December 9 10, 2014

After a day like today yesterday, I still love America.

After years like the last six we’ve barely survived, I still love America. After a Great Recession that’s robbed so much, from so many, I still love America. After a descent into the pit of hell that is retro-racism and witnessing Black life after Black life being snuffed out by thugs with badges, as hard as it is, I still love America.

Now, after the hell it’s been to read about the morally-corrupt behavior of the repugnant Bush-Cheney administration and its horrific war crimes against humanity – that is what the US Senate Select Intelligence Committee’s report on torture is – I still love America and reserve my right to go tell my indignation on the mountain.

“I love America more than any other country in the world and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.”
― James Baldwin

A country that doesn’t love and respect all of its own cannot respect itself. A country that doesn’t respect all lives cannot claim to have a moral soul. A country that behaves amorally with some, behaves amorally with itself.

Like James Baldwin, I still love America and I reserve the right to criticize her in perpetuity.

“You write in order to change the world … if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way people look at reality, then you can change it.”
― James Baldwin