Today we celebrate the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, and thereby the founding of this great nation. Whatever its flaws, and there are some, it is guided by the will of its people in a rather direct way, it holds no vast colonial empire, and it tries to treat its people decently so long as they behave decently.
The best measure of this nation’s success is that it is a magnet for foreigners looking for a better life, actually a much-too-powerful magnet. If we can’t figure out how to keep them from “swamping the lifeboat” in their tens of millions, it will likely “sink,” benefitting no one.
The other DrC and I have traveled much of this globe, depending on what list you use to count, setting foot in perhaps 100-120 countries. We’ve seen several other countries where we could comfortably live, but none has tempted us to actually move there. At the end of the day, while we identify with no “home town,” we’re clear this is our “home country.”
Tomorrow we’ll be back to considering the upsets within this body politic, the incipient violence in the hate on both sides. Today, on its birthday, we proudly say we love it dearly, warts and all.
