Has America surrendered?
Many are wondering at the meaning of the faded American flags mysteriously hung over the Brooklyn bridge overnight. White flags, which are symbols of surrender, flew from poles on the stone supports atop the famed bridge that connects Brooklyn and Manhattan over the East River. Authorities have yet to determine who did it or why.
The pale flags raise an interesting question in my mind, have we given up on America and her dream?
This imperfect country has been on the ropes before. She was nearly still born. The mighty United Kingdom snickered at America’s so-called Declaration of Independence with its lofty ideals and grandiose notion that all men are created equal.
The perseverance and heart of George Washington looked foolish in Delaware with little provision and barely clothed soldiers. It was grit, bravery and the hand of God that allowed victory to rise from such conditions.
The frontier of the American west did little to slow down her intrepid settlers. Santa Anna found out the hard way that Americans do not go down quietly into the night as he faced a rag-tag resistance at the Alamo, I hope we still remember.
The imperial armies of Japan and the goose stepping Blitzkrieg of Hitler’s Third Reich were no match for the American melting pot of various peoples who trudged though hell and more to set the captives free. America did not back down from the beaches of Normandy or the Baton death march, both Japan and Germany were soundly defeated and then given their countries back.
But has American now surrendered?
Even as brave Americans fought for freedom in Korea and Vietnam she endured spineless politicians and leaders tying her hands and limiting the will to fight. Good people believed the lies that allowed colleges and churches to be filled with the godless and the unpatriotic. Soon, primary and secondary education shifted from education to lawless propaganda, and America began to change.
It was about 40 years ago when Old Glory first appeared pale, America did not behave like America. She had endured Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society”, Richard Nixon’s criminal behavior and that peanut farmer, Jimmy Carter’s weakness and it appeared as if America’s best days were behind us.
Then something amazing happened. The United States of America tried something old or rather something timeless. She fought back. It wasn’t that Ronald Reagan was an incredible president, we misunderstand that. No, America remembered what was good about being America and found someone to say it.
He voiced American values. Values such as hard work, innovation and that there is evil in the world and we must face it head on. He did not think it too big a thing to win the cold war. He did not think it was too difficult to have a booming economy. Neither did we.
..I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don’t know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That’s how I saw it and see it still…. -Ronald Reagan
Has America surrendered?
Only if we allow ourselves to give in to the evil we face. Once again we have a president that does not believe that America was meant to be that shinning city on a hill. He represents those who want America to sit down and shut up and let the nations of the world handle these problems. He would fundamentally transform America into the image of a godless and hopeless nation. Open the borders to allow the transformation to accelerate.
We don’t need to surrender. We still have the heart of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, William Travis, Douglas MacArthur and Ronald Reagan. It was not the men that made the country as much as it was the country that made the men. It is time to gird ourselves up and echo the battle cry of those that came before.
“Give me Liberty or give me death.”