Imbolc Valentine Moon
I like this frame for the work of the next four years. It’s important to remember that it’s the same work the Tea Party and the Trump have engaged. And they’re doing better right now than we are.
“…recent events, here and elsewhere, revive the worry, expressed by Plato, that populist democracy can readily pave the way to dictatorship. Resisting this threat (and this temptation) is the first duty of today’s patriots.
The Bill of Rights, sometimes taken as a definitive statement of what freedom means, was in fact a hasty appendix to the Constitution and provided only a rough starting point subject to further amendment and continuous interpretive disputes. Instead of a vision of freedom, the founders gave us a framework for an indefinite continuation of their revolutionary struggle over what freedom should mean to Americans.
My proposal is that this endless, rancorous struggle for the soul of America is precisely what we should love about this country. (my emphasis) Patriotism is not sharing with our fellow citizens some anemic idealization of what freedom means. It is a matter of engaging them — with everything short of physical violence, from compelling argument to deft political maneuvers — in the rough-and-tumble of political conflict over how we should understand freedom. This conflict remains our only way of working toward the “life, liberty and pursuit of happiness” our revolution sought. True patriotism now requires not reaching across the aisle; it demands mounting the political barricades.” Rethinking Our Patriotism, Gary Gutting, NYT
