This year I considered doing a post like the past, but I didn't have the drive. Something was wrong. Is America still our ally? Sure, and we are theirs. Do I feel like I can go to visit as easily as before? No, I don't anymore, in fact the idea scares me, and simultaneously makes me angry, because there are people very dear to me there I want to visit. See link at bottom, for my previous post on the issue.
The reason I can't write a happy piece on America anymore, is how I see it tragically broken into warring factions, my US friends fighting with my other US friends. Sometimes I see both sides. Issues of morality have that effect, every individual needs to take their own stand, either for, or against an outcome based on their own consciences.
Yesterday, while researching for another post, I came across this cover by Lily Allen, that is just so sad. She's not American. The song and the clip illustrates so mournfully, how watching things there affects the rest of us. I'm not tired of America itself, but of the terrible hurt I see going on there.
My friends could be friends with each other if it were not for Donald Trump. That I know for sure, I saw it happening, the anger they were expressing to me privately, the divisions gradually widening. There were people who wouldn't speak to me much, because I was friends with one or the other. They are people I respect and want to know.
We around the world are seeing it happen online and on our TV screens, and newspapers. Hate. Americans hating each other. Do we have similar issues and divisions? Sure, but we don't have Donald Trump. I don't see him trying to extinguish the hate.
Where does hate end up? Rwanda. Serbia/Kosovo. Nazi occupied Poland.
I think some Republicans need to grow compassion, and understand that according to Jesus' teaching, the different, poor and disabled are our brothers and sisters. You can't take it with you when you die. Prosperity theology is a load of bunk, made up by telly evangelists who got very rich, as Jesus representatives should never be, and were embarrassed about it. Trickle down economics doesnt work without a decent minimum wage. Mostly it stays at the top. You won't get better law and order if starving people and sick peoples' relatives are stealing TVs from your living rooms. If someone has been living in your country for many years and isn't a criminal, then leave them be.
Also, bombing someone overseas might make them bomb you back, drop toxins in your dams, or hack into your electricity supply. If you poison the air, water, and earth, you will end up with an uninhabitable wasteland, duh.
I think some Democrats need to understand that it's fine to preach tolerance for religious, racial and s@xual diversity, as long as you include the rights of Christians , white people and heterosexuals in that mix. Unlimited immigration is unsustainable. Old white men are feeling pretty insulted now, and a whole class of people have been called deplorable. Would you like that if that were you? If someone doesn't want to do something for religious reasons, get someone else, duh, don't sue them, and put them out of business, starving their dependents. Suing wasn't invented for wedding cakes. It was invented for lifelong injuries and similar. You can't change people's religious views by force. Hearts change when they are loved. Lastly, you can't have peace in war torn countries without imposing law and order first. Someone has to do that, and someone has to pay for it.
Extreme right, you have to share your toys, or no one will like you. Stop killing that frog. Extreme left, Mummy isn't going to give you access to the toys if you're having a temper tantrum. You burned that flag, go to your room. Children, learn to play nicely together.
I think both sides need to listen to those in the moderate middle, for example like me, who is a Catholic, and simultaneously a Green. (There are alot of us. ) We here in no man's land are saying STOP ABUSING EACH OTHER!!!!
Hopefully I can post Whitney Houston singing the Star Spangled Banner next year, because things will hopefully have settled down in the Great US of A, and my friends will all be speaking to each other again.
