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Hello again, my friends - are you all pumped for the 4th of July?
Well, as you hoist your flags, inspect your fireworks and prepare your grills, I'd like to give you some food for thought.
This post touches on subject matter which is somewhat political.
I know that we don't usually do that here, but try as I may, I just can't write about the boundaries of our independence without alluding to our current political climate.
Note, however, that like you, I enjoy keeping this diary politically neutral and accordingly, I will make every effort to keep this blog apolitical in future.
We live in a very interesting time, to say the least. Technology is at its peak, pervading every aspect of our daily lives.
Ours is now a life of consummate convenience and constant connectivity, equally and simultaneously simplified and complicated by the trappings of modern society... yes, I love alliteration (as my regulars would know)!
Panic-causing hoaxes which zoom across the globe via social media channels, the ease with which unscrupulous individuals - even those in obscure, seemingly insignificant parts of the world - can snatch the identities and hard-earned money of unsuspecting, uninformed "marks", beguiling e-mail viruses...
What all of this ubiquitous inter-connectivity is teaching us, whether we want to admit it or not, is that we are all dependent on each other and we are all affected - to some degree - by each other's actions.
The US government is now learning this lesson in the hardest of ways.
It could have learned it from the adverse effects of the now distant global recession on the EU economy (worsened since by Brexit), the regulatory fallout from the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal (culminating in the formulation of the GDPR protocol and ultimately, the demise of Google+) or especially from the mad scramble across the entire World Wide Web to become GDPR-compliant.
But our government didn't learn, and now we have a trade war on our hands.
Our "might is right" foreign policy has resulted in resentment (and in some cases, hatred) towards Americans and most recently, the likely loss of American jobs due to retaliatory import tariffs on the goods which our local factories export around the globe.
For instance, in 2018 America's largest construction nail manufacturer found it hard to compete in China since the introduction of steep tax increases on American steel and aluminum in that country.
The outlook was so bad that Mid Continent Nail Corp was almost forced to move its operations to Mexico or to close down altogether.
Fortunately, it was able to stem its tide of plummeting sales and rapid down-sizing by successfully negotiating a tariff exclusion in early April, 2019.
Furthermore, Harley-Davidson was planning to move its manufacturing plants overseas so as to circumvent new EU tax increases on its motorcycle exports.
All this because the US government thinks it can demand more from its neighbors and allies than it is willing to do itself.
Is that how you make friends, by being obnoxiously overbearing and holding your peers to commitments and standards which you have no intention of honoring yourself? Of course not.
The problem is that for too long, the US government has chosen to interact with the rest of the world on the basis of ultimate authority and superiority. As a result, some countries harbor great resentment towards America and relish the opportunity to put us "in our place".
In return, our government has usually shrugged this off, being of the mindset that America is untouchable. Well, if there's one thing that 9/11 taught us, it's that we are not untouchable.
In my opinion, this autocratic attitude is the main reason why we've had to move from worrying about being hijacked or killed overseas (some years ago) to not feeling safe in our own backyards today.
I mean, why should we feel ashamed or somehow belittled to show due respect to our fellow nations?
Are we less than free citizens because we have to obey the law, pay taxes and be subject to punishment for not doing either?
Are adults still living at home any less adult (other than the fact that they're still living at home) just because they're subject to the house rules set down by their parents, even though they enjoy the freedom of managing their own affairs?
Are adults in general any less so because they have to continue to show their parents respect, long after moving out on their own and starting to live their own lives? No, no and no.
There really is no excuse for not dealing with our neighboring countries as sovereign equals or for not honoring the rules and regulations of our international group memberships.
In order to fix all of this, America must return to the roots of its independence so that it can rediscover its true meaning.
Not that long ago, our forefathers were victims of an authoritarian colonial master, the Draconian policies of which were driven and enforced by a tyrannical monarchy.
This great conqueror of nations had amassed a global empire, fiercely protected and continuously expanded by a seemingly invulnerable military the might of which was unequaled across the entire world... sound familiar?
The colonial masters pushed and pushed our forefathers, until the latter decided that enough was enough and started to push back - big time - and post-colonial America was born.
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So let's learn from the mistakes of that colonial master, lest we also go too far and wake up to a new world order someday in the near future.
Have a safe, happy, conscientious Independence Day, everyone!
Thanks for "hearing" me out.
Donna
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