The observations of Alexis de Tocqueville with regard to the way individual American's think remain as accurate today as in the early 19th century. He wrote:
"The Americans have no philosophical school of their own; and they care but little for all the schools into which Europe is divided, the very names of which are scarcely known to them. Nevertheless it is easy to perceive that almost all the inhabitants of the United States conduct their understanding in the same manner, and govern it by the same rules; that is to say, that without ever having taken the trouble to define the rules of a philosophical method, they are in possession of one, common to the whole people. To evade the bondage of system and habit, of family maxims, class opinions, and, in some degree, of national prejudices; to accept tradition only as a means of information, and existing facts only as a lesson used in doing otherwise, and doing better; to seek the reason of things for one's self, and in one's self alone; to tend to results without being bound to means, and to aim at the substance through the form;-such are the principal characteristics of what I shall call the philosophical method of the Americans. But if I go further, and if I seek amongst these characteristics that which predominates over and includes almost all the rest, I discover that in most of the operations of the mind, each American appeals to the individual exercise of his own understanding alone."
The power to reason and the power to imagine are man's greatest assets. But the world is vast. We are all raised with prejudices that must be recognized and neutralized if we are to make meaningful changes to the republic. That may sound tame, but it all depends on how we define 'meaningful'. I speak for myself personally when I say that I have lost ALL faith in the ability of the current political/economic system to effect meaningful change. I speak for this blog, Just the Tipp, when I say that we are personally committed to a re-thinking of the American system, and a complete overthrow of its current stewards. Jesus is said to have asked, in the gospel of St. Matthew:
"Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you, That he shall make him ruler over all his goods. But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; And shall begin to smite his fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
American's must again come to understand that WE are that lord. Our politicians do not act as if they believe in our power anymore. Our substance, our labor in the form of taxes, and the blood of our youth are being spent so that our leaders and the entrenched institutions of the republic can eat and drink with the drunken. It is time to begin to exercise our rightful power of ownership, and to put these stewards in their places. It will not be easy.
The subject is controversial and inexhaustible so it must be approached with tact, and it must be approached from specific angles. "When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
With a nod toward Just The Tipp Jenkins' recent trip to Chile, we will briefly consider U.S. intervention into Chilean politics as one such cause.
The U.S. spends more than half of all world spending on defense. If all the money spent by every other country in the world on their respective armies were to be combined into one pot, the U.S. pot would be bigger. I am neither condoning nor condemning this. It is simply an astonishing fact. Militarism is entrenched, and no revolution can be effected without the support of the military, at least in part. The actions of our military will only be considered in this blog in terms of the unfaithful stewards who have the power to wield it. I have nothing but sympathy and respect for the individual soldiers who sacrifice their lives, their freedom, and their time with family to serve an idea of America that is paid only an embarrassing lip-service by the wealthy and elite. While I will not try to elucidate that idea now, I will say that the support by the U.S. government for the dictatorship of Pinochet is contradictory to that idea.
Wars are remembered by a people forever. There is no mistaking this. War is such a brutal and ugly thing, so necessarily filled with injustices and horrors that the memory of it is indelibly stamped on the collective memory of a people. Sometimes it is necessary for the defense of the people, from those who would attack us, whether foreign or domestic. This depends of course on our definition of 'attack'. To Be Continued
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