Can We Still Believe in America?

A Saturday Prompt

(Photo by Hue Chee Kong via Getty Images)

I’ve heard from a number of people over the last few days that they just couldn’t celebrate the 4th of July. I get it: We don’t have to look farther than the big ugly bill that the Republicans just passed and Donald Trump signed, an immoral piece of legislation that will cause widespread pain to make the rich richer and turn the country we love into an increasingly unrecognizable police state.

Every Republican who voted for it told us that—in order to prove their obedience to Trump—it’s OK to strip away health coverage from over 15 million Americans and cut food assistance for over 40 million Americans (including 16 million children and 8 million seniors). It’s clearly just fine to provide trillions in tax cuts to the wealthiest among us and spend over $100 billion to expand and accelerate the rounding up, detention and deportation of immigrants. This rushed-through bill vividly portrays that Trump’s America is a tyrannical place defined by cruelty and hate, where the party in power actively legislates the expansion of pain and suffering, violence and death in order to appease their vengeful despot and further enrich those who need it least. (How did Trump spend the 4th? Telling Iowans how much he hates Democrats.)

I get it. Oh, do I get it, even though every Democrat rejected this latest abomination and its fundamental indecency. There’s a reason why I urged thinking of July 4th not as a celebration of American independence but rather as a day to honor our founders’ declaration of resistance against a mad king that took years of fighting to overcome (“Independence Day is Resistance Day”). Our time is more than a dark chapter proving that history rhymes; it’s a five-alarm fire that demands all of us struggling to recognize our country to both remember what we cherished and employ all the tools that will bring this hateful period to its conclusion. As Abraham Lincoln put it in 1859 before his election, “We…the people—the people— are the rightful masters of both Congresses, and courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert it.”

That means speaking out, rattling the cage of those in power, voting and protesting in massive numbers. It means ensuring that you don’t lose sight of what you value about America as this fascistic regime works aggressively to degrade our capacity to know what’s right and wrong and aims to increase our indifference about the inhumanity and destruction they’re causing. The words of poet Emma Lazarus inscribed on the base of the Statue of Liberty—“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”—may seem quaint and unreal right now. But if you feel heartbreak or outrage or any emotion in between, that means you still believe in America as a place that offers and seeks a better future.

So what do you think? Can we still believe in America? Or has the Trump regime and his party convinced you that American democracy dedicated to the pursuit of equality and justice is irreparably damaged? Perhaps you’d like to talk about your experience of July 4 this year, be it uplifting or mournful. Perhaps you’d like to share your thoughts about what values and principles of America mean the most to you. Maybe you want to describe your surprise at the speed of the regime’s dismantling. Maybe you’d like to share the ways in which you or those you know have decided to participate in the resistance. All of this, I believe, is part of how we continue to take strength from our community to traverse this dispiriting chapter and overcome it.

As always, I look forward to reading your observations and the opportunity for this community to learn from each other. Please do be respectful in your remarks. Trolling will not be tolerated.

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