Hop-Off

And so has the United States of America been dead now for a number of years, particularly since 9/11. Obama’s election to the highest office in the land simply amounted to the pronouncement of Last Rites.

I have always been keenly interested in foreign affairs. My interest in the Far East has been constant since high school. It was sparked in part by George Harrison’s ‘Wonderwall’ album. Then, when I had a chance to actually participate in an Indian student exchange program in college, I literally leapt at the opportunity.

On returning home, I found nobody was particularly interested in the stories of my experiences there. Most only had some vague notion of what lay beyond America’s borders. And that much was entirely understandable.

At the same time, India’s newspapers featured stories about America prominently on the front page of every edition. In many cases, Indians were better informed about what was going on here than we ourselves were. The reverse was hardly the case. We here in America seldom heard about what was going on in the rest of the world. True, there was some occasional dismissive mention about folks starving in India (which, by the way, was never quite accurate). When news about India did happen to receive attention in the American media, it was treated as big news at home (in India). Good news; bad news - it hardly mattered, was celebrated locally as if some glass ceiling had finally been shattered.

Now, hardly a day goes by without mention of world affairs. We hang on every word uttered by Osama bin Laden and others. We carefully follow the vagaries of China and carefully calculate any implications as to how these might affect us. They’ve hit the big time - Hollywood; Rambo, Jay-Zee! They’ve passed the audition; they’re now demanding their place in the spotlight. They’ve learned to manipulate us; to make us dance; hurt; squeal.

All this has happened in direct correlation to our having lost confidence in ourselves. We’ve chosen to be victims and clowns. We’ve chosen hand wringing and whining over leadership. “We’re bad! We’re bad! We apologize” - for what? We don’t rightly know.

In Iran, presently, there’s a case in which an accused and convicted man is awaiting a medical procedure that will paralyze him. We no longer dare to speak out against such brutality. Nor do we speak out against stoning; genital mutilation and a whole host of other unholy acts that should be repugnant to us. All our “Save Darfur” banners have come down since George W. Bush has left office.

We’ve abandoned our principles, our liberties, our honor, our faith, our courage, our senses - without which we cannot continue to stand. We have allowed ourselves to be overrun from within and without. We will submit to shariah and anything else that may come our way. The mosque at Ground Zero is a perfect example of how far we‘ve fallen. Does mayor Bloomberg realize that it will be off-limits to non-Muslims? - especially women? Maybe he thinks it’s no big deal; that it’ll just add a stop along the CitySights hop-on, hop-off tour - much like St. Patrick’s.