The Basement of Time

Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.

Abraham Lincoln

Our nation struggles to find itself from time to time. During the 1800s we decided that we would no longer legitimize holding others in bondage. In the 1900s we decided that women and people of all races should have the same rights as men. In this generation, we are deciding that the state has no right to know the inner workings of your bedroom.

The real issue through all of these freedoms has been a strong economy to drive the changes forward and provide a strong foundation to build upon. Today, the fundamentals of our economy are no longer sound. We spend more than we bring in and as anyone with basic budgeting skills can tell you that can’t last forever. In 2009,for the first time in American history, more than half of American households paid zero income tax. While the reasons are debatable, that 51% of American households paid no income tax in 2009 is a fact (Marr & Che-Ching, 2012). The question becomes are we all willing to give up services or pay more taxes to make the budget balance. This includes those who paid no taxes and those who received an earned income credit even though they paid no taxes as well as those multi-billionaires who pay some of the lowest overall rates. One more thing, there are 235 companies that use overseas tax havens to avoid paying their share of doing  business in the US. According to the Huffington Post, “…there are 235 other companies that told the SEC that they’re holding profits overseas but didn’t disclose their hypothetical U.S. tax rate, according to the CTJ report. In total, these non-disclosing companies hold almost $1.3 trillion in non-repatriated profits abroad, CTJ found. Are we willing to stop buying these products?

Additionally, we must make drastic spending cuts in all areas of government. No ones pet projects aside, we must cut ALL AREAS OF GOVERNMENT.

In the end, I feel like Lincoln’s quote is completely accurate, but it must be coupled with a quote from Lewis Mumford:

The liberal’s lack of a sense of history carries a special disability: it makes him identify all his values with the present. Should the present be a shabby one, he quickly comes to the conclusion that the country which exhibits the practical vices and mischiefs he deplores is unworthy of his allegiance.  But a country is more than the people and institutions tht exist in a single generation. The America we must save today, for example, is not just the America of shifty politicians and go-getting advertisers and slimy industrialists who would like to “make a deal” with  the fascists. nor is it the America of Hearst, Ford and Father Coughlin. No self-respecting person would lift a finger to save that.

But our America is the America of Adams and Jefferson, the America of Joseph Henry and Audubon and William James, the America of Whitman and Melville and Olmsted and Richardson, the America that may therefore still be realized in time to come by reason of all the ideas and forces and impulses that have come down to us from the past and are pushing into the future. Our country cannot be identified with “capitalism,” because many of the most precious parts of our heritage long antedated capitalism and will long survive it.

Lewis Mumford, 1940

America is worth saving. Are we all willing to do what it takes to make America work again?

Berman, J. (n.d.). 18 Of America’s Biggest Companies Using Tax Havens To Skirt $92 Billion In U.S. Taxes: CTJ. Retrieved April 19, 2015, from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/03/apple-tax-havens_n_3378935.html

Marr, C., & Chye-Ching, H. (2012, September 17). Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Retrieved April 19, 2015, from http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3505