Let's Fix America

The United States of America has many problems in 2024.  And this blog will solve 0 of them. 

But I think there is something to this election being an internet crazy election. When something is seriously mentally ill, sometimes sanity is the least appropriate response, sometimes what fixes serious mental illness is just a different more healthier version of a different mental illness.  

For example, there is no Harry Potter wand that I could just type and magically make every American know more history and make better voting decisions to fix our broken democracy. 

But I can observe, report, study, read and write, also known as.... Learning.

So when I observed the buildings when I walked around Capitol Mall in Washington DC two years ago for the first time.  I had the odd thought that the town was mentally ill because everybody in it forgot the founding fathers were trying to make the USA a modern day Rome. 

Just think of it, Rome fell in about 400.  And about 1400 years later some guys with European ancestry were in charge of governing a land that the Romans never got to, it was a wild forest with no cities, towns, history, nothing but trees and wild beasts nobody in Europe has ever seen like Buffalo.  It was in essence similar to what the Romans experienced when they first stepped foot in Great Britain or parts of Africa or Germany.  A land full of wilderness with angry tribes of people trying to fight them and protect their land. 

You can sort of think of the American Experiment we call our Constitution as a continuation of the Renaissance.  The founding fathers were taking something that was very old that had not been tried in a very long time before, and re doing it in a modern way for a more modern, enlightened time.  The enlightenment as we know it was a freedom of individual thought and putting an individual on the highest of pedestals equal to any King or Country.  

Or in other words. 

The enlightenment was the very last words written in the final book we call "The Middle Ages" which was a time where people forgot everything the Romans and Greeks did, and History, technology, science and knowledge went backwards instead of forwards.  The enlightenment was the triumph of the individual over the idea that Kings, Lords, Countries ruled over the people and controlled their minds and lives. 

So the Founding Fathers decided to start a new Rome along the banks of the Delaware in the city of Philadelphia.  And then move it to a new city a little south along the 38th parallel along the banks of the Potomac so it is aligned more with Greece and Athens instead of Rome which is along the 44th parallel and the border between PA and NY. 

So if we put the 2024 election within the context of Ancient Roman history what is a parallel? 

Working under the assumption that there are foreigners who view American problems as simply older European Problems that Europeans solved at some point in their history and forgot... What is a European historical parallel to this 2024 election? 

There are probably dozens of examples people way smarter than me can come up with.  But I'm going with Julius Caesar. 

My reasoning: 

Trump is going to run on "The Border" or a basic xenophobic campaign in which foreigners are destroying America and we are unmatched, we are crumbling as a society, and we have to take our country back from these foreign invaders. 

Which is a little like how Julius Caesar fought the Gauls in France for the glory of Rome.  By defeating the Gauls he protected Rome from foreign invasion and expanded their resources.  And Trump loves his border wall the same as Emperor Hadrian did with Scotland and England. 

Meanwhile the "Democrats" are probably running a campaign that is also exaggerated version of the Julius Cesar story. 

They will run some kind of campaign written by Cicero or Brutus.  Where Trump is a budding dictator who is trying to take control over the country by ruining our institutions.  (He is  doing that but still, this point is valid) But I am sure there will be some Democrats who exaggerate this point and say something like "We won't have a democracy anymore if Trump wins."  

I'm pretty sure Washington D.C. is still going exist in 5 years even if Trump wins.  I also think there will be our Federal system in place in 5 years.  City Councils, School Boards, County Supervisors, State Legislatures, Governors, bureaucrats at every level will still go to work everyday in every state even if Trump wins. 

That's our Democracy, where the people are at, in every town, county, school district. 

That is also kind of how the Romans governed places, they put in power smaller rulers over smaller territories who governed the area, and then people would go to Rome for money and power and reputation.

Another problem is that things get lost in Trans......lation. 

For example: 

America has a problem with religion, sex, power, politics, and religion.  This problem has been around since our founding.  

But the answer and solution to the problem that Europeans probably have told Americans at some point was to go outside and go on a pilgrimage and relax.  Hiking and walking is a solution to calming yourself down in a business that deals with sex, power, politics, and religion. 

But the problem is that America was founded by pilgrims (religious people) so to us pilgrims mean a boat called the Mayflower and Thanksgiving.  But to Europeans pilgrims are regular people traveling through town by walking and staying at churches.  It's customary for those who live in towns along a pilgrim road to give what they can to help them along the way.  It is a good person, community, helping people out sort of thing and less of a religion thing.  In modern times many people walk the pilgrim routes who are not religious but are just people who enjoy hiking and traveling. 

Any way somehow "Following the Route of the Camino/Pilgrimage" which is a normal European tradition and life lesson. 

Got lost in translation with Gen X because California has the only European pilgrim trail of sorts in the USA along the 21 missions of the El Camino Real.  

Because Gen X loves pop culture so much, they turned into something like following actors in Hollywood movies and the lines they use in different movies along their career.  Or musicians and their different albums and songs, combined with the words "Gender and Sex" it became some sort of mess where Hollywood kept switched genders and sexes in movies over the last decade and the word "Trans" became to mean something different then it used to be mean as in "transportation" or "transport" or "translation" or "transfer" 

For the record here is the etymology definition of the word "TRANS"

word-forming element meaning "across, beyond, through, on the other side of, to go beyond," from Latin trans (prep.) "across, over, beyond," perhaps originally present participle of a verb *trare-, meaning "to cross," from PIE *tra-, variant of root *tere- (2) "cross over, pass through, overcome." In chemical use indicating "a compound in which two characteristic groups are situated on opposite sides of an axis of a molecule" [Flood]. 

All I'm saying in this blog post is that something went sideways at some point in California and America about 10-15-20-30 years ago (I actually have no idea when things got off track) 

But my theory is that some kind of conversation among the powerful began getting odd.  They were using the same words but the meanings were becoming different and they lost control a little. 

This blog post doesn't necessarily fix any of  Americas many problems. 

But it is at least a theory on America that might lead to a more perfect union one day.  

If the right people happen to read it at some point.