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A new poll from RealClearPolitics shows that only 28 percent of Millennials and Gen Z feel very patriotic.
The discrepancy between how young people feel about America vs. the rest of the country is pretty staggering.
The United States has more freedom than anywhere else in the world. For our entire history, immigrants from other countries have come to America because of those freedoms. The countries they left often had caste systems.
America was the New World.
There is no better system of government in the world than the U.S. Constitution, which uniquely and plainly lists our God-given rights. Relatively free allies like Canada and England don’t even have a First Amendment. Say the wrong thing in either country, and you might be fined or jailed. I don’t even have to get into the lack of free speech and religious freedom in theocratic or totalitarian states.
But in America, freedom of speech and expression are bedrock principles.
Good luck finding anything like the Second Amendment in many of the world’s countries.
America fought massive wars to save the world, twice. President Reagan prepared us to do it a third time.
No other country is more generous. America has been the most charitable nation in the world for a long time.
I could write an entire book here on how when measuring the United States against the rest of the world, America comes out on top more times than not.
It is tragic if potentially millions of Americans of any age don’t understand this.
Our country has had its problems. Major ones – as any country made up of flawed human beings will inevitably have. Slavery. Segregation. Japanese internment camps. Today’s national warts and all would include an ongoing border crisis with no end in sight.
There is no such thing as a perfect country. But the American experiment the Founding Fathers kicked off on July 4, 1776 couldn’t have gone much better than it has, all things considered.
When Great Britain was the dominant world power in the 18th century, most of the world could not have imagined those thirteen colonies would one day rise to be the dominant world power.
And America rose to prominence not by suppressing freedom and controlling citizens, but by allowing maximum liberty for all.
That is beyond unique in the history of mankind. If we aren’t getting this across to our kids, then something is wrong with us and our system.
Americans of all ages should remember they live in the greatest country in the world. If they don’t realize it, remind them.
July 4th is as good a day as any.