America, My Beautiful

If a stranger were to stop me on the street, not with the intention of mugging me but of asking what being an American means to me, I may have to say that I do not know because I may have been one of the lucky ones. I was born here. I did not have to hide and cower or over my religious convictions or political affiliations, I do not have to wear a burqa or veil for modesty of reasons or risk being stoned, and growing up, I did not have to engage in child labor laws by squatting over a loom for ten hours a day. You can't say that over many places on Earth.

While this country is not perfect, there is a reason why we have an immigration rather than an emigration problem. And that's because like it or not, this is still "the land of the free and the home of the brave." This is one of the few countries on Earth where a person can come here with nothing, set up shop and do rather well for himself. Just look at Arnold Schwartzenegger, my father, my Armenian mechanic or anyone else who came here with little more than a hope and a dream or maybe a family connection or two and made something of himself.

And this is one of the few places in the world where you can pretty much write or say anything you want without fear of being carted off in the middle of the night. That's why it always kills me when people criticize this country. Sure there are those things that are wrong, sure there is still discrimination and those who are unfairly jailed, but if someone doesn't like things, they can always work, and here's the keyword here, in appropriate ways to try and change things. Otherwise, if they find the heat not to their liking, then they can always leave the kitchen.

But unless we tighten up our laws, stop making excuses for those who have spent a lifetime making excuses for themselves and stop letting any yahoo in, then we won't remain this way for long. Otherwise, I predict we will soon be riding away into third world country land.