I was listening to the radio in my car the other night. As is frequently the case, it was tuned to the right wing talk radio station. For some reason, I can't really listen to music for long stretches. NPR is only on for a few hours and this wasn't one of them. I always want to hear what they are thinking, although some of them drive me crazy.
One yapper's show was starting. I don't know whose, to be honest. It was late at night when I'm not usually listening. He starts his show with a montage of famous American historical quotes. They are things like "Give me liberty or give me death", "All men are created equal", "I have a dream", "Ask not what your country can do for you...", and because he's a right winger, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" and, reserved for last, "We are going to Make America Great Again"
The proximity of the "Make America Great Again" quote to the "Ask not..." quote struck me as interesting. I got to thinking. Donald Trump wants to make America great again, but he never asks anyone to do anything. He doesn't demand anything from Americans. He doesn't call for Americans to work harder. He doesn't call for Americans to strive for excellence. He doesn't ask Americans to make sacrifices. He sure as hell doesn't ask anyone to pay for the cost of whatever it is that will make America great again. He just declares that it will happen.
That's a real contrast to the Kennedy quote. Kennedy was telling people to ask themselves what they could to for their country. He was putting the onus on the citizens to make America great. In another famous quote, he said that we chose to go to the moon and do other things not because they were easy, but because they were hard. He implied that Americans would have to put forward a lot of effort to make it happen.
FDR called on people to show courage and not fear. Kennedy called on people to ask what they could do for their country. I can recall Jimmy Carter asking people to sacrifice to conserve energy. George H. W. Bush called for a volunteer spirit, asking for people to become one of the "thousand points of light".
What have the more recent presidents asked of us? Did Bill Clinton ask people to step up to the challenges? George W. Bush assured us that our military was going to crush the terrorists, but did he ask anything of ordinary Americans? Obama would do all sorts of things for us, but I can't recall him asking us to do anything, and Trump will Make America Great Again, but he doesn't say what we ought to do to make it happen. It sounds like it will be done for us.
Watching documentaries as the 50th anniversary of the moon landing neared, one segment struck me. Some people who had been teenagers during the post Sputnik era recalled how people seemed to take it personally that America needed to catch up and lead the way into space. They talked, without exaggeration, about how they felt it was their patriotic duty to study their math and advance science and technology in whatever way they could. Does that spirit exist today?
Conservatives decry the state of our educational system today, and they take aim at the cult of self esteem, which tells educators to praise students unfailingly for even the slightest accomplishment, or even no accomplishment, but for their effort alone. If the truth be told, they often praise that effort, even when a critical observer might question whether that effort was all that substantial. I cannot count how many times I have heard a speaker after an event for students declare that every one of them did a fantastic job. Really? Isn't anyone below average?
Ironically, a Republican, Donald Trump, seems to embody that spirit better than any recent politician. His self-aggrandizement is legendary, and he encourages others to similarly heap praise on themselves. We are great, apparently, by grace of God, not through our effort, and all we have to do to Make America Great Again is acknowledge our greatness. This is what the cult of self esteem has brought us. A substantial portion of the US electorate was willing to support a man who declared himself the best at everything, and all of the people's problems would go away without labor, effort, or sacrifice, as long as they basked in his glory.
Trump's approach doesn't seem to me like a recipe for greatness. I think to Make America Great Again, or at least to improve its level of greatness, we need something from our people, and especially from our young people who will carry our nation into the future. It won't happen by putting on a magic hat. I don't see anyone, especially Trump, demanding the type of effort that will turn rhetoric into reality..
One yapper's show was starting. I don't know whose, to be honest. It was late at night when I'm not usually listening. He starts his show with a montage of famous American historical quotes. They are things like "Give me liberty or give me death", "All men are created equal", "I have a dream", "Ask not what your country can do for you...", and because he's a right winger, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" and, reserved for last, "We are going to Make America Great Again"
The proximity of the "Make America Great Again" quote to the "Ask not..." quote struck me as interesting. I got to thinking. Donald Trump wants to make America great again, but he never asks anyone to do anything. He doesn't demand anything from Americans. He doesn't call for Americans to work harder. He doesn't call for Americans to strive for excellence. He doesn't ask Americans to make sacrifices. He sure as hell doesn't ask anyone to pay for the cost of whatever it is that will make America great again. He just declares that it will happen.
That's a real contrast to the Kennedy quote. Kennedy was telling people to ask themselves what they could to for their country. He was putting the onus on the citizens to make America great. In another famous quote, he said that we chose to go to the moon and do other things not because they were easy, but because they were hard. He implied that Americans would have to put forward a lot of effort to make it happen.
FDR called on people to show courage and not fear. Kennedy called on people to ask what they could do for their country. I can recall Jimmy Carter asking people to sacrifice to conserve energy. George H. W. Bush called for a volunteer spirit, asking for people to become one of the "thousand points of light".
What have the more recent presidents asked of us? Did Bill Clinton ask people to step up to the challenges? George W. Bush assured us that our military was going to crush the terrorists, but did he ask anything of ordinary Americans? Obama would do all sorts of things for us, but I can't recall him asking us to do anything, and Trump will Make America Great Again, but he doesn't say what we ought to do to make it happen. It sounds like it will be done for us.
Watching documentaries as the 50th anniversary of the moon landing neared, one segment struck me. Some people who had been teenagers during the post Sputnik era recalled how people seemed to take it personally that America needed to catch up and lead the way into space. They talked, without exaggeration, about how they felt it was their patriotic duty to study their math and advance science and technology in whatever way they could. Does that spirit exist today?
Conservatives decry the state of our educational system today, and they take aim at the cult of self esteem, which tells educators to praise students unfailingly for even the slightest accomplishment, or even no accomplishment, but for their effort alone. If the truth be told, they often praise that effort, even when a critical observer might question whether that effort was all that substantial. I cannot count how many times I have heard a speaker after an event for students declare that every one of them did a fantastic job. Really? Isn't anyone below average?
Ironically, a Republican, Donald Trump, seems to embody that spirit better than any recent politician. His self-aggrandizement is legendary, and he encourages others to similarly heap praise on themselves. We are great, apparently, by grace of God, not through our effort, and all we have to do to Make America Great Again is acknowledge our greatness. This is what the cult of self esteem has brought us. A substantial portion of the US electorate was willing to support a man who declared himself the best at everything, and all of the people's problems would go away without labor, effort, or sacrifice, as long as they basked in his glory.
Trump's approach doesn't seem to me like a recipe for greatness. I think to Make America Great Again, or at least to improve its level of greatness, we need something from our people, and especially from our young people who will carry our nation into the future. It won't happen by putting on a magic hat. I don't see anyone, especially Trump, demanding the type of effort that will turn rhetoric into reality..
via International Skeptics Forum https://ift.tt/2YZ0YUo
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire