ago. America isn't great because we do great things--we rarely do good things these days, look at how long it took to pass healthcare reform, and even that was so watered down by fearmongerers that it's next to worthless--but because we still exist despite the kinds of people who participate. The Christian Right, one would think, would have established The Republic of Gilead at least 30 years ago, and all of the homosexuals and heathens would have been summarily executed, and women subjugated once again. But Jerry Falwell is dead, and our Constitution still stands. Not "Long Live America," but rather, "Long Live The Constitution!"
Which brings me to another point about these people, though that should have been my final paragraph. If they actually knew what the Constitution really says, they wouldn't be arguing for Christian theocratic governance, or complaining about healthcare, and it would be sufficiently proven that George W. Bush is the worst President we've ever had. The Onion wrote a story about a man who defends what he thinks the Constitution is3. The Onion? Satire? Sometimes I'm not so sure.
So Patriots! You can take your loud and pompous patriotism and eat it. For if to decry that the President is treasonous, and to believe that we are founded on a Christian theocratic system (see Treaty of Tripoli and the First Amendment) is patriotic, then I hereby declare that I am the most Unamerican insurgent who has ever lived. Happy Independence Day, Glenn Beck!
1) http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/EP07398441_c.pdf
2) http://www.dlayphoto.com/post/548021091/this-teabagger-wants-to-close-the-va-hospital
3) http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-passionate-defender-of-what-he-imagines-c,2849/
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