PrintJuly 4, 2009
America - Good Things to Come
The Broad Street Bullies - the Philadelphia Flyers of the 1970's - had Kate Smith's "God Bless America," played at all of their home games. And they won...a lot. The team took back-to-back Stanley Cup trophies in the middle of the decade. The team went from nothing to something in a very small window of time. Kate's vocals on the song that defines this country was a sound that at last carried the tough guy's on ice to victory night after night.
Also in the 70's, the country faltered under the weight of ten years in Vietnam. Stumbled under the shadow of Watergate. And collapsed with the rise and fall of Jimmy Carter in high office. God blessing America seemed to be a distant chorus. The 70's gave us the singer/songwriter, the Hustle, disco-mania, and a string of novelty songs that will best be forgotten. Still another sour note produced during this time was the Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade. The case provided for a constitutional right to destroy life before it was born. God bless America?
We donned our sweaters and waited in gas lines. The country also waited for a return to what made the country great: the belief that there was something special about this land. That belief -- some call it arrogance -- called this nation to higher things and loftier goals. Our monuments stood their ground in the capital city and said, yes, "God bless America!" America's founding documents are a testament to the glad hearts of its writers who gave voice to the yearning within to be free of tyrannical governments. They found such freedom in the words, "endowed by their Creator."
So, God did bless America. It was here that he ended slavery following a bloody civil war. It was here that he raised an army that would establish liberty in distant places during two world wars. It was here that he established noble men who would rise to defend that liberty when challenged. Men and women from this land have given and give their lives daily to help humanity in the face of inhumanity.
And, all these things, all these beliefs, all these lives sacrificed, and all these testimonies, are being belittled, dragged through the mud -- not from without, but from within.
President Obama, his administration, and the Democrats in Congress, are currently destroying the foundations of this nation. They plan to build something new when this destruction is complete. They, however, need a nation of people who will have forgotten their roots to accomplish this plan.
God bless America? A song not to be sung in this new place.
Can the tree of liberty be uprooted? Not if the branches – and every succeeding American generation is a branch - hold strong. If they do, good things will come.
