Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, July 4, 1995 TAG: 9507050037
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
WHAT makes America great?
My father had only a seventh-grade education. My mother had only an eighth-grade education until receiving her general equivalency diploma after we children were grown. Yet they managed to rear and educate three children.
My brother and I have master's degrees, and my sister is a registered nurse. In America, stories such as these aren't unusual as people rise above their class and circumstances everyday to become what they are capable of becoming.
In another family in my community, a young woman who had four children was left widowed. Even though she worked a low-paying factory job and all her children had to work during their high-school years, all four have professional degrees. One is a dentist, one is a lawyer, one is a teacher and one is an interior decorator. There are many other examples like these just in my hometown, and untold numbers of success stories like these across the United States.
Three things make America great, and they go hand in hand:
This is truly the land of opportunity, and a person may make of this opportunity what he or she will.
There is a certain disregard for class structure in this country, which makes it possible for the talented and hard-working to succeed and to elevate themselves above the station to which they were born.
There are people, like my parents, who are resourceful enough to use the opportunities that come their way.
SUSAN V. TEMPLE
ROCKY MOUNT
CHOICES
Americans can pursue any dream
PEOPLE LIKE me.
I was born to a couple who gave me the heritage to believe in God, country and the rights of everyone. I was taught that if you visited a place, you should leave it in better shape or as good as when you arrived.
Where else but in America can an uneducated person take a 39-cent fountain pen and make as much as a doctor or lawyer? In America, you can dream and pursue your dreams without fear. You can plan your future. And if you really try, you can achieve your goals.
In my 72 years, I have had the pleasure of being in several foreign countries. The worst day an American could have is better than the best day people in foreign countries have.
Is our greatness at risk? Only if we lose sight of what made this country so great - that is, our freedom of choice. The one thing we can do is vote. This is the only free thing we have that no one can take away from us.
R. KENT WRIGHT
ROANOKE
DIVERSITY
Rich with resources of its people
AMERICA IS great because of its people. The majority of those who live here believe in others as well as themselves.
They work hard, play fair, and support the freedoms of life even while facing the worst conditions that losers can throw at them.
They complain, undercut their competition, exploit even the most intelligent, and survive the pitfalls of greed and selfishness by sharing whatever they have when others need it.
America is reality and expediency combined. It will never succumb to the tyranny of political dynasties, and the God its people believe in cannot be bought, sold or destroyed.
The land is quiet and beautiful one day; an ogre of activity and change the next. The consistencies of its laws and promises breed strength and determination to make life better. Each new idea has its chance to survive, and should it be stolen, there is a form of justice that will eventually correct the records.
America is a combination of people whose customs, beliefs, ambitions and dreams keep the heart of this country pumping in the synchronized rhythm of music inspired by hope and the future.
America is home, freedom and opportunity. It's simple and complicated; success and failures. It's also the epitome of a natural resource unequaled anywhere else in the world - its people. They make America great.
JOANN DANIEL
LEXINGTON
CITIZENS
No need to resort to revolution
WHAT makes America great? The citizens of this great country, having discovered after 40 years and the expenditures of $3 trillion that liberalism is merely a grab for power and a failure, still have the freedom to change the size of our government and the way it works without having to resort to revolution.
PHIL T. PAFFORD
ROANOKE
SECOND BEST
Tax rates are not burdensome
WHAT I think makes America great is that it's the second least-taxed country in the world.
WILLIAM R. VEST
ROANOKE
LAND OF PLENTY
Others never had it so good
WE THE people who live in America are what makes it great. We are white, black, red, yellow and a mixture of all skin tones. But in our hearts and minds, we stand together - united and loyal to one flag, the Stars and Stripes.
Everyday, people from other countries around the world dream about coming to America. They will risk life and limb, with nothing but the clothes on their back, and try to sail through shark-infested waters to reach our shores. And when they are welcomed with open arms, they tell us in broken English and with tears in their eyes why they want to live here.
What do I like about America? Good things I like about it are as numerous as the stars in the heavens on a clear winter night. And the good things outnumber the bad 1,000 to one.
Is our greatness at risk? Not at all. We remain the most powerful and most respected country on Earth. Will our children and grandchildren look forward to living the American dream as our forefathers envisioned and pursued? Absolutely! Children today enjoy more luxuries and have more opportunities than our forefathers would have ever dreamed possible.
I would rather live in prison in this country than be an average citizen in Russia today, or in any other Third World country. That's how good we have it.
I like being an American because America is truly the land of the free and the home of the brave. Here, you can be all that you can be. Ambition and hard work are all it takes.
In the United States, we have the best the world has to offer. And we know it. I am, indeed, proud to say that I am an American.
RON PENLAND
WYTHEVILLE
VETERANS
Lives sacrificed for its greatness
WHAT MAKES America great? Men and women who sacrificed their lives, limbs and minds to keep the lamp of freedom burning. Veterans of World Wars I and II, of Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, Somalia, etc.
I see them as the backbone of liberty. I revere the memory of those who died in the trenches in Germany, poisoned by mustard gas, those who were cut down on Omaha Beach, froze to death at the Chosin Reservoir, died in the swamps of places unnameable in Vietnam.
Our children and grandchildren will only know how great America is if historians are faithful to the truth, and stop trying to revise history to suit some warped sense of guilt.
I don't just like being an American - I love it.
I love being able to come and go as I please. I love being able to lift my voice in praise each Sunday, and on the Fourth of July as part of the big shindig at Victory Stadium. I love watching my husband, a disabled Korean War veteran, put on his cap and receive honors for his service to other veterans.
