What has happened to America? Part II

In an addendum to my "What has happened to America?" post, I can't help but to see the strong correlations between what has happened to America over the past 40 years, and Mahatma Ghandi's "Seven Deadly Sins". While reading each of these, reflect on the state of our country. You will find countless examples of each one:

1. Wealth without Work
2. Pleasure without Conscience
3. Science without Humanity
4. Knowledge without Character
5. Politics without Principle
6. Commerce without Morality
7. Worship without Sacrifice

(On an unrelated note, many times I use Ghandi's "Science without Humanity" as an argument against embryonic stem cell research. It drives the Lib's nuts to have their beliefs corrected by Ghandi.)

The troubles of America are not specific to our history. Scottish historian Alexander Fraser Tytler (1747-1843) documented the sequence of the ascent and decline of past, great civilizations a few years before America was even established. Here are his stages with my citations alongside in parenthesis specifically reflecting on American History:

1. From bondage to spiritual faith (The Mayflower voyage fleeing from religious persecution.);
2. From spiritual faith to great courage (the American Revolution- country farmers taking on the greatest military strength in the world.);
3. From courage to liberty (The signing of the Declaration of Independence and Constitutional Convention.);
4. From liberty to abundance (The Industrial Revolution);
5. From abundance to complacency (Post Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal.);
6. From complacency to apathy (Where we are now, not caring or feeling helpless about a trillion dollar bail-out.);
7. From apathy to dependence (Our next 10 years with the Govt. owning our banks, businesses, health care and lives. Supplying our societal and individual survival with government handouts.);
8. From dependence back into bondage. (Where our children and grandchildren will be paying for this obscene debt. Never being able to get ahead regardless of how hard they work.)

Tytler also furnishes us with this relative warning for our times:

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years."

So as this pork-laden "stimulus" bill is passed this weekend, America will get exactly what it voted for. My hope is that this era will not be followed by a "dictatorship", but by a group of dynamic, young conservative leaders who will give America back to those who they are supposed to represent. Abraham Lincoln's pertinent words echo in my head , "We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth."