50 years - From MLK's "Mountaintop" to Trump's sewer
On April 3, 1968, Martin Luther King gave his last speech. His words were inspiring and appealed to the best in humans. And his words were also prophetic in that he said, "... I've been to the mountaintop and I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you ..." The next day, he was assassinated.
Many from that era believed it was, not only the end of King's "dream," but the end of the "American dream."
Turned out it was the beginning of a great decline. Within months, Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, the Democratic Party was torn to shreds in Chicago, Richard Nixon came to power, and America started down that "slippery slope."
And now, in the era of Trump, that "slippery slope" has become a water slide with no bottom. The corruption that drives Trump and the entire Republican Party seems to be devouring any hope that this nightmare will end. There is now a rot at the core of the American dream and many have given in to despair.
So what now? Well, high school students across the country, a reinvigorated women's movement, and teachers striking against decrepit school systems are showing us the way. The vast majority of Americans are fed up with the plague of a billionaire-owned political system. So it seems there's much more we can do besides voting. Write, march, protest, walk out, but don't give up. Participate.
It may seem as though we are up against a monstrous system that can't be defeated. But that's the same way it looked to Martin Luther King and millions of others, 50 years ago, in that horrible year of 1968. But they acted. And, for a while, they changed the world.
Now it's our turn.
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