Recently Sara Palin emerged like Puxatawny Phil. Fortunately
she emerges only about as often these days. When she does, she always leaves a
shadow. Palin spoke recently to the Conservative Political Action Committee
convention. Her 15-minutes-of-fame, stretched to an hour, nearly over, this
speech may have been her last hurrah. Watching her, you could not help but
think how America’s most meaningful symbols have changed in recent years.
When a group of Marines hoisted the American flag over Iwo
Jima, the symbolism was clear. America was strong, its people brave. Americans
and their government had accomplished something important. Here was Palin
hoisting a 32-ounce paper cup filled with Coke. That cup was a symbol of the
disdain she and her followers feel for government and even minor efforts to
reduce health care costs and encourage responsible choices.
Symbols matter. National symbols tell others what’s
important to a people and teach their young the country’s values. Icons like
the flag, the eagle, the Statue of Liberty and so many others have served over
decades as shorthand for patriotism and a united commitment to one another.
Today’s symbols are entirely different. Many seem to speak more to our
differences and to a disdain for one another and our government.
The first Tea Party was a gathering of colonists at the Old
South Meeting House in Boston in December 1773 to protest against taxation
without representation. Today’s Tea Party is a gathering of angry white people,
many of whom are receiving government healthcare while they protest what they’ve
been told is a government take-over of our healthcare system
For many folks, a lighted cigarette has become the primary
symbol of liberty. People who have
little concern about whether someone’s right to vote is being limited or denied
scream bloody-murder if they think those they elected are going to limit their
“right” to smoke.
States like Mississippi implore the courts to exempt them
from requirements of the Voting Rights Act while busying themselves passing
what they call “the anti-Bloomberg law,” prohibiting free people from passing
laws in a democratic process if those laws impinge on the “rights” of
overweight people to eat fast food and teach their children to do the same.
The gun has evolved into the most revered of all national
symbols of freedom. People who would deny Muslims the right to build a mosque
and worship freely believe the right to bear military style arms with
high-velocity clips filled with bullets is the most fundamental right of all. They
would deny same-sex couples the right to marry while defining traditional
marriage as a relationship between a man and his gun. Some claim the gun is the
primary symbol of all “God-given rights.”
The gun has become the symbol of the final triumph of rights
over responsibilities. The NRA has promoted new laws and constitutional
amendments across the country naming the right to own a gun a fundamental and
preeminent right. Already courts in Louisiana have ruled the language prohibits
the government from denying guns to violent felons. How’s that for the new
symbolism of freedom?
But the gun as a symbol of the wont to exercise rights with
no responsibility is not alone. Cigarettes, 32-ounce tubs of soft drinks,
shifting one’s healthcare costs to the rest of us symbolize the freedom to
ignore your own health in favor of having the rest of us pick up the tab.
The Bible, at one time the symbol of the freedom to worship,
has evolved into a symbol for the triumph of notions and prejudice over reason,
reflection and science. It’s a symbol for many that global warming is an
anti-God hoax, that Barack Obama is the anti-Christ, and an all-out war in the
Middle East will usher in the Second Coming.
The nations founders would not be happy. They’d regret their
failure to include a Bill of Responsibilities alongside their Bill of Rights.
If they emerged they might or might not see their shadow but they wouldn’t
recognize it.
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