For multitudes of Americans over many generations; liberalism has rightfully been seen as the most powerful expression of patriotic symbolism of what it means to hold the values that distinguish Americans from the rest of the peoples of the world.
Ever since George W. Bush was selected to the presidency by the Supreme Court after the 2000 presidential election between Al Gore, the Democrat who won the popular vote by some half a million and Bush, the Republican who used a network of cronies and a five to four advantage on the Supreme Court to gain the White House; there has been a steady but perceptible rise among Americans who have redeclared their faith in liberalism. And by the time Bush illegally invaded Iraq, declaring oneself a liberal reclaimed a long over due, positive and patriotic meaning.
For liberals, Vietnam meant a long and tortuous journey through the wilderness of American politics; always far from the seat of American power and influence in the nation and across the world; liberals were dominated by American conservatives who mocked the term liberal into near oblivion. But perhaps liberals are finally exiting from their self-imposed exile from wielding power as the leadership and voice of the United States.
It is a new kind of patriotism that liberal Americans should demonstrate. It is a patriotism that fashions its policies and opinions from the constitution. The very constitution that the founding fathers crafted in such a way that it would be adaptable to the changing needs of a dynamic and ever-growing nation. Americanism is the dynamism of capital regulated and guarded against the unfettered challenges mounted by reactionary voices for the chaos of a marketplace left to it's own designs. Liberalism is the grand voice spoken by the constitution from which Americanism gains it's resonance as the voice of freedom that protects the powerless who petition to the constitution's authority of granting the rule of law against those who would rather cast a shadow over the light of freedom and knowledge to bring obfuscation and create a government ruled by turmoil and disarray.
When Obama spoke before the masses who stood before him on the great Mall; he was speaking to the true spirit and nature of nearly 2 million Americans who chose to witness the rebirth of an American nation that owes it's greatest accomplishments to liberalism and the influences of liberal thought and actions. They stood together, shoulder to shoulder and braved the icy winds of the last several decades that have kept liberalism at bay and beholden to its conservative masters.
But still they stood there to listen to a single brave voice that has come to represent the hopes and aspirations of a nation's people. Those who have had to live under the disastrous thumb of a powerful elite that felt no pity or shame in using Americans for their own purposes of attaining self grandeur and everlasting wealth.
No, the voices we have heard from Washington and from all corners of our nation over the last several decades since they vilified the freethought of the late60s; have had one purpose and only one purpose in mind; to trample and obliterate the honor filled message of liberalism and its greatest achievement, the Constitution of the United States born of liberal genius and put to paper as the great protector of liberalism.
Running counter to the connivers who reshaped the foundation of Americanism from the liberal rights of the individual into a thing wholly made up and recreated in mythical terms twisted from Frederick Jackson Turner's "frontier thesis" that spoke of a new "coarseness and strength combined with acuteness and inquisitiveness; that practical, inventive turn of mind, quick to find expedients; that masterful grasp of material things, lacking in the artistic but powerful to effect great ends; that restless, nervous energy, that dominant individualism, working for good and for evil."
For liberals to reclaim their famous dictum of individualism from the wellspring of liberalism's productive expression of the American spirit; it's Americanism that connects rather than individualizes while the myth makers have asserted the power of the individual defines the American spirit of patriotism. No, patriotism's true nature is found in its inherent power gained from liberalism to shape once individualized and separated human beings into the collective expression of Americanism: to give us the power of becoming a connected people.
We must stand prepared to rekindle liberalism's compassionate and protecting spirit for the person who is a victim of social discrimination or political injustice. That is the true spirit of Americanism that is produced from the great abundant source of liberal though and practice.
We have been reminded by this new patriotic Americanism that liberalism empowers those who choose to make America their new homeland through hard work on their journey to achieve the American dream.
The patriotism of liberal Americanism issues the path to freedom from oppressive powers that would build barricades and obstacles to impede the collective march of millions of feet pounding, and millions of voices sounding the call for change.
The individualism that is produced by liberal voices calls out in welcoming expressions for a return to our heritage that was and shall ever be that of a multicultural nation teeming with individuals of different backgrounds and ethnic origins who struggle together to give shape to liberal Americanism as the sublime takes form as everyday improving performances.
That is where the American dream exists. Found within the struggles to take change and shape it anew into the practice of each day from the grass roots upward.
No more trickle down. Just the spirit of change to coalesce among those who move forward from the liberal wellspring; to let America be America once again; turning away from intolerance and plutocracy.
To once again celebrate the artistry of our greatest achievements won at the local and regional levels that combine and collect to tell of the rich tapestry of Americas past.
These works of rediscovery and revitalization are once again called for by ordinary voices in search of their glory-filled rich past of individuals working together to achieve collective knowledge that dispels the fictions of false beliefs.
The liberal patriotism of America also sings out to provide thought provoking harmonies that this land is your land and is to be governed for the well-being of the poorest of the poor rather than the richest of the rich.
The rediscovery of the civic virtue of liberalism holds the key for our richest and most aw inspiring form of Americanism; its liberal heritage that deserves to be spoken of freely from the hearts of progressives; it must reclaim its rightfully privileged place as the founding ideal of Americanism; this return of liberal patriotism.
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