Please disable your Ad Blocker to better interact with this website.

Opinion

There Was a Time ‘Made in America’ Was Common and Noble

Some time back, when being a cowboy was a profession that a lot of men were in, the United States was a much different country. It doesn’t strike me that we’ve progressed much in certain aspects. We had strong opinions about people and places and, in some cases, we were wrong about those opinions.

Take slavery as an example…we fought a war to prove that it was wrong, and today it still exists, although to a much lesser extent in America. Believe it or not, we almost went to war with ourselves again, for civil rights in the 1960s, and we thought we fixed it…but segregation is again being practiced…in reverse.

Cowboys were a rough-and-tumble lot as depicted in many a Western movie, but the times demanded that sort of man. America was expanding from ocean to ocean and it took men and women who were brave and adventurous to make the trek westward…and sometimes that trail led only to the cemetery. There are still cowboys, I understand, but they’re quite different in their ways.

A lot of people have said, in various ways, that children are our future, and they are. Why then, are some people determined to try to wipe out that future…perhaps an entire generation? Jihadists, all over the world, are using children as movable bombs, detonating the explosives strapped to them when the explosion will do the most damage. In America, we seem to have begun to sacrifice them to the theory of what they don’t know won’t hurt them, and that will bring disaster to us down the road. We have decided that boys and girls no longer exist…we now have “theybies” and children who decide for themselves what gender, if any, they are.

Perhaps the news article that brought this to mind was in the New York Times on July 22nd. The headline was “The U.K. is using children as undercover spies, report says.” Well, if that didn’t bring to mind the children of Germany in the 1930s, when it was decided that they should report their parents for doing things against the Third Reich, nothing would. The piece stated that British Intelligence and police units are using children in a drive to expose terrorists, criminal gangs and drug dealers. By itself that’s an interesting start, because England has, in my not-so-humble opinion, begun the descent into becoming a caliphate. As a safeguard, the Home Office proposes to carry out monthly reviews of the program to see that the children involved are safe. It was mentioned that child informers were used as a last resort in order to gain information on the bad guys. The various children’s rights groups are determined to ensure their safety.

The former occupant of the White House is having problems with his legacy. The current President is countermanding whatever ridiculous rules were set up, as fast as he can. The legacy in trouble, for the most part, is the one in Chicago. It was reported on the 29th of July that the group trying to get the project built was having to delay, perhaps indefinitely, the actual start of construction. The building, which is supposed to be a combination library and “glorification” (my word) of the former occupant of the White House, has been delayed several times already. There are environmental issues, there are historic issues since it’s supposed to be built in Jackson Park which is on the list of Historic Places, and there are traffic issues to be considered because it will involve closing and expanding streets around the project.

It’s no secret that I didn’t like (and still don’t) the former President, and he gets the blame for a lot of the problems that America is facing now. He was divisive, less-than-courageous in dealing with other countries, and showed a strong affection for Islam and Muslims, all things that brought our country to a low point, and, in general, displayed what a lot of us considered an anti-American viewpoint.

From time to time the subject of products being made overseas, as opposed to being Made in America, comes up. My longevity allows me to look back on a time when whatever it was, we made it in America. Our automobiles were the best in the world (my opinion) and they were made in Detroit which is why it was called Motor City. We made airplanes and ships for the war in such quantities that no one could keep up with us. There were mills in the Carolinas that made all sorts of woven goods from socks to blankets. We made firearms that were the best and still are revered today. We invented powered flight, the electric light bulb, a cure for polio and numerous other things. That little label that proclaimed this thing was Made in America gave us stature. We could do it, and we could do it better than anyone else. What in the world happened? Can we blame it all on greed? Really? Think about it.

Parting shot: No matter what I might think, there’s someone that has already said it. Robert Binyon said, about heroes, “They went with songs to the battle, they were young, Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow. They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted, they fell with their faces to the foe.” Please, try to do something for our heroes today. Thanks.

Image: CCO Creattive Commons; https://pixabay.com/en/wood-boards-stamp-production-205186/

Larry Usoff

Larry Usoff, US Navy Retired. Articulate. Opinionated. Patriotic. Conservative. Cultured enough so that I can be taken almost anywhere. Makes no excuses for what I say or do, but takes responsibility for them. Duty. Honor. Country. E-mail me at: amafrog@att.net

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *