The Death of the American Dream

By Jim Purcell

I was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1966 and grew up in a mighty nation. We were first in nearly everything in the world, be it sports, government, freedom, entertainment, education, manufacturing or commerce. The United States of America was the place to be, and we were the 'cool kids' on the world stage.

Back in the day, America was a place of joy and freedom.

Our nation still basked in the dimming glow of World War II where, in large part, this mighty nation took on the earthly forces of evil, in the nations and leaders of Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan, and beat those forces back to the Gates of Hell, where it was acknowledged by most they all belonged. And then, through the Marshall Plan (1948-51), it was this country, and no other, that breathed life back into a burning and bombed out world in Europe and Asia.

America had given hope to mankind everywhere man could be found, and our nation taught the world that freedom and peace were possible. Tyrants no longer had to be observed by oppressed people, because America had shown a new way, a better way that was possible. The depravity of evil no longer had to be the order of the day for peoples who could, for the first time in their cultural memories, hope to more than some dictator or cabal of miscreants.

America believed in things, and we as a people did not just talk about it. There was a president who misbehaved and, despite being the most powerful single world leader alive, he was removed from office not by force of arms or by treachery, but by the will of the people of the United States. President Richard M. Nixon, the 37th President of the United States, left office on Aug. 9, 1974 after the Washington Post published a series of articles explaining improprieties that took place under Nixon's direction. And...not one shot was fired. No one was murdered. The American Experiment of the Founding Fathers proved itself and the American Dream of peace and prosperity, belief in our Constitution and our Rule of Law all worked.

Republicans grumbled about Nixon's departure, Democrats crowed about it. A nation mourned because of it. But, all was as it was supposed to be. And, as for Nixon, he went on to be a best-selling author, speaker and unofficial statesman. Everyone won. Nobody lost. God Bless America.

America was not without its flaws: a war of sorts happened in this country during the 1960s and early 70s regarding civil rights for Black Americans and women's rights; the war in Vietnam, unpopular and convoluted was repudiated by the American people, and America withdrew from that war; and how we all were inspired by the words, deeds and sacrifices of men like John and Bobby Kennedy, Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X. As a nation, we beat down those who would plunge this nation into Hell with peace and intelligence. God, it was a mighty thing to see.

The America I described no longer exists, I am sad to say. We have gone from a nation of great and good people and become a people cowed into accepting conditions that are revolting to the precepts and ideals of this nation.

God Bless America? I think not. 

It is 2014 as I write this, and we are a country that no longer bears any likeness to that great nation we were in years past. We are unworthy of the title of Americans, who live in the Great United States, leaders of the world and purveyors of freedom. We are a measly place of little people, small feuds, bureaucrats and political self-interest. We are a vomitous version of the shining city on a hill that was almost real, almost America. And, it is sickening to live to see.

As a nation, we carry out optional wars of misadventure in far-flung places in the world for no actual reason other than what leaders tell us: Somehow, these are for "freedom." They cannot say how and the reasons Americans are told we fight are frequently lies. These lies support the wealth of oil companies and private-sector companies whom the very politicians who make war have investments in. We fight wars for investors' returns and not for freedom anymore. Accordingly, America loses such wars. God did not bless these. Our Founders did not invent this country for this barbarity.

There are those we call "Right Wing" political ideologues who, despising fair reporting, have created their own propaganda machines on television and Online to regurgitate lies and half-truths to act as a balm for the Great Unwashed to encourage them into the insanity that is everywhere today in American society.

These Right Wing, Tea Party people try magic itself: Tell women they cannot control their own bodies because God will not have it; tell the poor to die quietly on America's streets, send all of our nations jobs overseas and blame the workers who lost their jobs, close down legitimate news sources and harass real reporters who would speak truth to power and say it was Jesus who said it was OK.

I will not convince anyone of anything in this editorial. It is written for the writing and I fear not the reading. My own children, able and smart women, believe me mad for some of my beliefs, because I remember freedom and recall how sweet it tasted every single day; before cameras at stop lights, armed guards on the White House Christmas Tree, concrete boulders in front of airports and authoritarian government taken to its illogical extreme. But, I believe it nonetheless, the way that some Jeremiah lost in the woods looks upon Jerusalem and sees it turned into a sour pit of evil. I am not saying there is any hope. I am saying hope has fled and that the Great America I worshiped so dearly is gone. And what is left is desolate. It is a thing of no value, it is as hollow as the American Dream today.

Our police are not here to observe order. They are here to vent their murderous ways onto the public, and for whatever money they can  steal to supplement their paychecks. Our politicians are little better than street-walking whores, less virtuous than whores because a whore does not lie about what she does for a living. Our art is plastic. Our great paintings are cartoons. Our symphonies are "Rap." So be it.

I cannot change this world, but I can hide from it. I am a broken old man, simply waiting upon his pension to make his final move to a sunny American Shore where I can turn off the radio and see the water shine for as many years as God may give me. Be quiet? Probably not. I do not know how to be quiet. I will not be quiet. But, I will seek to find peace away from reading the news of the day or hearing about the Great Causes this army of morons, miscreants, meanderers and murderers of the American Dream espouse and shake their tin cup to bring to life. I do not choose to hear the fallacious words of the day, nor see the shiny medals these murderers of the Dream present themselves against the dimming light of our nation's glory.

Yes, Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at see, our vessel has been struck by an iceberg and already there are bodies pitched from the smooth, clean deck into the icy, murderous waters of the frozen Atlantic. No ship shall see our signal. And, everyone is lost. No help is possible and no signal will work.

Well, now that I have brightened the days of everyone who read this far, have a lovely rest of the day.


(Jim Purcell is an award-winning journalist, who has garnered recognition by the United States Congress and the NAACP, among others. He is a former U.S. Army Intelligence Analyst and Publisher of The Courier newspaper, in Middletown, New Jersey. And, Mr. Purcell graduated from the New York Theological Seminary, in Manhattan, NY in 2010.)