All American......

"After the ball is over......"

Remember when we were all Americans.....Has it been so long ago that we’ve forgot?
I recall when I was a boy, I was a Kentuckian ‘n I teased brother John ‘cause he was born in Ohio...it still upsets him that Mom ‘n Dad were visiting Dad’s parents in Ohio when he was born...
I can’t recall anyone identifying themselves as anything-American....
The population wasn’t as large then but the country itself was pretty much the same size.....well, the lower 48 at least. We added Alaska ‘n Hawaii which turned out t’be a good thing for Sarah Palin....
But going back a couple hundred years, anyone born in this country was considered t’be an American....’n anyone who immigrated here from any other place in the ‘hull world ‘n could take a citizenship test ‘n become an American....’n millions of people did just that....
I don’t know just when we began identifying each other as hyphenated Americans ‘n I don’t think it matters much long as the hyphen goes before American ‘n not after....
If you want t’be African-American or Arab-American or Irish-American, that’s okay with me. If you stay off my toes, I’ll sure try ‘n stay off yours....
I purposefully left off referring to American Indians as Native American because it’s my belief that anyone born here is a ‘native’ American...
As opposed to a ‘naturalized’ American who, common sense should tell you, was born somewhere other than this p’ticklar country. ..
Like the Governator....Arnold was born in Austria but he’s as American as apple strudel. I suppose that in some realm of imagination, y’might refer to him as an Austrian-American but you might want to make sure that you were smiling when you did it....
Now, I’ve made no secret that I believe the Democrat Party’s strategy of class warfare is a bad thing...the fact that they been doing it since Tammany Hall don’t make it right.....
And tho’ it has evidently been a successful strategy for the Obama campaign, first against Hillary ‘n then against the Republicans, it still don’t make it right....
Once upon a time, Americans believed that it ‘didn’t matter whether you won or lost, but how you played the game.’ Perhaps that was never really true, Perhaps winning is all important. No matter the cost. Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead. There’s no such thing as second place....
Of course, the bad thing about an all-out war is that no one wins. Everybody loses. And this campaign has split the country right down the middle to a degree not seen since the great Civil War...
Ah well, there was a time when we were all.....just Americans....
And if that’s too damn sappy for you, why you can just go piss up a rope.