Saturday, January 20, 2018

Why It’s So Important to Understand What Actually ‘Made America Great’ in the First Place

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan launched a major attack on Donald Trump—but more fundamentally on Americanism. In Louis Farrakhan: America 'Became Great Enslaving Us,' So Trump Won't 'Make America Great Again', Tyler O’Neil reports for PJ Media:


On Thursday, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan called on President Donald Trump to repent for America's sins and denounced the very idea of American greatness. He addressed Trump, saying the president cannot "Make America Great Again," as his campaign slogan promised.


"Mr. President, you won't make America great again, not in our time," Farrakhan declared Thursday in a speech at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. "She became great killing Native Americans. She became great enslaving us, bringing us from Africa into America to work the cotton fields. You're not going to get that opportunity back anymore."


Farrakhan's group, the Nation of Islam, was formed in Detroit in 1930 and Farrakhan took control of it in 1977. The group started in order to "teach the downtrodden and defenseless Black people a thorough Knowledge of God and of themselves, and to put them on the road to Self-Independence with a superior culture and higher civilization than they had previously experienced."


The Nation of Islam leader called on Trump to "repent for all of the evils that America has done to us, to the peoples of the world."


Was the treatment of blacks and Native Americans consistent with America’s Founding philosophy?


A resounding NO!!


America wasn’t made “great” because of the collectivism that makes slavery and other like evils possible. America is great because America was formed on the basis of the individualist principles that led to the abolition of slavery (along with other forms of political inequality). The Declaration of Independence clearly states that


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. . .


There is nothing unequivocal about those words. It says all men.


The principles in the Declaration of Independence directly conflicted with both slavery and the reactionary Separate-but-Equal and Jim Crow laws—a fact that both the abolitionist Frederick Douglass and Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King and other crusaders for justice well understood. Fortunately, the Declaration won out over both of those evils, albeit after much blood was shed.


Political equality for individuals across the board, based upon the common fundamental nature of all humans as beings of reason—that’s what made America unique, and exceptional, and great—and has been an inspiration to, not an “evil” done to, the freedom-loving “peoples of the world.” Unfortunately, Donald Trump doesn’t understand that—at least not fully. So his “Make America Great Again” slogan rings hollow. Worse, Trump’s usurpation of the slogan plays into the hands of statists who reject those principles of America’s greatness. As proof, I give you Louis Farrakhan’s comments.


Related Reading:














[Excerpt] “The tale of Douglass’s education, escape from slavery and ascent to leadership of the abolitionist movement is familiar to any high school American history student. But less examined is the story of his intellectual transformation, from a follower of radical rejecter of the Constitution, William Lloyd Garrison, to an ardent defender of the self-evident truths embodied uniquely in America’s founding documents.”

4 comments:

Mike Kevitt said...

What made America great was the philosophy contained in its Founding Documents, despite the fact that contradictions to it were also contained in them. The contradictions were subordinate and incidental pieces of philosophies contradictory to that contained in the Founding Documents. But, the philosophy in those documents, that of individual rights, was the only philosophy in them, there was no other philosophy, only subordinate and incidental pieces of those philosophies in incidental contradiction to the philosophy in those documents. So, that philosophy was prevailing over the contradictions, but only for a while, because the people were never, by their choices, up to that philosophy. Today, the people are moral degenerates, by their choice. They REJECT that philosophy, all the way.

This country was, and is, great, but only in its philosophy, non-contradicted in writing nor in action. I've read that the best of the Framers, in their time, had good reasons for allowing the contradictions into the documents, hoping their posterity would weed them out in due time, in any way they might have to. Their posterity was never great enough for it, was less than the country left to them. Today, the people, in their cold blooded rejection, don't deserve this country. They deserve the slavery they hanker for and wish upon us, us 1 out of 22,500.

This country was never great in its people, but only in the non-contradicted philosophy in its Founding Documents. The Founders (Framers) were great enough to put it in writing, formally and official, after the Revolutionary War and subsequent challenges, even with contradictions, just to get it through, on the books. After the philosophy in the documents, the Framers of them are the greatness of this country. The rest has been, overall, downhill to now. Today, everybody apes for consciousness in inanimate matter or from beyond, in either case, a mono-theistic 'God' of all consciousness.

The philosophy in the documents are there, but otherwise, this country is gone. The degenerate, untoward people are irretrievable. Us 1 out of 22,500 must separate, somehow, and go it alone and start over. With what we know, and with 10,000? of us, that might not be too bad a starting point. How 'bout it?

principled perspectives said...

It's a starting point. And it's bigger than is used to be. And we don't need to convince everyone. A study I learned about via Ilene Skeen (https://www.facebook.com/ilene.skeen/videos/10155910756383468/) concludes that "Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have found that when just 10 percent of the population holds an unshakable belief, their belief will always be adopted by the majority of the society." (https://news.rpi.edu/luwakkey/2902) So all we need is 1 out of 10—a tough project, but more hopeful. And we have those Founding principles. In the words of Harvey Milk:

"On the Statue of Liberty it says, 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free . . . .' In the Declaration of Independence it is written 'All men are created equal and they are endowed with certain inalienable rights . . . .' That’s what America is. No matter how hard you try, you cannot erase those words from the Declaration of Independence. No matter how hard you try, you cannot chip those words from off the base of the Statue of Liberty." (https://prologue.blogs.archives.gov/2013/06/25/my-name-is-harvey-milkand-i-want-to-recruit-you/comment-page-1/)

Mike Kevitt said...

I made a mistake in one important number. There are 325 million Americans, not 225 million. So maybe we number 14,000 on our side, not 10,000.

To get 10% on our side, we need 32,500,000 people, a 2,314.3% increase from 14,000. That increase must consist of active minded people, and the projected majority must be active minded people, and they must be unshakable, as a monolithic block. If they're divided, like Republicans of today and the minority is a monolithic block, like the Democrats of today, that minority is, effectively, the majority.

Among all active minded people, we must be a monolithic majority, especially if we face a monolithic minority, which is probably what we'll face. We start now, with maybe 14,000 which we assume is united by choice, and shoot for 32,500,000 in the face of, I might discuss that later.

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