The End of the "Me" Generation?
Beyond the constitutionally mandated annual State of the Union addresses, presidential speeches to a joint session of Congress — of the kind that President Barack Obama delivered on health care reform last week — are historically rare.
In fact, in the first 124 years of the United States, John Adams was the only president who — just once — addressed a joint congressional session. So barring a major national security crisis, it's a good bet that President Obama will not be speaking anytime soon to another joint session on Capitol Hill.
On Sept. 9, 2009, Obama successfully reminded many listeners why he was — other than Franklin D. Roosevelt — only the second Democratic presidential nominee in U.S. history to win more than 50.1 percent of the nation's popular vote.
Yes, he persuasively made his case for reforming the nation's health care system. But what captured my attention and raised my spirits was that President Obama, in addition to rightly casting the question of who receives health care as a moral issue, actually treated us, his fellow citizens, as if we were capable of thinking beyond our own narrow self-interest.
He read from the dying Ted Kennedy's final letter to him: "What we face is above all a moral issue; at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character our country."
Obama added that "large-heartedness — concern and regard for the plight of others — is not a partisan feeling. It's not a Republican or Democratic feeling. It, too, is part of the American character — our ability to stand on other people's shoes; a recognition that we are all in this together."
Here, the president was not going through the predictable routine of just telling each of us exactly what was in it for each of us. Instead, he told you and me what was "in it" for us and for our fellow Americans: calling us all to be full partners in an admirable national community that honors and embodies justice.
For too long, our political language has been impoverished. Candidates from both parties regularly pander to us (successfully, let it be noted) as shallow and selfish individuals with the same question: Are you better off than you were two — or four, or eight — years ago?
The question, rather than "Am I better off?" ought to be, instead: "Are we better off? Are the strong among us more just? Are the weak among us more secure? Are the people who grow and harvest our food, the people who clean our offices, park our cars, care for our children (in addition to their own) and change the soiled sheets on our hospital beds — are they, our brothers and our sisters, better off?"
The political leader who believes that we might actually respond to a reminder of our obligations as well as the privileges of American citizenship pays us a genuine compliment. Is it possible that we just might be witnessing the sunset of the "Me Generation" and, perhaps, even approaching the dawn of a "We Generation" — where we recognize our interdependence and all that we owe to each other?
We may not be the masters of our destiny. But we can still be the captains of our souls and our brother's keeper. That, too, is an essential part of the American character.
To find out more about Mark Shields and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.
DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM
COPYRIGHT 2009 MARK SHIELDS
 Email updates
 RSS Feed
|
|
 |
|
|
4 Comments | Post Comment
|
|
Sir;...It might seem strange to the many people in the world with a group ethic, identity, and responsibility that we think of ourselves as individuals... The process of becoming individuals, and the philosophy of individualism has been slow in growing and long in coming to fruition; but we see that fruit in the likes of Mr. Madoff who preyed upon every group to which he may be said to have belonged...Of course, Nietzsche could rail at St. Paul for inventing the individual, and the equal individual at that... Of course, it was unfair that the innocent should suffer hell fire for the crimes of their guilty community... But, we should all understand when we talk about the individual -just how elusive is that quality...An innovative Roman, in writing of the Law of Nations, the beginning of our natural law, thought all nations were equal...It is a big step from having equal standing with all others by virtue of ones nation to having equal status as an individual... Who is to defend ones rights but ones own kin??? Today we have a nation made up of many people from many lands with no common mother but our shared notion of liberty and justice for all... Yet, what kind of nation are we when we deny this Alma Mater, this soul mother of our common existence.. First goes humanity, then goes civility, and finally goes peace and security... Do we believe in this place and the shared ethic that gave us birth and life??? If we can say that for the rich to have all the poor shall have nothing, or that the poor should pay to fight for a land that does not give them hope or sustinence we then give lie to our Declaration of Independence, and to the purposes for which we were constituted... This is our land, and as much as we shall look we will never find in it an individual morality... There is no reason for morality, and reason argues against all morality...If we do not feel for this place, for our brothers and sisters, our children and our old, our healthy and infirm then we do not belong here... Reason is individual, and from the perspective of the individual... Reason sees all from a certain perspective to a certain advantage... Morality is not reasonable... People do not rush into burning buildings, or swim to save the drowning child out of reason...And people do not care for the body politic because it is reasonable, or even cost effective... Reason shouts: Every man for himself -and fools listen... Yet, the simple fact is that no society has survived individualism while all people came out of communalism... The legal individual is only about a thousand years old, and it has been individualistic societies that have run over the top or communal, and primitive societies... They are also the ones that have brought us to the edge of ecological disaster, over population, widespread famine and disease, and nuclear holocaust... It is individual societies that make war as we know it, and war would not be possible without masses of nameless, faceless nobodies to the individuals who choose war...Though we think we are individuals in a society that prizes the individual we are not, but are uniform, buying off the shelf the fashion of the day...All that is missing from our lives is the understanding that we are in this life together... We need a common defense of rights, and while this suggests a sort of communism, formal communism would never be necessary... Every community is that group that defends the rights of its members... If this society does not defend the rights of all its members it is not the community of all...Those who attack the common defense of rights, in this case, to life, as health care is- as communism -do so out of demagoguery... They seek an advantage that destroys the nation for their individual benefit... They do not belong here, and should go, or recognize in their neighbors their equals in all things, especially in their desire for life, and for the necessities of life...Thanks...Sweeney
Comment: #1
Posted by: James A, Sweeney
Sat Sep 12, 2009 6:06 AM
|
|
Not sure you're quite clicking right on this one, Mark: "Are the people who grow and harvest our food, the people who clean our offices, park our cars, care for our children (in addition to their own) and change the soiled sheets on our hospital beds — are they, our brothers and our sisters, better off?" ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The answer is a resounding "no", and way too many of these folks are the very same illegal immigrants who even our president has decided should be screwed out of healthcare reform. Doesn't seem like the cup of large-hearted warmth runneth over for them, or is likely to any time soon. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The remainder of the folks in that group are SEIU members or should hope to be. (Forget the UFW, they've lost their relevance to anything other than controversy over what to charge a vanishing membership for union dues.) Maybe you're thinking of all those future SEIU members, but I don't think it's large-heartedness that will get them where they want to go. On the other hand, organizing muscle will. Hope they can do it without card check. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's what to advocate for illegal immigrants: Free healthcare, education, and auto insurance financed by a special tax levied on all the industries known to employ them in significant numbers. Let those brilliant business tycoons start paying for all the misery their easy-money employment practices shuck off on the rest of society to clean up or put up with. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Those industries, many of which you mentioned in that quote, Mark, build illegal immigrants and the fantasy cost of employing them into their very business models, and they will be the first to stop any true attempt to prevent illegals from coming here.
Comment: #2
Posted by: Masako
Sat Sep 12, 2009 10:11 AM
|
|
Re: Masako; ... Sir.. A friend once told me that consumerism was revolutionary because when people begin to demand value for the money that they give their lives to earning then the end of business as usual is near...We do not get value for our labor in this land, not from those who employ us, or from those who govern us... How dare I speak falsely??? We cannot be governed, especially by those who cannot govern their own excesses and desires, and are then ruled... The leaders in this land are that few in number that they are free to choose what is right when opposed to expedience most of the time, and in the dark... The vast numbers who vote representatives into office are no more firm than a fat man's flesh...They fear the evaporation of their majorities on winds of prejudice and bigotry...In a democracy it is the minority which should govern so long as the many go along....Now, the many govern -or at least decides upon who will govern, and the few MUST go along... Where then is the protection for minority rights??? Where is the protection for any rights??? Property is always in conflict with true rights, just as now we see profits against life-as if the right to bleed the population is a right when in conflict with the right to life...Let's talk about rights... Property once demanded human chattle to stuff up its maw, and war once ravaged this land so slaves could choke the beast of property one day more...We are not better off than they if we cannot buy freedom with our toil -or life with our wages...Until the population will rise up and say; My life is worth preserving -we will never hear what so many have been weeping -that our lives are all worth preserving... Luxury, profits, property, and wealth win every moral argument... We cannot justify them and justify ourselves, our society, and our sacrifices...There is a simple reason why societies fail... They cannot afford luxury for all..Sooner or later the meaningless excess of one means only one single fact: That people must die....Food is taken from the mouths of babes, and why not medicine???We may well make a mistake of thinking the boundless rich are happy, but the misery of the poor knows no bounds...And it is pointless to tell people to stand up for their human rights when no one feels like anybody until they have more than they will ever need... The poverty of the body feeds the poverty of the soul until moral standing and life both depart...We have a criminal element in this society just as in every other, and left unchallenged, that group has come to run us through a rat hole into our graves so that they alone can own the whole place... Sorry, but I don't accept it... Individualism; irresponsible individualism is the cause, and responsible individualism is the key...People should demand their lives and value life, and if they did this, there would be no nest on our body politic for parasites....Thanks.... Sweeney
Comment: #3
Posted by: James A, Sweeney
Mon Sep 14, 2009 5:57 AM
|
|
Geez, Mr. Sweeney, I love ya, but it seems like you write the same nonspecific philosophical stuff every time, and it could be in response to what anybody says. If I can't get it, that means 99% plus of everybody else who's reading can't either. Can't we be more responsive to the specific issue at hand and get to the point? Sorry--I do like what you write, but I would like to hear more about what you think of the specific issue. Cheers. Masako
Comment: #4
Posted by: Masako
Tue Sep 15, 2009 8:12 PM
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
