Over the last 24 hours, the American People have seen two visions for America by its two major political parties this Independence Day Weekend.
The first, by the current occupant of the White House, Donald Trump, delivered last night on the national hallowed grounds of Mount Rushmore, called for American dystopia and segregation, Republican electoral dominance through national voter suppression, and a new Red Scare against imagined Communists and invading Immigrants.
Then you have three Democratic Responses from leading Executives who stressed hope and optimism for the future of the American Ideal on its 250th Birthday.
The first one below is from Maryland’s Governor Wes Moore. In his address, he spoke of the need for a selfless patriotism that serves others and unites communities, not the white nationalist kind that suppresses rights, denies services, scapegoats individuals or demographic groups, and corruptly profits from public service.
The next one is from California Governor Gavin Newsom. His address focused on the theme that Donald Trump is the epitome of everything the Founding Fathers fought to prevent: “forcing Americans to ask the question, ‘Do we still have a government that belongs to the American People?'”
In his remarks, Newsom called for a “Declaration of Election Independence, free from election manipulators and deniers. Freedom from the militarization of Election Day. Freedom from the fear of imprisonment if you don’t go along with Trump’s schemes.”
After exposing Mr. Trump’s unprecedented corruption as “A corruption story… a heist…corruption with a flag pin,” Newsom pointed out that history and the resilience of the American People have dealt with monsters like Donald Trump before, saying:
“…This is not the first time our country has been tested this way. Women marched by the thousands and chained themselves to fences for the right to vote, a right secured only 106 years ago. Americans marched, sat at lunch counters, walked through schoolhouse doors, faced lynchings and beatings, fighting for equal citizenship and the right of black Americans to vote without interference and without intimidation.
Every single time, every time, this country’s answer has been the same. We expand the promise. We do not abandon it.
250 years ago, it was a group of farmers, printers of shopkeepers. They looked at the most powerful empire on earth and refused to kneel. They faced certain death if they failed. But what they did was an idea. That’s what they had. Ordinary people with an idea that believed that they were fit to govern themselves.
That’s the miracle of America. At times in our history, we may have been wrong. Sometimes we’ve been cruel and we’ve fallen short of our own words. But we have never stopped reaching for that idea. Every generation, every generation, that promise is carried down the road.
Seneca carried it.
Selma carried it.
And now it’s in our hands. That’s the spirit that lives in every American who still believes their voice counts, who acts like it. Our freedom is guarded by you. When you show up, when you vote, when you participate, when you rise up, and you refuse, generation after generation, to let go of the wheel. So let’s keep our Democracy. Let’s prove one more time that this is a government of the people.
In his address, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani spoke of those who carry the mantle of Independence Day and their belief in American Exceptionalism, driven by American Drive and the inclusivity of Immigration to the United States to become part of the American Dream and Ideal, compared to those white supremacists who hold that “only a select few are allowed freedom, where not all are created equal. America, if you ask them, becomes less the more people it welcomes. America, they will tell you, belongs only to those with the right accent or the right shade of skin. The rest of us, they insist, should be grateful for merely being allowed to visit. How small they are, how weak, how unoriginal.”
Mamdani concluded his remarks with:
“Those ideals upon which our nation was built, they are strong enough to endure any authoritarian regime, but only if we reach for them.
Ours is a nation working each day towards the perfection in which it was conceived, a nation striving each day to better itself. Therein lies the work of America, the striving, the bettering, the reaching towards perfection. What a privilege each of us has to live in a nation that every one of its inhabitants can shape.
What a responsibility each of us possesses to prove ourselves worthy of all those who came before. What power each of us holds to bring America ever closer to the greatness so many have seen when they looked upon these shores, the greatness that for 250 years has been America.”
Discover more from Blog for Arizona
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.