Where has my country gone?

My country ‘tis of thee

Where has my America gone?

We’re all too blind to see.

We the people cannot see the truth through the political fires burning inside our eyes. How bad is it? Some believe we are on the brink of a civil war. It’s not the North against the South from the 1860s. It’s Democrats and their voters against Republicans and their voters. It’s left vs. right, with a silent majority of Americans standing somewhere in between.

I grew up in the ’60s. It wasn’t a perfect time, with political assassinations and civil rights marches highlighting the news events. Nonetheless, my America was not so divided by ideologies. Families were not arguing with each other every day about what was said from the White House.

My mom voted Democrat because she said they took care of the poor and the Republicans took care of the rich. When Richard M. Nixon was elected, he, of course, was not her choice. She taught me something that day. She told me, “No matter who wins the election, you have to respect him. He’s the president.”

It’s hard for me to have respect for this administration and for Congress with all the finger pointing going on, but that’s not the most significant problem. I’ve lost my America somewhere inside the fanaticism of our nation’s people. Lines have been drawn in the sand on social media. Democrats are accused of being communists. Republicans are being called fascists.

If you call me a liberal, you think I want a government by socialism. I support minorities and I advocate abortions during unwanted pregnancies. Call me a conservative and I want a heavy-handed law and order from the government and breaking the law should bring serious consequences. If I’m to the far right of center, I’m a Bible thumping Christian. I’m pro-life, but you might call me pro-birth. After the child is born, it’s the mother’s responsibility to find affordable health care and child care.

The latest violence in our streets ended with an ICE agent shooting and killing an American citizen. Instead of calling it a terrible tragedy for both the shooter and victim, our government called her a domestic terrorist. Republican Americans have posted on Facebook: “She was trying to run him over. He was defending himself.” Another said: “She was an evil woman. He should have put bullets in both of her eyes.”

Democratic Americans say, “There’s federal law that says an officer can’t shoot at a moving vehicle unless the driver threatens him with something other than the vehicle.” The law also says that if an officer stands in front of the vehicle, he is at fault by creating jeopardy and by escalating the confrontation. They want an investigation and justice served.

In my America from back in the day, a president would ask for prayers for the grieving family and suspend the agent until further investigation of the incident. In this America’s politics, one side says she was an innocent mother gunned down while she was exercising her constitutional right to assemble and protest, and the other side says she was a paid domestic terrorist who tried to kill a government agent.

One side says undocumented immigrants poured $20 million dollars into our economy in 2023, receive no federal assistance, are taxed at the rate of millionaires, pay into Social Security from which they will never receive unless they get their required green cards and they do hard labor jobs in the construction, medical and agricultural fields.

The other side says they’re criminals, murderers, rapists and drug dealers, and they all must be deported. They support ICE to use whatever force needed to hunt down and arrest all the illegals.

In my America, we believed in the words “united we stand and divided we fall.” In my America, we flew Old Glory to celebrate our patriotism that now is the battle cry from both sides of the fence. In my America, Jesus was a Christian symbol of peace, love and forgiveness, and now he’s been used as a political tool to advance conservative propaganda.

Here’s an indisputable truth. Neither side will get the country they want. That’s why we have always had two major political parties for checks and balances; however, the country’s anger is raging more than I have ever seen in my lifetime.

I belong to no party. I’m a fact-checker, and finding the objective truth about anything today is like catching a snowflake during a storm and trying to preserve its beauty before it melts. Opinion has become truth, and truth has become opinion.

I’m looking for my lost America,

the one where we were all sisters and brothers.

We just have different fathers and mothers.

We all bleed red no matter our name.

From the inside we are all the same

One great family

One creation

One nation

God shed his grace on thee

And crown thy good with brotherhood

From sea to shining sea.

I need to find my lost America. My children and yours, too are depending on us.

Email Rich Strack at richiesadie11@gmail.com