Do You Hear the People Sing?

by Irene Daniel

This question captured my imagination this week. This cry for democracy -- the right of every human being to choose his or her own destiny -- is the never-ending cry of humanity all over the world. Today we hear that cry in Hong Kong, China. We heard it in Egypt during the Arab Spring of a couple of years ago. This song has been sung in India, Africa and South America. It used to be our song too.

They want what we have here in the United States: the right to vote and to choose our own leadership. And yet, here in the land of the free, most of us don't exercise that precious right of choice in mid-term elections like this one. And local elections not held during presidential election years go largely unnoticed. This precious right, bought by the endless blood, sweat and tears of generations of Americans, and for which people all over the world are clamoring, often goes ignored here.

And I started to wonder just what song the American people are singing today. It seems that we are all singing different songs, in different keys, to a different measure. Our current American song is one of discord and dissention. The right wing extremists sing a song of separation from the rest. While in Ferguson, Missouri, the song of the people there asks a different question: Which side are you on, boys? Which side are you on?

And we are, of course, free to choose whatever song we want to sing here in the home of the brave. But we have all witnessed the miraculous power of the iron American will when we are all singing the same song. When we sing in tune and in time, there is nothing that we can't do; I mean absolutely nothing.

During WWII, the captains of industry and President Roosevelt halted their war with one another to go to war with Nazi Germany, fascist Italy and the Empire of Japan. Ford Motor Company shipped tanks and equipment to Stalin to help the Russians fight Hitler on the eastern front. Big business, big labor and big government were all singing the same song then, united against a common enemy.

And when President Kennedy challenged us to go to the moon, big business, big labor and big government took us there -- and back, a bunch of times. Growing up in the sixties, I remember what a big deal it was, and how much pride we all felt at that moment when Neil Armstrong took that "giant leap for mankind." Not even the sky can limit us Americans when we sing together, united in common purpose.

So what song will we sing in the 21st century? Will we band together and unite against our 21st century challenges? Or will we all drown each other out and be drowned by the rising tide of climate change? Or financial collapse? Or global terrorism? Armageddon may very well be upon us, and it has many opportunities to simply wipe us out, especially if we continue with our discordant note.

Will this be our Swan Song? Or can we, once again, realize the power of our American greatness when we are all on the same page?

Sometimes we need big government to solve big problems. But that government is powerless without the will of the people, the cooperation of capital and the muscle of our American workers.

We have faced big challenges before, and we have excelled and become a stronger people as a result. It's up to you, America! We are all in the same boat now. Do we choose to be apart from, or a part of, our 21st century American song?


                                                                                      Copyright 2014, All rights reserved, Irene Daniel