Only In America…

Only In America…

Is true freedom of speech a celebrated Constitutional Right.  Right?  I hear it’s still true today unless you offend those in power and retribution is not only an action taken but is premeditated and announced.  Never mind that slander appears to be altogether dismissed, it’s pretty evident we’ve elected and appointed more thin-skinned bullies than servant stoic leaders on the left and right sides of the aisle.

Only in America can freedom of speech be tempered…even punished…while the supposed checks and balances of power to ensure the freedom, don’t, won’t or can’t protect the freedom to do so for whatever inexplicable reason.

Only in America can a private health insurance company deny insurance claims in a quarter that same company posted multi-billion dollar profits.  The same company that was forced to acknowledge the existence of a claims process that employs a ‘deny, defend, depose’ strategy and uses third party algorithms to approve and deny claims under contractual agreements that compensate for a percentage of claims ‘saved’.  Read that again and try to reason why we don’t have health care for all.

Only in America is health care an option chosen, including government sponsored options for elderly underwritten by major private industries who receive government subsidies yet can still negotiate with hospital service administrations to set prices, or simply fail to come to agreement and drop health coverage altogether.

Only in America are mass shootings by civilians conducted in elementary schools with no legitimate course of action to follow to mitigate it ever happening again.  Even any ensuing conversation drips into quiet neglect only to be picked up when it happens again.

Only in America is Christianity a truly weaponized religion.  Never pictured a holster on Jesus’ robe, nor did I ever think he taught anything about weaponizing anything that wasn’t attached to tolerance, forgiveness and love.  Christians spewing hate is certainly not a new thing.  It’s just that some Christians in America use their religion as an excuse and celebrate a distorted view of ‘freedom of religion.’  America’s appeal for liberty began with the right to a personally chosen faith without the imposition of another.  Simply, despite references to God, we do not have a national religion…by design.

Only in America is Christianity celebrated in sports arenas while the evangelicals leading their paying sheep are living in multi-million dollar homes with a yacht in the backyard.  Remember Jesus…the savior in the robe and sandals?  Remember he asked his disciples, one of which was recognized as the first spiritual leader of faith in Jesus, to GIVE UP their worldly possessions to spread His word?

Only in America are private education institutions deemed non-profit or tax-exempt while owning massive percentages of real property with no- to limited taxation while in custody of multi-billion dollar endowments earning hundreds of millions, even billions of dollars annually.  Why are their earnings tax exempt?  They don’t serve the public.  They serve their alumni and cry for federal grant money.  The tax exemption on billions of dollars isn’t enough?

Only in America are those same institutions crying about not receiving federal grant money unless they comply with new government edicts/mandates.  I write ‘edicts/mandates’ because I’m not sure these were ever ‘laws’ passed by Congress and am still trying to determine the use of an Executive Order beyond what I always thought the intended use is/was.  And then those same institutions tuck tale and comply, despite their stated principles holding an opposing view of said edict or mandate.  So, were these held-fast institutional principles and beliefs, or a facade.  I maintain the latter.  They got their money, eh?  How are these institutions of higher education and research not viewed as frauds?

Only in America every one of us is from a blood-line of which someone was an immigrant to this country.  Except for the truly indigenous folks who are somehow only well-represented on reservations they are still being pushed into.  Many of which are partnered with non-indigenous private corporations to provide resort entertainment for many us from the immigrant families to entertain ourselves.  True liberty prevailing?

Only in America can you sway an election by financially supporting a candidate with corporate donations or contributions from the filthy rich…in public!  No need to hide millions of dollars of support.  It’s legal.  So…what could be wrong with that?

Only in America is there a Statue of Liberty welcoming with the sonnet, 

“Give me your tired, your poor, 

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

A declaration of the greatest people in the greatest land for sure.  We should try to understand it well.  Even build upon it.  Oh wait…we did!

Only in America, the land of opportunity, where immigrants like Andrew Carnegie produced generations of wealth, not just for themselves but for higher education and the expansion of related industry, is “immigrant” now trumpeted as a threat.

Truth may be that much of this is NOT only in America.  But we were, and are, supposed to be different.  We were, and are, supposed to be great.  We’ve undoubtedly had great moments.  Great highs and great lows.  Lest we never forget, the foundation of our settlement itself can be seen as a low moment.  The indigenous people of this land barely have a voice.  Slavery, though the pillar of our southern economy, was undoubtedly, a low moment.  As is the divisiveness of today, for we are without question in a very low moment.

For only in America, was generational wealth built to the extent and magnitude it was on the displacement (and slaying) of nations of people, slavery and indentured servants and now in lining of pockets of oligarchs, corporate executives and public officials.

Only in America, has freedom - the true liberty of soul - held so much promise and yet in such a short time realized so much hypocrisy.

Only in America…is America still just a great idea.  For outside of the beacon on the hill for which this country stood for, for so many that had been admiring from afar, from so many places elsewhere, the light dims as we snuff out it’s brilliance with spit towards one another.

Only in America…