Two uplifting thoughts for you to take with you

Yes, events are moving very quickly now, but don’t despair. We’re still Americans, there’s still an America, and we can still make a difference.

Thought 1: One of my favorite books is Max Dimont’s Jews, God, and HistoryIt was written in 1961, so it’s obviously a little outdated, but it’s still a wonderful book. It talks about how the ancient Jewish Kingdoms rose and fell, but how Jews, unlike any other people in the history of the world, survived as a coherent group, separate from their racial identity.

I don’t have my copy of my book at hand (it’s buried in a box somewhere), so I’m drawing on memory here. As I remember it, early in the book, maybe in the introduction, Dimont mentions that a famous British historian, maybe Arthur Toynbee, had the theory that nations rise, then fall, then vanish. His problem was that the darn Jews wouldn’t fit into that mold — and that, I believe, was before the creation of the modern State of Israel.

Of course, what made the Jews survive is that they were organized around ideas, not territory, or genetics, or a single royal lineage. The land could vanish, the genetics change, and the monarchs fade away, but the ideas lived on.

We Americans, like the Jews before us, are a nation defined by our ideas. Sure, the continent marks us on the map, we can point to the government in D.C., and the left insists that we look at everyone’s skin color and obsess about it, but what holds us together is the Constitution. It is a contract between us and the government predicated on a few extraordinary ideas, all arising from our inherent rights to liberty and property. These two foundational concepts drive everything we are and do.

The left is determined to defeat those two core ideas: No liberty, no property. That could erase America on this continent, but will it erase the idea of America? I don’t think so. I think that idea will live on.

However, my really strong suggestion is that we do not allow the left to begin the experiment to see whether American ideas can survive the socialist death spiral.

I don’t care what you thought of last night’s debate. I don’t care if you thought Trump was a bully, not a warrior. I don’t care if you thought that Biden (who was probably chock full of Adderall) made a better showing than you expected.

This election is about two ideas, not about two candidates: The first idea is the binding notion — one that’s not tied to geography or ethnicity — that liberty and property are the two most important values for a people, any people, to thrive. Trump is all we’ve got to defend that idea, and it’s true whether you like him or not.

The second idea is the deadly notion of subordination to government, with no liberty and no property. Whatever you think of Biden, abandon it. It’s enough to know that he is the left’s avatar in this election.

America’s ideas will survive, but let’s make sure on November 3 that America survives too. Vote. In. Person. On. November. 3.

Thought 2: I was at my favorite local gun store today. So were a lot of other people. They were young, old, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, Northern, Southern, and who knows what else. I didn’t ask, but they might have also represented different places on the LGBTQ+ spectrum.

What bound everyone together was a shared belief in the Second Amendment. That’s quite a bond, and it made for a place of happy camaraderie.

I was also at my local Walmart today. So were a lot of other people. As was true at the gun store, they ran the age, racial, geographic origin, and gender spectrums, and probably pinged some of the LGBTQ+ spectrum too.

People were friendly and helpful. They scooted out of each other’s ways in the aisles. They waved at little children because masks mean they can no longer smile at them. Tall people helped short people get items off of high shelves. (And do you remember how offended Michelle Obama was that someone dared ask her to do that? What a . . . self-involved rhymes with witch.)

The chattering classes, the media, and a handful of obnoxious people want to tell you that America is hate-filled. They fill the airwaves with that garbage. But we’re not.

Yes, there are haters. There are scraggly bands of ugly white supremacists. There are gangbangers who try to murder deputies. There are psychopaths who turn their communities (usually innercity black communities) into shooting galleries where children become targets. And of course, there are angry, lost, white young people who have been taught to hate themselves and their nation, and who have a lust for violence. Those are the leftist foot soldiers.

All of these ugly hate-filled people make for good media fodder. And we need to know about them so that we can challenge their actions and the ideas that drive them.

But.

But please remember that they are not America. Every time you go out into your community and say “hi,” to someone, or scoot out of someone’s way in the grocery store, or ask a fellow gun store customer for his/her opinion about ammo, with everyone responding in a friendly fashion, you are looking at America.

I can get very depressed — we all can — and crazy is in the air this year, but hang onto your ideas, vote your ideas, and spread your ideas and your kindness.