Let us banish forever from the lexicon of America phrases such as scandals of wounded troops, preventable deaths of American heroes, torture memos and metaphors about mushroom clouds designed to create fear and terror in our good, great and brave nation.
Let freedom ring.
As Thomas Paine wrote in his time, it is within our power to remake the world, if we mobilize the armies of the progressive internet, the progressive airwaves, the progressive media, the progressive grassroots, the progressive arts, the progressive journals, the progressive stars of screen and song and theater and sports, the progressives of faith and progressives of hope, the progressives who dream, the progressives who work, the progressives who pray, the progressives who know that we are the heart and soul and spirit of Americanism in its highest and truest form.
We are the heirs of Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, the Sermon on the Mount and the Battle of Midway, the soldiers who give their lives for freedom and the civil rights heroes who gave their lives in the segregated South to bring hope and light to future generations.
What is more American than Springsteen singing Chimes of Freedom at a concert for Amnesty International?
Who is not proud that an American is honored around the world for championing the cause of saving the earth from blindness, pollution and greed?
What is more patriotic than George Clooney making a film against McCarthyism in America and raising his voice to banish forever the genocide that still poisons the world?
What is more noble than JAG officers wearing the uniform of every branch of the military services, defying those of lesser Americanism who would destroy their careers, as they join human rights advocates, civil libertarians and civilized people everywhere rising against torture that violates the cardinal values of America and the two hundred year tradition of American military history championed by our greatest leader who crossed the Delaware at the head of the Continental Army?
It is time for progressives to mobilize, organize and fully understand that we speak for the aspirations of the vast majority of Americans and the vast majority of citizens throughout the world who believe in democracy, justice and freedom.
We should end the defensiveness and the depression of the present, and begin a new boldness and confidence based on the power of our numbers, the truth of our ideas, and the reality that a dark era is coming to an end and a new era will soon be born again in the country that is forever young.
We should champion a great America of progressive patriotism, and we will begin a new era of patriotic renewal, rejuvenation and reform for the great spirit that was Born In The U.S.A.
1 | 2
