'American Exceptionalism' Wasn’t Achieved, Nor Can it be Maintained, from the Fetal Position

If the scales don’t fall from our eyes over a recently expressed liberal view of Americans, there is little hope of  correcting our rapidly accelerating national decline.

“Is Obama so isolated he can’t see that Americans are curled up in a ball, beaten down by a financial crisis, an identity crisis, a political crisis and a leadership crisis?”  (Maureen Dowd, Aug. 20, 2011, emphasis added.)

Americans curled up in a ball?  Really?  Well, “yes,” according to New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.  Left unsaid, but plainly evident, is that she is channeling the collective “progressive” view held by those who surround the current president in this miserably incompetent administration.

But, consider this: if Ms. Dowd were accurate in her observation, does it not follow that hope may well be lost?  No person, no country, can survive when fighting a battle from the fetal position.  The only thing that happens in these situations is the “beaten down” get beaten to a pulp.  And then they succumb or die.

Are Americans, as Dowd also claims, being beaten down by a financial crisis?  In the eyes of a liberal like Dowd, perhaps.  But in my view, it seems to be more false hyperbole by Dowd and her fellow progressives including, one suspects, the thirty-some-odd percent who remain Obama supporters.  At the same time, Americans most certainly are battling a very tough economic crisis, one that was not caused by, but has been horrendously exacerbated by the Obama administration with its plethora of anti-capitalist, anti-business, anti-freedom, and decidedly unconstitutional policies. But beaten down?  Weathering is a more accurate description; maybe even “successfully fighting back” is closer to the mark (think the Tea Party and the historic election results in 2010).

As for Americans being beaten down by an identity crisis, give Dowd partial credit here.  Listening to the president openly diminish American exceptionalism and consistently denigrate America’s past, many Americans surely must wonder, “Who were/are these ‘Americans’ whom Mr. Obama feels an almost obsessive need to demean?”  The fact is, virtually no American today can—nor should—reasonably identify with the cruel and abusive few who terribly mistreated their fellow human beings in centuries past.  After all, what nation or race has not had its fair share of horrible tyrants?  Indeed, man’s inhumanity to man continues today across large swaths of the Middle East and Asia.  No place is immune to it.  Yet the truth remains that far more Americans today identify with the morality, strength and courage of our American ancestors who died by the hundreds of thousands during WWII to liberate millions suffering under inhuman totalitarian regimes of the type Mr. Obama seems blithely to ignore.  These same Americans, our fathers and our grandfathers, later returned home to fight successfully for equality and civil rights for all Americans irrespective of gender, race or national origin.  Like WWII, it is a fight we largely have won.  We should take great pride in it.  Why Obama doesn’t, remains among the deeper mysteries surrounding his administration.

Finally, Americans definitely have not been beaten down by a political and leadership crisis in Washington, D.C.  Thankfully, that particular crisis affects mainly those who reside inside the Beltway—and those, like Dowd, whose livelihood depends upon writing about their continued lunacy.  However, a cure is on the way.  Just watch what happens come Tuesday, November 6, 2012.  With a smidgeon of luck, and barring wholesale voter fraud by . . . (well, we all know who), the current regime soon will be gone.  When that happens, real hope will make a welcomed return.  And Americans, once again, will show why the country of our founders—with all its human flaws—remains the last, best and greatest hope for mankind.  In the end, most Americans are not men and women who have chosen to revert to the fetal position rather than stand and face our toughest problems directly.

My sincere suggestion to Ms. Dowd is this: She might want to get an early start on a column about that.  She can always call me if she needs some help.