As we enter a new year full of both promise and foreboding, I have a variety of wishes for myself and others.

First, I want this to be an outstanding year for my children and grandkids.  The children are doing well.  The grandkids are getting older, with a couple already in their teens.  Grandpa — papa to the little guy — wants nothing but the best for all of them as their lives unfold.  Hopefully, no more time will be foolishly lost to masks and at-home learning.

Second, I wish for sanity to be restored to this great country of ours.  The parallels between our nation and that of the Roman Empire are too close for comfort.  The erosion of our precious state, as it was in Rome, is coming from within, and far too much of the damage is being done intentionally.  The progressives want a diverse one-world government where we all would sit by the campfire singing "Kumbaya" as we watch the windmills spin and enjoy the reflection of the solar panel arrays as the world deteriorates around us.

The leftist morons who have appropriated the term "progressive" would have us do just the opposite of moving forward.  Among their many misguided goals, they want an intentionally ill structured diversity in this nation, appointing their chosen heroes and victims to positions of leadership and status.  I wish for diversity as defined by the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., where skin color, and by extension, sex, is irrelevant.  (Gender would be defined as one of but two possibilities, personal proclivities notwithstanding.)  This diversity would be a coincidental diversity within an intentional meritocracy.  Merit should be the defining term in all endeavors.  I want leaders and heroes who have earned their status, and I don't care if they are coincidentally male or female, straight or gay, Black, White, green, or blue, so long as they have earned their position.  That should not be too much to ask or wish for.

Third, I wish our leadership would grow spines and do what is best for our country or get out of the way and allow for a new generation of leaders willing to put forth the effort to re-establish national greatness.  Making America great again is too important an ideal to be credited to one individual politician, no matter how well he represented the concept.  It should be the goal of all who live in this great nation-state.  Only by pulling together can we slow and ultimately reverse the decline of our country mirroring that of Rome.  Let's insist that making America great again become not only fashionable, but universally accepted in this nation.

My final wish, a selfish one, is that I will be here to reminisce about 2023 and be looking forward to 2024 a year from now.  That will depend on God's wishes and the efforts of my oncology team.  I can only hope and pray that God gives my doctors all the tools necessary to make this wish comes true.

Like everyone, I have other selfish goals and desires, but I believe that if those I have listed above come true, the more petty ones will take care of themselves.  Let's all pull together and make that happen.  Not for my sake, but for America's.

Bill Hansmann is a dentist and dental educator with over fifty years in the profession.  He continues to teach and write political blogs and semi-mediocre novels while living with his wife and cats in Florida.

Image: Public Domain Vectors.