for love of country?

in her introduction, martha c. nussbaum says,

Most of us are brought up to believe that all human beings have equal worth. At least the world's major religions and most secular philosophies tell us so. But our emotions don't believe it. We mourn for those we know, not for those we don't know. And most of us feel deep emotions about America, emotions we don't feel about India, or Russia, or Rwanda. In and of itself, this narrowness of our emotional lives is probably acceptable and maybe even good. We need to build outward from meanings we understand, or else our moral life would be empty of urgency.

when we are not provoked, we are apathetic and despondent. nothing can be more true of myself than what nussbaum says about the united states. i sit idle, clueless, and compassion-less unless i find that i am in danger, some threat to my well-being.

case and example. the truth of the matter is, i am the biggest procrastinator in the world. i, however, like to call myself a "pressure writer", or better yet, a "clutch" writer. my basketball parallel would probably be robert horry. not kobe, not dwayne, not even steve nash. it's not that those superstars aren't clutch, but the fact is that i don't do anything in the first, second, third, or even the forth quarter. i still stand at the three point arch and score only two points, the only two that can win the game.

i'm not saying that i always win, but what i am saying is that i don't do anything till the very end.

what martha wrote about, however, has nothing to do with basketball or procrastinating, but it has everything to do with how America doesn't move an inch on most world issues until a great threat is posed on our precious soil or future aspirations. i'm not saying that i'm any better, or that i would make better decisions than bush, i would probably make the same, but what i am saying is that we need to make a change.

relient k says it best in their song down in flames

I'm part of the problem,
I confess,
But I gotta get this off my chest.

Let's extinguish the anguish
for which we're to blame,
and save the world
from going down in flames.

i'm sorry for sounding so apocalyptic, but we are all heading down a direction that doesn't look so good.

it took pearl harbor for the united states to get involved in world war two.
and it took september eleventh for us to join together to and be compassionate for each other.

nussbaum ends her intro,

Seeing how vulnerable our great country is, we can learn something about the vulnerability all human beings share, about what it is like for distant others to lose those they love to a disaster not of their own making, whether it is hunger or flood or ethnic cleansing.

weren't all men created equal? and if we were, how come we don't act like it?

there is, fortunately, a glimmer of hope.
Rousseau says, "Thus from our weakness our fragile happiness is born".

Or is it?