George Washington once wrote, “The establishment of our new Government seemed to be the last great experiment for promoting human happiness.” Judging by the state of our country today, I wonder if Mr. Washington would like to rephrase that.
The country has gone through many periods of strife in my time here: assassinations, recessions, desegregation, inflation, gas crisis, Watergate, hanging chads, the AIDS crisis, 9/11. Maybe it’s the 24-hour news cycle or the immediacy of social media that makes the landscape seem so bleak, but I don’t recall us ever being so divided.
No one in our country seems happy today. The right is angry. The left is despondent. Our nation reminds me of those married couples who try to stay together for “the children” but end up making everyone around them miserable.
Maybe it’s time for a breakup. Yes, I know a few Southern states tried this before and it did not turn out too well. I am thinking about something a little less bloody — like Brexit.
America had a nice run. We won two world wars, gave the world the automobile, nuclear power, the internet, and put men on the moon. But now it just may be time to admit that our country has jumped the shark.
We used to be the beacon of freedom for the world. Now we are the ones with children in cages, paramilitary on the streets of our cities, and being monitored by Amnesty International. We used to oversee other country’s elections. Now they want to monitor ours. We used to be the place people ran to for safety. Now we are the pariahs of the world, our passports unable to take us almost anywhere.
Honestly, would breaking up the United States really be such a bad thing? California could stand alone. They are already the fifth-largest economy in the world. So could Texas, Florida, and New York. We have seen as the federal coronavirus response failed, states already breaking out into groups for survival. That could be the beginning of something that finally makes us happy.
Our current situation leaves us with a feeling of futility as the ground constantly changes beneath our feet. George W. Bush did not like the Kyoto Protocol and pulled us out. Barack Obama believes in climate change and supported the Paris Accord. Donald Trump does not and pulls us out. Joe Biden will make us reverse course and support it again. The next Republican will most likely pull us back out again. Is this any way to run a government?
https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/america-divided-split-different-nations-20200918.html
The Republi-cons are an albatross around the neck of Democracy and progress. They are dragging us back to pre-Revolutionary War monarchy days. They are a minority party ruling the majority. Time to go our separate ways.