WHAT DO THE GETTYSBURG ADRESS, AND DRUG ADDICTION HAVE TO DO WITH TODAY’S POLITICS IN WASHINGTON?

It’s ironic that the most well-known faux pas in Abraham Lincoln’s outrageously masterful Gettysburg Address, is that he asserts that his most famous speech would quickly be forgotten.  His exact words: “The world will little note nor long remember what we say here…”  Yet there is another hidden, yet more important mistake in his speech

After referencing “a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” Lincoln maintains that the Civil War was really about whether “that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure.”  In other words, did this experiment in egalitarianism inexorably lead to the civil war, and was it therefore doomed even before it began?

Yet the question should have been whether a nation conceived in genocide, (Indians) and dedicated to the proposition that whites had the right to treat African people as less than animals could long endure.

The Civil War was not fought because the country was conceived in liberty.  It was fought because the country was conceived in slavery.  Not only was the country not dedicated to all men of all races being created equal, but it did not allow that even white men let alone women) were created equal, hence the compromise that brought about the electoral college which plagues the political process to this day.  Basically, the founders did not trust the common man to see through subterfuge and vote intelligently, hence the need for an intermediary body to cast the actual vote.  (Once again, slavery played a major role in all this).  And once again the irony is downright exquisite that the two worst presidents in history were elected precisely because of this intermediary.

The point is that there are real reasons why the United Sates is leading the European world in self-cannibalization, just as there are real reasons why recovering addicts (alcohol or drugs) must make amends with all the people they hurt during their addiction. 

The issue is one of growing and becoming as well as the consequences for failure to do so.    As long as the substance abuser clings to the excuses he has made for his horrible behavior during his addiction, he will never be free to outgrow his addiction.  The more egregious the behavior, the more difficult it is to address it but also the sweeter it is to overcome it.   Without reconciliation the addict stagnates and is eventually consumed by his addiction. 

By disavowing his past egregious acts, the addict/sinner embodies the true meaning of being born again; and not the racist garbage espoused by the white supremacist Evangelical community.  America could have/ should have been born again at the end of the Civil War.  African Americans should have received their forty acres and a mule.  A rebirth should have produced a commitment to try to repair the unspeakable harm that had been done.

The exact opposite occurred.  The darkness that produced slavery continued to flourish as it was manifest as riots that destroyed successful black communities while the rioters demanded blacks pull themselves up “by their bootstraps.”  Jim Crow and lynching continued and racism/white supremacy has remained at the heart of the national conversation to this day. 

There have been other opportunities for redemption.  Losing the Vietnam war, like when an alcoholic hits bottom, provided just such an opportunity.  Unfortunately, there came a “hero” riding a mighty steed who would rescue America’s psyche at the cost of her soul: Ronald Reagan.  The darkness that produced slavery, manifest destiny, the genocide of Indians, Imperialism and international hegemony continued to flourish.

Fast forward to today.  As that darkness feels threatened by multi-culturalism-a black president, people of color in traditionally white roles- its desperation produces a willingness to sink to new lows in an ill-fated effort at self-preservation.  The darkness lashes about, injuring those who seek its protection as much as those it seeks to oppress.   It provides the impetus for a childish, malevolent, narcissistic, intellectually challenged pathological liar to occupy the Executive branch and a soulless hypocritical amoral Congress to remove any checks and balances.  Like the plant in the “Little Shop of Horrors,” the darkness grows; its voracious appetite fed by the white supremacy which in turn is fueled by militant, intentional ignorance. 
                                          
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