We Need to Turn It Down a Notch

January 21, 2013 was a day when pomp and circumstance took over.  It was the inauguration of President Obama for his second term in office.  It reminded me of past inaugurations.  I am still somewhat of a political junkie so when it comes to things like inaugurations, elections, and political conventions I tend to pay attention more so than a lot of other people.  There is something unique about each of those events.  Maybe it’s because of the way they are structured in our country.  You have to admit our political system has stood the test of more than 200 years.

            But it seems we are fraying around the edges.  Some would just come out and say the system is broke because we cannot seem to get anything done.  We almost cannot agree on anything.  Posturing has replacing consensus building.  My way or the highway has replaced compromise.  The rhetoric has become almost acidic to the point of poisoning the system and prompting the vast majority of people to simply no longer care.  The rhetoric has also divided this country to the point where divine intervention may be the only thing that closes the chasm between people.

            There is an answer though, even if it becomes only a starting place for reducing our differences and providing a point from which we can again seek consensus and compromise.  This was inauguration week and inaugural addresses are sometime known for just a sentence.  President Kennedy’s  “Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country” comes to mind.  Then there is this…which was tucked away in an inaugural address less than a decade later.

“Greatness comes in simple trappings.
The simple things are the ones most needed today if we are to surmount what divides us, and cement what unites us.
To lower our voices would be a simple thing.
In these difficult years, America has suffered from a fever of words; from inflated rhetoric that promises more than it can deliver; from angry rhetoric that fans discontents into hatreds; from bombastic rhetoric that postures instead of persuading.
We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another—until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.”    Sounds like it applies to this day and age.  But it was President Nixon who said it in 1969 at his inauguration, following the tumultuous year of 1968 which included the Tet offensive, the assassinations of Kennedy and King and the unrest in major cities including 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.   Perhaps those words from 1969 should apply to today.  Just some food for thought from someone who is getting tired of the rhetoric.

“We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another—until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.”  

 

                                                                                                            Richard Nixon  1969