Someplace Like America

     It's hard to suppress the upwelling of emotion that rises in my throat, like bile, as I read through the introduction to Dale Maharidge's Someplace Like America. Foremost among those emotions is a burning anger, a hatred, towards the utopian lie of the American dream that I'd been expertly peddled throughout my youth. Even then, as a young child, I was rebellious against the ideologies laid in place by my forefathers. I grew up the only atheist in a family generation that included more than thirty children. In my adolescence I became an avowed democratic socialist. This was another first in a fairly affluent family of capitalists. Today, as I watch the rising tides of despair swell all around me, even in this short reading, I am more than reaffirmed in the decisions that I've made. The flames of capitalism must be extinguished.

      In the two decades I've been alive, I've seen the supreme court declare corporations as personages, and grant them rights to unlimited political contributions. This alone makes me markedly ashamed of my country and it's political institutions. I've seen the introduction of the Patriot act, which was merely the first wisps of snow before the damning avalanche of revocation of personal rights, known as the war on terror. I've seen a young populist president with the momentum of a nation behind him fail utterly, either by choice, or fear, to modify the structures of power that brought the American economy to the precipice of disaster. I've watched the bailout of bankers, investors and hedge fund managers, as families lose their home, their jobs and their futures. I've seen the numbers on the record breaking bonus checks of executives. I've seen the writing on the wall.

     Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

     It's past time for realizations and epiphanies. How far must the teeming masses be pushed backwards into a corner of despair and poverty until we speak up in revolt​? Not in violence, but in peaceful unity against the policies smothering our opportunities. We must wage war, not physical war, but war against the failed ideologies of oppression and striation. Every man, woman and child in this country deserves the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, as we were promised as children. Instead this country has become a privileged dream for the few and a nightmare for the many.

America stands as the final first-world country to institute a policy of socialized healthcare, stands as the last bastion of a deep wrought greed so powerful that even the medical needs of our fellow human beings do not serve as reason enough to separate grubby fingers from coin. This alone proves as a profound exercise of political cartography and a dangerous precedent to leave as acceptable behavior. If we cannot even stand up to save our own blood, skin, muscle and bone; then the future we leave for our children is grim and dark indeed.

     What liberty and democracy we have left as a nation is slipping quickly from our grasp. Here, and now must be the high water mark. We must turn this tide back before we all drown miserably in a tangled mess of flesh and broken pride.