Thoughts on the Revolution in America

There is something tragic in the country. Something that I sense better than I know. Today, for instance, in a conversation with one of my professors, I let slip that I was a big fan of cynicism. This is all related to the election--I know it. It is as though the nation is infected with a terminal disease but will never know it until its too late, and, even then, while in its last throes, it won't understand why it expires. As I listen to Barack Obama's victory speech, I listen to the cheer of the crowd. I am not touched by his words, but I am touched by the idea behind them. An actual idealism exists there, and, though he himself is a Machiavel, he is also a Machiavellian idealist. After he gives the speech he does not twirl a mustache in wonder at how these people have drunk of his molley, for he has drunk it himself. Nonetheless, I know that the America of Barack Obama is one in which my greatest asset--my conscience--will most likely be under constant threat. This, I believe, is at the root of my cynicism, but I still lament that my cynicism drives a wedge between myself and this country. I do not know how I would react to the fall of America; all nations--as with all people--come to an end, though their ideals, like our souls, live on. Nonetheless, there is an America that I love. The America that I meet when I walk out my door every morning--the heat in the summer and the cold in the winter, the combustion, motion, activity, vivacity--this is the world that, within centuries, will disappear. Did I wake or sleep.