Wednesday, December 4, 2024

This Generation’s Task: Save Democracy | By Louie Overstreet

October 1, 2022 by  
Filed under Community

BY LOUIE OVERSTREET

Louie Overstreet

The generation before mine, America’s greatest generation, are dying off at the rate of 600 a day. They were tasked with saving the world from tyranny and they completed their task in a magnificent way!

My generation was tasked with promoting and preserving civil and human rights. We got off to a decent start in the 1960s, but as we play through the back nine of life, the jury is still out on how well we managed our task. This is primarily due to the fact we did not heed the saying, “the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

This generation’s task is to save democracy. Let me tell you, from my vantage point, their grade could well be given out as early as on November 8, 2022.

The present generation gives me the distinct impression that not even an alarm clock can wake them up. Not to make sure they wake up for work on time, but to alert them to the clearest and most present danger since Lincoln stated, “America will not be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedom, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”

In my self-appointed role of town crier, on occasion I use hyperbolic language to create fear and disagreement among uninformed villagers. However, such is not the case when I cry out that American democracy is at a tipping point in terms of becoming unbalanced due to numerous un-American activities being sanctioned by the rulers of a major political party.

These dogmatists did not exist in the first decade of this millennium; however, their extreme ideology is now fully capable of causing the collapse of our constitutional federal republic.

Preventing this collapse now rests firmly with the present generation, despite their demonstrated lack of any sense of responsibility. As such, democracy could well perish, if typical off-year voter turnout in south of 50%. We need the present generation to create a turnout north of 62% to save our nation from tribalism. No, make that cannibalism.

Speak Your Mind

Tell us what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!

Comment moderation is in use. Please do not submit your comment twice -- it will appear shortly.