It’s late Tuesday night here in Beverly Hills. The air is thick with humidity. I feel as if I could reach out and grab the air.
The news is all about a hurricane that was supposedly brewing in the Baja Bay. It’s over now — it’s a rara avis that sends a hurricane to us in August, but then so much of life lately has been strange. In decades past we worried about the Russian communists and their plans for world domination.
Now, we worry, if we think at all, about made-up “collusion” conspiracies that the Reds have made with Donald Trump. Of course, they are all complete fantasies. But that’s how elections are won and lost these days.
We worry — again, if we think at all — about a complete hoax: a supposed worldwide conspiracy against men and women of color by conservatives and commentators.
Of course, it’s all fantasy. But, again, that’s how the world runs today. How can Donald Trump, just as a human being, bear to face each day new complete lies about him? He was a fine president. He brought peace to parts of the Middle East that no one thought could ever be reconciled.
He gave a new spirit to America: that instead of being ashamed of our nation, we should — and must — be proud of the greatest nation that has ever existed on earth.
The USA — a nation that runs by what the people want, and not by what a small, violent clique want.
America got to be the most powerful, richest nation on the earth not by its Army but by following the will and the desires of the people. Our Constitution is about what is in the hearts of Americans. Power does not grow from the barrel of a gun, as Mao said. It grows from love and respect for our fellow humans, and from allowing them to do their best work for each other.
America was founded as a part-slave, part-free state, as most of the Western Hemisphere was. This was thoroughly evil, disgustingly evil. But we as a nation fought each other with horrible bloodshed, pro-slave versus anti-slave, to create a free country. This had never been done before: the master race killing each other to free men and women of a different race who had no rights.
It took a horrible war, and more than a century of dreadful cruelty to blacks, to put this legacy behind us. But it’s behind us now.
And America was, starting in the mid-sixties, a colorblind nation in large measure. We had the best and the brightest working for a better nation, regardless of their skin color.
These were the glory days of our nation. Then something evil happened: Politicians realized they could win elections by backsliding into racism. They told black people they were victims. Always had been. Always would be. Tragically, this won elections for Democrats. It got us terrible government and, in part, an end to free speech and free elections. We are seeing it right now; it’s called “woke politics.” What it means is: “Racism makes money and racism wins elections.”
It’s evil and it’s got to stop if we are to realize the greatness that is America. It’s time to start — and dear God, let it start with me.
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Author: Ben Stein
