What Will Make America Great?

I was born in 1945, at the end of WWII, in New Hampshire. My dad lay in a Navy hospital bed in Texas until I was a year old – when I finally met him. I grew up steeped in patriotism. I knew that my country heroically helped stop Nazi and Japanese imperialism and successfully spear-headed the Marshall plan to rebuild Europe. I admired both Republican President Dwight Eisenhower and Democratic President John Kennedy. America to me was the greatest country in the world and a model for others to follow. Now I, like so many of us, have to ask the question:

Is a country great if:

• Three individuals in that country have as much wealth as half the rest of the population? (1)
• Forty million people in that country live at or below the official poverty rate? (2)
• The country claims to be a democracy but nobody can run for national public office without raising a fortune from rich people and/or corporations?
• Its medical health care systems rank last in the world among countries with similar GDPs per capita? (3)
• More than 50% of its discretionary budget goes to the military – much of it for outdated weapons in an age of cybernetics – and it spends about 10 times as much money on the military as its primary rival, Russia (4)?
• Its leaders continually lie to its citizens about extremely important issues (e.g. weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, climate change, immigration, the personalities and policies of leaders in other countries, etc.)?
• It separates children from their parents in prison camps, builds walls to keep out immigrants, and condemns those immigrants as criminals, instead of helping countries develop vibrant economies by reversing trade and corporate policies that have contributed to the economic decline, violence and desperation?
• Sixty of its biggest companies did not pay federal taxes in 2018 despite making billions of dollars in profits (these include Amazon, Netflix, General Motors, IBM, Chevron, Eli Lilly, Delta, Occidental Petroleum, Honeywell, Prudential, Halliburton, Whirlpool and Goodyear)? (5) and . . .

On and on. The questions seem to loom larger every day, and the answers lead to the conclusion that the path of the US after World War II has taken an abrupt turn backwards. This nation, like most of Europe, may be seen as a refuge from the poverty, desperation and brutality of impoverished countries in Africa, the Middle East and Latin America, but the US is no longer respected as a model of greatness. Beyond that, the world no longer idealizes the US as a democracy. The influence of money – legalized corruption – in the election process has emerged from the closet for all to see.

In today’s atmosphere, it is tough to speak out like this, to admit that our post WWII experiment has failed. Many of our politicians accuse people who say such things or ask questions like those above of being unpatriotic. However, any student of history knows that the opposite is true. A real patriot has the responsibility – the mandate – to ask the tough questions. Only by asking them, being willing to honestly hear the answers and using those answers to formulate plans and policies for change, can we return to the path to greatness.

When I speak of such matters at public forums, I sometimes hear responses like “the US may not be perfect, but it’s the best there is” or “we’re a lot better than Russia and China.”  Such responses are a cop out. They do nothing to improve the situation. Ultimately, they are self-defeating. None of this is about comparisons. It is about the US. It is about greatness. It is about answering the question: What will make America great?

If we truly want to be a great nation then we must stop denying our shortcomings, cease to blame the Russians, Chinese, immigrants, and any “others” who conveniently enter our sights, and we must buckle down to the job of serving as a model for the world. We must get back onto the path of environmental sustainability, social justice, compassion, and economic wellbeing for all; we must carry the torch down that path. Only by leading the way will we make America great.

1. https://www.forbes.com/sites/noahkirsch/2017/11/09/the-3-richest-americans-hold-more-wealth-than-bottom-50-of-country-study-finds/#2ee8d0a33cf8
2. https://poverty.ucdavis.edu/faq/what-current-poverty-rate-united-states
3. https://www.internationalinsurance.com/health/systems/
4. https://www.nationalpriorities.org/campaigns/military-spending-united-states/; https://armedforces.eu/compare/country_USA_vs_Russia
5. https://www.democracynow.org/2019/4/12/headlines/report_amazon_netflix_ibm_chevron_paid_no_federal_taxes_in_2018_despite_billions_in_profits