Happy Fourth of July

!video as troubled as our country is, I'm grateful to live, work, and raise my family here

!video I think we fall into complacency when we assume what we've built is just guaranteed, that progress was and is inevitable, that things can only get better

!video we are basically at the end of a long series of trial and errors, of tactics and strategies that have survived the filter of time and complexity, and now we must figure out something new

!video so far, miraculously, from cave-dwelling to human rights we've managed a way to pull out of the nose-dive at the last second

!video as flawed and hypocritical as can be, as badly as we betray America's ideals, I marvel at the moment we find ourselves in...

!video the premiere power in the world, the first global empire, as destructive as it is, as corrupt as it is, happens to have as its founding mythology the right of every human being to be free... simply as a matter of faith

!video I can feel the objections boiling up into your consciousness, I've spoken, written, and debated many of them. Yes, we are flawed, but...

[[logos]]

!screen declaration of independence

!screen consent of the governed

!video this is the difference between this country an other countries... this, as I see it, is American Exceptionalism, not that we are better people, like all humans we are flawed, but that our faults are tempered by better Ideas

!video the fact that, for now, America has won supremacy is not an accident. It's a better system, if we use it, and there have been, and can be much worse systems

!video Today we find ourselves at the helm of a corrupt, creaking super power, in violation of her own promises, yet, we're here now, the writing is still there... all we have to do is tell the truth

What would it look like if America lived up to its ideals? What is the first action it would take?