Ingratitude

I’ve been fortunate to work at the same technology company for about six years, located in one of the better office/industrial parks in Miami-Dade County. Every so often, while downstairs not wanting to violate the Florida Clean Indoor Air Act, a visitor will arrive -- and I know they are visitors and not workers in the building because of the deer-in-headlight look they have as they walk up to the building entrance -- that asks for directions. “Can you tell me where A is?” or “Is this the building where B is located?” Questions like that. Completely innocuous. My answer is "no" nine times out of ten. You'd be surprised how many do not have an address to find, just a general location.

This morning, a gentleman walks up to the north entrance where I smoke and asks if the office of a well-known Federal agency is located in my building, the second building, heading west, of the main drag. They had told him that the offices were in the second building. All of the compliant smokers tell him, “No, the offices are further down the road.” We explain that the building must be the second building as you’re heading east down the main drag. The gentleman then proceeds to walk away pissed off, talking very loudly, slamming the agency, slamming the fact that they had merged several locations into one, that they had probably fired staff, and finally – and this is the part that really, really pissed me off – that this government was no better than what he'd experienced in Cuba.

Being the shy fellow that I am I shouted back as he was walking away that he maybe he should return to Cuba, inasmuch as (1) being on the government dole was not enough, (2) being able to loudly complain was not enough, (3) he wasn't in a fucking prison for speaking out (like Oscar Elias Biscet is), and (4) that having the freedom to get in a fucking car and go down three blocks to the right fucking building with big numbers that any dolt could read in daylight was not enough. As I was finishing my highly-taxed, but enjoyable, cigarette, I muttered loudly under my breath and called him “and ungrateful blankety-blank” -- in English. You can fill in the blank.

I cannot tell you how pissed off I was, and how pissed off I still am. I am always stunned at the ingratitude of a certain type of immigrant or exile. They get more freedom than they could have ever hoped to have in Cuba (or any other hell-hole) and yet they complain and bitch and moan. Folks, I know that this country is far from perfect. We have problems galore. I can rattle off about thirty pretty quickly. However, even with its problems, it's still the best the world has to offer. Read what the always superb Bill Whittle wrote four years ago on the Fourth of July:

Today, on her 227th birthday, the United States stands astride the world as the most economically, militarily and culturally powerful force history has yet revealed.

Why?

Well, one reason is because here in America, a practically broke 19 year old kid can be the President of a Corporation, that’s why. Of course some of these fail. Most of them fail, spectacularly fail, flaming wreckage, oh-the-humanity failures. I’ve had many of these, personally. More will no doubt come. It’s easy to succeed in a country that lets you fail this often and this easily.

The ingredients for greatness, goodness, success, happiness and prosperity are not hard to find, and yet so much of the world is a political and economic disaster.

Again: why?

Because folks, it ain’t the ingredients. It’s the recipe.

So we’re off on a little all-American road trip, this time to figure out why our economy, when sick, is stronger than anyone else’s, when healthy. To see if we can figure out how 300 million strangers, all the troublemakers and upstarts from every nation in the world, can come to one vast continent, be given more freedom than any people before or since, and manage to become the most prosperous, powerful, tightly-knit nation in history. And how come we invent everything, too? Must be something in the water out there.

We’re gonna go find out. Let’s just hop in the car and see if we can’t chase down that American Dream. You know the one: Think of a better way. Take a chance. Start a business. Put in the extra time. Work hard. Buy a house. Live a better life than your parents and a poorer one than your kids. And do it all in a place where you can be free and happy and safe.

America is a success machine. Yes, it’s easy to fail in America. It is also the easiest place in the world to succeed, to do the big things -- become wealthy or famous -- or just carve out a comfortable little patch of ground to spend an afternoon barbequing or watch your teenage kid drive off in their brand new used car.

It’s a siren song for many people, this idea of freedom, this dream of making your own life according to a script you wrote in your head. But it’s not for everybody. It requires some courage, at times. It demands hard work. It can challenge your bland security. It’s not cheap, this American Dream – nor should it be. And it lives and breathes optimism. Without that you’re sunk.

"America is a success machine."

If you cannot leave a literal island prison, and kiss the ground you walk on for the liberty you have to do whatever you want to do, then I politely ask you to leave. As you leave, open the door for someone who wants to be here, who truly appreciates the miracle that is the United States of America.

Posted by George Moneo at July 30, 2007 11:36 AM

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