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[Sequoia]

Paine's Counsel For a New Time That Tries Men's Souls
by Harvey J. Kaye

Eager to reconnect with the Spirit of 1776, Americans have turned biographies of George Washington, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton - along with histories of our War for Independence such as David McCullough's "1776" - into huge best-sellers. We celebrate the Founders' audacity and commitment, marvel at their battlefield heroics, literary talents and political wisdom, and heatedly debate their collective and respective flaws and contradictions.

However, as the failure of local, state and federal governments to respond promptly to the disasters in Louisiana and Mississippi all too tragically revealed, we have ignored the most important point of the story: that the American Revolution, for all its failings and sins of omission, was fought to create a political and social order radically different from those of the monarchical and aristocratic states of the Old World.

Even as we have been enthusiastically reading about the Founders, we have been foolishly turning away from their greatest legacy: the idea that government should be dedicated to the pursuit of the public good - not the good of selected families. For a generation now, while cutting taxes for the rich and welfare provisions for the neediest, we have allowed our material inequalities to intensify, our social and cultural divisions to widen, our industrial and commercial foundations to weaken, our national and local infrastructures to decay, and our capacities to prepare for and respond to threats to our national security and freedom to decline.

When Americans declared their independence from Britain, they firmly believed they were not acting simply for themselves. They imagined that they were acting in behalf of future generations and humanity at large.

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http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1111-28.htm

My hero of all time.