WERE, ARE, COULD BE

     Most people, at various times of life, usually at crisis time, examine their lives. They ask the questions of the title: who was I, who am I, and who can or will I be. Will they continue on in their known path or will they make changes, large and small, in their path and emerge a different person, hopefully a worthier person, though there are those who simply double down on their resident evil and deepen the depth of their commitment to wrong, to greed, to oppression and suppression.
     This is the current situation of the nation today. We need to take stock of ourselves as that nation. Who were we, when we were founded, when we developed, when we walked the paths of growth? Did we do wrong? Did we work to correct those wrongs? Did we slip badly at times? What were our goals of the past and were they met or discarded as we moved into the present? This part requires honesty of backwards looking lenses and an acceptance that no one and no nation is perfect.
      Next, the nation must evaluate its current status. Who are we in this moment? Who are we in the daily lives of the world's nations? Have we been keeping lockstep with our national goals, our ethos as a nation, or has our present turned sour as we walk down the wrong path, the path of death for democracy - and in our lifetime, in the present, not in some nebulous future time.
     Part of the present time of evaluation is checking the leaders we have chosen, and there is no doubt about it but that our choice of leaders tells much about the nation's present status. We have chosen corrupt and corrupting individuals, those who sell the nation down the river; those who encourage others to flout the nation's ethos and break our three runged system of government as a nation. At present we have a nation in a moment of crisis, yes, but also in a moment of peril, peril such as we have never seen before.
     When a nation's leader(s) breaks the law, knowingly, openly, and the cohorts live in a moral vacuum, then the nation is in existential peril. It is not enough that the name of the USA continue to exist, but that the name represent what makes us proud, a nation of the world, a democracy true to our founding basis, true to the patriots who decided it was time to throw off the yoke of corruption and oppression, of wrong laws, and become a stand up, proud, and independent nation. It was not easy, but what have we done with their efforts and what are we doing now? 
     Today, if they were here, visiting us from the past, their wigs would fly off their heads, Washington and Lincoln would lay down their heads and weep, Madison and FDR would wonder why we have neglected their warnings and guidance. Ike would wonder what he fought for all those years and the haunting moans and sounds of weeping and pain from those killed due to hatred, to prejudice, to the ignoring of morality, will overwhelm the air waves of the present. Even JFK will have no inspirational phrases, words or speeches to help us out of the hole we have dug for ourselves, as we keep digging ever deeper. No, our present is certainly not rosy.
     The hardest part of the evaluation hits us now. Now, we as a nation, must make a choice. Who will we be if we continue as it is or sink ever further into the muck of hatred, of pervasive lies, over 15,000 already out of the chief liar, Trump, of exaggerations, of despair and supression, of opresssion and censorship of the falsest basis ever.
    No, he did not win an overwhelming landslide victory in 2016. In fact, he lost the popular vote by millions, and cheated his way into office. No, the 'new' treaty with Mexico and Canada is not new, only a rewriting of the old one. NO, the economy is not the best, job slots are low, the economy grew only 2% rather than their prediction of 3% or more, and his supposed historical treaty with China comes as a partial one, after so many trade war characteristics with a resulting anger that remains. His tax cuts gave money to the fatcats, who store it overseas, not a penny of it coming back to the nation. NO, there is no truth to this man and his cohorts, his sycophants who back him up just as those selfish and evil and blinded people supported Hitler.
    And here is when the individuals of a nation must examine themselves in the three time periods. What have we done, what are we doing, and what do we wish to do in the future? Have we been true to the past ideals which fueled the nation, to those who gave their lives for it, so that  we might have the privilege of living here, of having a Lady Liberty express our dreams and purpose in life? Are we living the best life we can, now, in the present, being the best people, person, we can  and should be? What will our present conduct and beliefs, our present activiites portend for the future.
     Will we be true, genuine Americans in every sense of the word or will we be something else? It has been said that "All are not huntsmen who can blow the hunter's horn." Are we to be the true huntsmen of today, the setters of a good and blessed future for the oncoming generations, or are we to blow the horn in a mournful reminder of the impending death of the world and all the individuals upon it? We need to be the best individuals we can be if we wish the nation to be so. Time to make choices, hard ones, to face the facts as they are, not as we want them to be, and do the right thing. Before it is too late and all huntsmen horns will be silenced forever. The window of opportunity, of reform, of safety is shrinking rapidly, and once closed, do not look for its opening again, only possibly small cracks as the brave people who recognize right and the true path of the nation, fight to right the wrongs, perhaps tilting at Don Quixote's windmills, but to do something is better than to do nothing, or worse, to aid the wrong along and to victory.