Saturday Morning Musings

                                                                   

One day, many years ago, my creator mixed up a batch of Swedish, German, Irish and Cherokee Indian...and made me. And I was so fortunate to have been born in America where I could breathe free and dream big. I was free to choose my bride and raise my children in a land that gave them the freedom to dream big too. 

I have a warm home, enough to eat, the freedom to choose my religion and my church, and believe in God or not. I can go to the sink and run myself a glass of clean water to drink and I know that my food supply is cleaner than anyplace else on earth. If I wish, I can get up this morning and drive down to a lovely park; to take a walk, to listen to the birds sing, or just sit on a park bench and rest. 

But sometimes I wake up in the morning and I seem to be all "nerve endings". It's like my antenna has been raised and all of a sudden I can pick up the vibrations of a world full of misery. I know that 3,000 little children will die today simply because they don't have clean drinking water. 

Another 10,000 will die from a communicable disease that could have been prevented with a minimally healthy diet and a vaccine. There are 6.5 billion people living on the earth and half of them will go to bed hungry tonight. Before the clock strikes midnight tonight 10,000 people around the world will have died by violence. 

Unlike the atheist and agnostic, I do not place the blame on God..not even for one minute. God gives us the tools and talents to build a better world and, if we fail, we own that failure. I can't even question the death of innocent little children, or innocents anywhere; who am I to judge whether this world is better than the next? What does man do with all those God given tools and talents? 

Well many do good, many hearts are tender and loving. But, just in the last century, man's wars have killed at least 75 million people! If you can't get your head around the idea of 75 million war victims, narrow it down to just the children! Or if that is too difficult, just imagine those 3,000 children who will die today for want of a clean cup of water. 

And yet, today, there are millions of Americans who cry poverty, even as they enjoy clean water, an abundant array of government benefits, who cry poverty even as they drive a late model car and entertain themselves with gaming systems and big screen television and type gibberish in text code on their smart phones! Fifty years ago 80% of America lived in homes that weren't air conditioned and now if the poorest are without it, some relief agency will come in and install it and subsidize your electric bill to run it! 

And rather than being grateful an impressive number of Americans cry and moan over their lot. Some cry racism in a country that is the finest on earth for accepting diversity! In Africa this week they were killing their enemies, then cooking and eating them for God's sake! 

And we have jobs that go begging because some business is not hiring Gender Studies or Psychology or Women's Studies graduates. Those studies won't get you a welding job, or a manufacturing job, or entry into a science lab or internship in a hospital! And many more are not even seeking jobs...a warm blanket of government benefits has proven more profitable than a job!

And no one seems to realize that our heard working ancestors built this country, and this wealth, by the sweat of their brow and on the strengths of their backs. And we have now spent their inheritance and now live off of a huge government credit card with no spending limits!

Sadly, we have ventured far from the Republic our founding fathers established for us. They pledged their lives to winning us a freedom that has never existed ever on earth before. They wrote a Constitution that for the first time deemed a citizen's rights to be god-given and not guided by the generosity of government. They declared that we all have the same opportunity to achieve happiness but did not guarantee it...that should depend on our own individual efforts. 

During the early days of this Republic America faced enormous struggles. But our creator blessed us because we blessed him. He performed miracle after miracle to bring this nation to life, to bring our freedom to fruition. Perhaps, on July 4th, 1826, God sent us a great message, a warm hand on our shoulder. That was the day that both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson passed on, only hours apart. Perhaps he was letting us know back then that we had done well and would do even better in the coming centuries if we would only continue to embrace Him and the divine document that he inspired.

Our children are not dying by 3,000 per day. Few in America are hungry. But our minds and hearts are being poisoned by sloth and lack of purpose and an abandonment of the principles that caused this country to grow and prosper like none other in the history of man.

God Save America....the last best hope for man on earth.