American Exceptionalism: Self-Flattering Phrase or Reality?

     With good reason, most Americans have considered their beliefs to be superior, but has our “exceptionalism” become a self-flattering phrase or a verifiable reality? The view that America is exceptional because our core beliefs make us superior is not a new idea. Our beliefs begin with “all men are created equal” but also include other shared values such as individual freedom and the existence of human rights.   

     Unlike many other countries where a rigid economic class system existed and human dignity could only be achieved by a superior few, here in America birth did not determine fate. Our core beliefs clearly linked the concepts of equality and human dignity.

     There are those that think American exceptionalism is eroding. Many are beginning to notice a great divide caused by the growing power of an economic elite here in America. It appears that some Americans have become more equal than others as the gap between the haves and have-nots becomes wider.

     Today, the upper class in America has evolved into a dominant species, more detached from the lives of the great majority of Americans than in the past. They run the country, meaning they are in control of the courts, legislation, and regulations produced by the government. They run the show when it comes to the films and television programs you watch, the news you read, along with the fortunes of international corporations and financial institutions.

     This new upper class has separated itself from the great majority of Americans not only culturally but also geographically. The members of our elite have increasingly separated themselves into hyper-wealthy neighborhoods, isolated behind gates and security cameras. Often the only time we see these enclaves of the rich and powerful is when their appetite for excess leads to arrest and prosecution, but even then the news cameras are always kept at the appropriate distance.

     As the income gap widened the new upper class has amassed sufficient monetary resources to isolate them from the rest of America.  As they pulled away from mainstream American society they were not satisfied escaping with their heaped wealth, they also slashed and burned the economic security of the middle class. The aftermath has left working families without a livable wage, pensions, healthcare, or the job benefits formally provided by union collective bargaining.

     If America is to be “exceptional” again we must renew our commitment to the economic well-being of working families. We must learn from the World War II Generation and allocate our wealth and resources to make America a better place to raise all of our children, rich and poor alike.

     Our path to exceptionalism must be paved with the following changes:

1. Free Public Education is not the problem, but rather the solution. Every child should be valued and is deserving of a free public education. Cuts to public education make it hard for the children of working class families to go on to universities and complete their career path. Free public education has always been the great social and economic equalizer.

2. Every worker must be valued and is deserving of a living wage. Raising the minimum wage is good because it would help the working class to reclaim the life they once had and spend more time together as a family. In addition, a higher minimum wage would be a boost to economic recovery by raising payroll and income tax revenues, lowering the federal deficit, and Social Security worries would fade.

3. Congress must stop its attacks on the poor. Instead of cutting health care programs, food stamps, unemployment benefits and child tax credits, Congress needs to cut the bloated Defense Budget and subsidies to big oil companies.

4. American working families deserve a level playing field with big corporations; Labor Union membership and the right to collective bargaining for all workers must be guaranteed and supported in all 50 states, particularly the “Red States”.

Finally, we need to remember the words President Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered to Congress in 1944 when he said:

“True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.

People who are hungry and poor are the stuff of which dictatorships are made”.