Amash and the Two-Parties

Ronald Reagan famously said, when becoming a Republican, "I didn't leave the Democrat Party.  It left me."

That has always resonated with me, not exclusively with the Democrats, but with the Republicans, too.  I don't identify with either party and often I refuse to vote for candidates they offer.  Neither party is what it was 50 or 40 or maybe even 30 years ago.  They have both changed, moved, and not for the better.

On July 4, West Michigan Congressman Justin Amash announced he was leaving the Republican Party, becoming an Independent.  Good for him!  The parties, as he correctly stated, have become "an existential threat to American principles and institutions."  They have become concerned more with themselves, with grabbing and holding power.  That's not, in itself, a bad thing.  After all, if one doesn't get elected, one can't do anything.  But once they get elected, both Republicans and Democrats, they do all they can to remain in power, for themselves, not for the American people.  Some folks will dispute that, but from where I'm sitting it's true.  Neither has represented me; neither has reflected the values and principles I hold dear.  "I didn't leave the _____ Party.  It/They left me."

My hopes that Amash's departure will spark a major difference are small.  Few people care.  They blindly vote the way their unions or professional organizations tell them to vote.  They vote for the candidates who raise the most money, regardless of their effectiveness in office.  It's become de rigueur to "Hold your nose and vote for the lesser of two evils."  Bah!  When given a choice between two evils, choose neither.  That's what Amash has done.

For doing so, he is to be commended.  But what does the President do?  Instead of praising one who leaves "the Swamp," he goes off on one of his typical cowboy tweets/twits (or whatever they are called) and called Amash "disloyal" and "one of the dumbest" members of Congress.  Particularly ironic and hugely funny is that Trump had the gall to actually call someone else "a loser."  (Trump supporters, spare me your invective.  I'll never vote for him.  But we can agree to disagree with civility.)

Rather than merely playing party politics, going along to get along, perhaps more elected officials, especially in Washington, would do well to think about Amash and his reasons for defecting.  (I'm using that word for fun.)  If more joined the Amash bandwagon......

"Patriotism?"

An Independence Day editorial seemed to me to get it a bit wrong.  Nolan Finley (The Detroit News) seems to equate being "extremely proud" of the United States with "patriotism."  I suppose defining the terms might alleviate my consternation with Finley's assertions.

For instance, he cites a Gallup Poll on this Fourth of July that finds "only 45 percent of Americans are 'extremely proud' of their country."  The next sentence he counterposes that with 2001, when "70 percent of Americans considered themselves "highly patriotic."  Hmmm......

Let me facetiously (What is unique about that word, facetiously?) dismiss our growing penchant for the things that really matter in life, such as the next NFL season, new episodes of Dancing with the Stars and Survivor, etc., which would obviously steal from our patriotic zeal.  But it seems wrong to conflate "pride" with "patriotism."  It's as if we assume our country and our government are one and the same thing.  Perhaps that's what many people have come to believe.

One can certainly be patriotic and still not be proud of what one's country is doing, right?  I know this is a stretch ("He who first invokes 'Hitler' in an argument loses."), but couldn't one still be a patriotic German, but not at all be proud of what Germany was doing in the '30s and '40s?  Isn't that what the Underground was all about?

One of my professors, Henry Steele Commager, once wrote an essay to which I've referred many times in many situations.  He asserted that, often, the most important members of a society are its critics.  Can't a critic of a country still be patriotic, especially if that country is taking the wrong path?

Can't one not be proud of our institutionalization of slavery or involvement in, say, Vietnam, and still be patriotic?  If I'm not a fan of President Trump, and I'm not, does that mean I'm not patriotic?  Hardly.  And were those not "proud" of what President Obama did or even that he was President unpatriotic?  Again, hardly.

I keep thinking of some ding-a-ling, maybe Joe Biden (?), who some years ago claimed it was "patriotic" to pay more taxes.  (No, I don't remember the context.)  So, although there were a couple attempts to establish a federal income tax before 1913, there was none that lasted.  (A Constitutional amendment was required.)  Does that mean all those Americans before then (and the 99% who still didn't pay any federal income taxes when it was initially enacted) weren't patriotic?  Should we list the names?  Were those who opposed a federal income tax unpatriotic?  And, if paying more taxes is so "patriotic," why aren't the wealthy people, particularly the wealthy Democrats, lining up to voluntarily pay more?  Why do so many folks, yes, even patriots, hire accountants, lawyers, and other tax experts to get the most out of exemptions, credits, and deductions?

Finley did cite Oakland County Judge Michael Warren and Judge Warren's attempt to shore up the teaching of American history.  He doesn't wan to "sugar coat," as Finley notes, the history of the US.  That is, we should be teaching the flaws in our past.  But we shouldn't teach them at the expense of the wonderful things that evolved from the great American experiment nor should we emphasize them to the point of trivializing American successes.

This will no doubt rankle any relativists and multiculturalists who might read this, but, yes, the United States is an exceptional place.  Yes, we are a better culture than, say, what is found in Saudi Arabia or China.  And that's because of our Founding Principles.  Those, as much as the physical United States of America, are the basis of American patriotism.