God bless America!
SANDRA TUCKER-MAXWELL
ROANOKE
SERVICE
A daughter in the Marine Corps
AMERICA is the freest country on the planet Earth.
America is where my 16-year-old daughter signed to go into the Marines during the Persian Gulf War, and is still serving her country.
America is respecting our president, and loving God and country. God bless America.
CAROLYN S. ROSS
COVINGTON
SO MUCH GIVEN
Hearts open wide to help others
ALTHOUGH I believe some of our freedoms are eroding, we still have access to the ballot box, without fear of reprisals for the way we vote. I still have faith that our government is doing a credible job, in spite of a few unscrupulous, self-serving politicians. If not, we can use our feet and head for the ballot box.
We can enter the church of our faith and worship as our hearts dictate. And what other country in the world has such an abundance of food, manufactured goods, almost anything the heart desires? Ask any foreign visitor.
I believe in the generosity of the American people. When disaster strikes our fellow man, the outpouring of help is almost overwhelming. Consider the multimillions of dollars donated to charities each year. Americans still open their hearts to those less fortunate.
Yes, there are still far too many injustices, laws that need overhauling, wrongs that need righting, Also, people need to see their fellow man as equal, not according to social standing, the color of their skin, etc.
But God has blessed us so abundantly. And as much has been given to us, much is expected of us. When we cease to be good, we will cease to be great.
NORA S. SAUL
BOONES MILL
THE VOTE
American citizens have real power
YOU WANT to know what's great about America? The vote.
The vote is no toy, no mere shiny bauble. It's a profoundly valuable and precious thing. It's no wonder that men have gladly fought and died for it, or that the world's disenfranchised brave every terror imaginable to acquire it. It's vastly more powerful than one truck, or even a fleet of trucks, loaded with kerosene-soaked fertilizer.
After all, even though governments, from local to federal, steal property outright via abuse of the civil forfeiture statutes, even though creatures from Housing and Urban Development are so contemptuous of the Bill of Rights that they seek civil penalties against those who dare criticize its policies, even though all levels of government indifferently destroy the lives of children and their families by the devices of welfare and outright dismemberment, even though our governments steal a gazillion bucks a year from the working classes, even though there is hardly an indecency you can name that our governments haven't gladly perpetrated against the citizenry to aggrandize themselves, there is one line our modern tyranny knows it dare not ever cross.
For on the day it does, it will fall nearly at once to open, armed rebellion, and rightly so.
It dare not fail to hold elections, and it dare not refuse to install those whom the people have lawfully chosen.
This is real power, the genuine article. If you don't like the local utility director, police chief, school-board member, dog catcher, etc., vote 'em out. If those employees don't answer to voters, then recall those who won't bring them to heel. Tired of smug, tedious psychobabble from teachers, social workers, that whole complex of moral bullies who make up our modern compassion industry? Then tell your state senator to stop paying for it with the money you went to work to earn. Or else.
You might say, ``Oh, sure. How can you believe something that naive? Elections don't change anything.'' Well, I'm right.
Though government at all levels is failing in it's most fundamental responsibilities, and is openly contemptuous of the citizenry it's supposed to serve, it must inevitably, if slowly, yield - because America's sovereignty remains vested in it's citizens, thanks to the vote.
ROBERT M. FELTON
ROANOKE
INNER PEACE
Blessings are found in nature
I WILL be forever grateful that I live in America.
Only in these great United States can one sit in peace, listen to the soft sounds of Irish music or country music and derive such inner peace.
Only in America can one roam freely through the woods, and receive a complete and total soul transformation from the gentle breeze and sounds of running waters.
Love can be felt from every blade of grass, every flying bird, every roaming animal. We are free to talk, teach, learn, and grow into better people than we were before.
We have everything that one could possibly ask for. We are blessed by God. Feel it. It's there.
SHEILA McALEXANDER
FERRUM
THE GOSPEL
God's blessing is on America
WHAT MAKES America great? That's an easy question to answer. It's because of God's love for this nation. I base this belief on what the Old Testament says about the Israelites and the nation of Israel.
God brought the children of Israel out of bondage in Egypt and made them a great nation - not because of their goodness, for they were rebellious, but because of God's goodness and his love - in order for Israel to be a blessing to the world. This was accomplished when they produced the Bible and by the birth of Jesus Christ.
In the same way, God has blessed this nation in order to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ to all nations.
ROBERT S. McCORMICK JR.
LEXINGTON
PESSIMISM
Family breakdown threatens America
HAVING lived in the United states for 76 years, I am fairly familiar with our nation because I am a wise reader. Will Rogers once said, ``All I know is what I read in the paper.''
It isn't recommended that a person be a pessimist, but I say with sadness that I am one. I can hardly avoid that viewpoint. Not too many years ago most people were optimists, but I find few in that category today. Faith in our government is fading away.
I'm grateful that we still have the greatest nation on Earth, but we are slipping. I do not see a rosy future for our youth. We have problems by the score.
Without detailing it, our most pressing problem is broken homes. The divorce rate is 50 percent. Many children are raised by one parent; some with no true parent.
Stable, loving families are the backbone of any nation.
When families break, the nation breaks. It takes both mom and dad to make a house a home. Values taught - such as honesty, respect for others, dependability, willingness to work - will remain through a lifetime. Americans are becoming a lazy people by the large. Idleness is the devil's workshop.
Public officeholders must become aware that they are public servants and not let greed blind them.
EDWIN R. ROBERTSON
PEARISBURG
by CNB