Penny Thoughts: So Now What?

My quasi-retirement seems to have afforded me more time on my hands than I could ever have imagined. Sadly, I believe I have not used that time to good advantage for myself or anyone else. I have watched many more movies with my myriad of streaming services, and I have re-watched many of my favorites… “Tombstone”, “Avatar”, “Dances with Wolves”. I have also binge-watched some of my favorite series as well… “Law and Order”, “Blue Bloods”, Yellowstone”.

But I do not just entertain myself with television. I also watch NewsMax, one of the best Conservative television stations, in my opinion. I watch the early shows to get up on the latest events and the silliness being perpetrated on America by Joe Biden. Between the two television experiences, I have become extremely perplexed with where we are today in our great Nation. We are being deceived by mainstream media. We are constantly being bombarded with news of some new strain of viruses. And we seem to be torn apart politically and morally.

So now what?

Ever since the stolen 2020 Presidential Election, we seem to have been drifting from one extreme National attitude to another. What Biden had promised – to   “unite” the Nation – has been an abysmal failure. We can attribute that to his ineptitude or his cognitive inability. Whatever the reasons, we are a Nation adrift searching for a substantive identity politically and morally. The divisions seem to be widening with each pronouncement coming out of the White House, as well as the folly of legislative points of focus; to wit, the “January 6 Investigation”.

There is no National unity. There is no National direction. There is no National identity. And there is no National purpose.

Thus, we meander back to the initial query: “So now what?”

This interrogatory does not imply another “surprise” on the National front – as with the raid on President Trump’s home – but rather, what are WE to do with all this nonsense which constantly bombards? How are WE to act to try to bring back some sense of National unity and pride. Clearly, it will not come from the White House or the misguided inhabitants  thereof and the Main Stream Media which has surrendered any semblance of objective reporting – and Walter Cronkite and Harry Reasoner are probably turning over in their graves.

So, what are we to do now as citizens of the great American experiment which so many of our ancestors believed in and for which they sacrificed their very lives.  Some on Face Book have merely suggested that we stop watching the “news” on television since it is not really “news” anymore. Perhaps that is one suggestion, but there seems that we can do so much more on a personal level.

I believe we can insist that our schools promote and instill a sense of personal responsibility in reinforcing what our Nation’s history really is, without glossing over the “messy” parts. There must be some sense of National pride left in us Americans. We need to admit that we did not always do it the “right” way. In the Constitutional Convention of 1787, we did not deal with slavery or the women’s right to vote. The Dred Scott decision in 1857 or even the Constitution declaring that slaves were 3/5 of a person are all contradictions to what the founders seemed to profess.

All this may seem to be very pedantic, but I remember that every day school began with the Pledge of Allegiance, a reading from the Old Testament, and the Lord’s Prayer. But since the 1960’s those practices have been declared illegal or have been done away with for some obscure reasons.  And he moral tenor of our Nation has witnessed the consequences.

In order to respect someone or something, there must be a common ground on which we can stand…some common beliefs and some common views must be established so we can begin to communicate and maintain civil discourse.

Those things to which we all try to cling as being part of the principles upon which our Nation was founded must re-emerge in contemporary discourse or the future of America will be in question, and forever will be “now what”.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of The West Alabama Watchman.