Current Events — HabitableZone

Current Events » in reply to Laws

How about that?
Mary Anne — (archived)

Common ground at last.

I'm proud of my country too.

I'm not proud of everything it has done. It seems to me that we can look coldly at our past record, embrace the good and try to do more like that, admit (that's important) and reject the bad, and try not to do any more of that, and remember that our essential role in the world is not only all those beacon-y things that travel from folklore to popular song, but to find ways to do things that no one else has thought of before.

Because we are the improvisers. Because we say, "Why not?" Because we let everybody have their say, if they have the nerve. Because, on September 12, 2001 -- after the initial 24 hours when everyone was so angry -- the Middle East was not a plain of radioactive glass. Because (shut up) we have people who will actually speak up for due process for those who may be our enemies. Because we have the guts to look up at Mars and think about how to live there. Because we can find a way to include any way of life if that way of life can find a way to adapt to us. Because we have people who will go to foreign lands and fight for the peoples there in whatever way they know how. Because we are the most dynamic force for change that this planet has ever seen. Because we invent ourselves over again with each sunrise.

I never want that to change. I never want the change to end. I never want us to become smug and self-satisfied, convinced we don't have to do any better. We always have to do better. That's what will keep us the best.

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