Ideas Matter

Should we celebrate America with a Jingoist jingle?
Should we celebrate her with conservative rants against freedom of speech
Or leftist calls for constant crises and revolutions?
Once upon a time there was an ideal we have lost:
This country was founded on celebrating life and liberty and property.
We forgot that to be conservative here is to be liberal,
That the European left and right have no business being here,
That we are not nationalists, but integrationists,
That we're not for democracy, but anarchic republicans,
That we oppose resentment while helping others in times of need,
That we protect rich and poor, strong and weak in equal measure.
We should be proud that racism is a problem to us in this country,
Since in other lands, nobody has a problem being racist.
We should be proud that we live somewhere so rich
That we can be poets and scholars in comfort and wealth.
Does it seem trite to celebrate this way? to celebrate American with a song?
So be it! I will sing this song and celebrate our liberal soul
And celebrate the possibility that we can find it once again, improved
By all that we have learned and learned to see.