The best in the world?

Comments like “The greatest country on earth” continue to be expressed even when things are bad. Are comments like this mental cover-up? Are they intended to show patriotism or some form of denial?

We like to think that we are the greatest and the best even when facts show otherwise.
Based on our current depressed economy and financial crisis, if we are considered the best, what does that say about the rest of the world?

Is our unemployment the best in the world?
Is our currency the best in the world?
Are our politicians the best in the world?
Is the misery of our citizens the best in the world?

Living on our past successes and accomplishments doesn’t count. We are as good as what we are doing today.

A positive mental outlook is important; however being in a state of denial is not a healthy attitude. If we refuse to recognize our faults, our failures, we tend to compound the problem by accepting the bad as good.

Being critical is healthy. It means we care. It also reflects our desire to make things better. Ignoring our faults or failures by living in the past is to accept defeat. We are never defeated until we give up. I don’t think Americans have a give-up mentality. That mentality needs stimulation to affect positive change. If we want to live in the past, then it is better to think of the things that were done that led to success and start doing them again. Actions are the catalyst to change, not wishful thinking.

I guess I say that because some days I become tired of expressing the doom and gloom. It's as though saying those words will make it true since I have no financial power to make a real difference.

I do believe that for me this is the best country in the world because it is the country of my birth and where I have the most experience and had the most hope for a quality life. I lived in other exciting countries but always felt detached from their fabric. Here, the fabric includes me.

I'm also part of the hoopla generation that participated in corporate sessions that started with "we are great and getting better" chanted by an audience to accompany the latest guru. There was something catching about the mantra whether it was true.

Even at or greatest, we have a history of political corruption, greed and divisions due to bigotry and bias. So, I'm not exactly a "look back to greatness" person either unless victory in World War II makes us great. Our "greatness" is measured by our middle class, a product of the aftermath of prosperity following World War II.

I think Bush though a war would bring back prosperity and his own popularity. He was wrong. There is too much tribal bloodshed across the globe sucking the life out of nations.

Perhaps it's our potential for greatness that I claim. Our potential is certainly there. Exploiting that potential in this climate of "I got mine and you aint' taking it" is questionable. President Obama took on an impossible task - and he's experiencing the impossibility.

I guess my biggest problem with the statement has to do with the emphasis on"country." It has a nationalist ring to it that separates countries one from the other. We just can't do that anymore. Is this crisis can teach us one thing, it must be that we are all in this together. To place praise or blame on one country or another misses the whole point. Which of this country's founding fathers said, "If we don't hang together, we shall all hang separately"? What was then true for this group of "uniting states" is true for all states and nations around the globe.

We are all one humanity. We all share in the responsibility for keeping the whole world safe and sustainable for the future generations.

Ann

Ann, a global view is not the temperament of this country. It is the temperament of her corporations for the purpose of profit.

I'm not sure I understand that one, DK. I do get that the corporations would like to exploit the idea, but that isn't the direction I'm coming from.

And, it's true that there are many in this country who don't hold that world view, but maybe they should.

As long as we see borders between countries and hold on to our nationalist perspectives, we will need to protect those boundaries from "outsiders."

It's that thinking, to my mind, that leads to wars. The "my country is better than your country" idea grew out of the "our god is more powerful than your god" concept.

That was the perspective I was speaking from.

Ann

I agree with you Ann, in theory. I am realistic enough to be discouraged by the rebirth of separatism in this country cloaked as patriotism. The hatred toward illegal immigrants, the cries against aiding those pitiful people in the world who are starving, the religious hypocrisy and the elitism all trouble me.

dkchristi wrote:

I agree with you Ann, in theory. I am realistic enough to be discouraged by the rebirth of separatism in this country cloaked as patriotism. The hatred toward illegal immigrants, the cries against aiding those pitiful people in the world who are starving, the religious hypocrisy and the elitism all trouble me.

Ann