I just read where Oklahoma wants teachers from California and New York, as well as other “blue” states wishing to teach in Oklahoma to take a test proving they support America First. It should be noted that Oklahoma currently has a teacher shortage. It should also be noted that there are 30,000 certified teachers in Oklahoma who have chosen not to teach.
In the first
place, why do they need a test? Couldn’t a prospective teacher simply wear a
flag pin the way Republicans do in Congress to prove their patriotism or crucifixes around their necks the way they do to prove they value Christianity?
More
importantly, shouldn’t prospective teachers, not to mention Oklahoma (rated
fourth in literacy in U.S.), be aware of the bad reputation that the concept of
“America First” has in this country. America First in the 1930s meant should we
just let the Nazis destroy democracy and learn to live with them after they
take control of Europe. Basically, saying that the threat to democracy was not
our problem.
America
First did not sit well in the 1930s and has not aged well in the 2000s. It is
still nothing more than arrogant pride based on foolish fallacies.
America was
not first when we drove the Indians from their homeland. We were merely common
aggressors with better weapons.
America was
not first when half the nation built its economy on the backs of millions of
slaves. We were just a nation too lazy to do the work ourselves.
In the annals of history, the Jim Crow Era was just one more example of the powerful abusing the weak, the inhumane treating humanity badly to serve their own prejudices.
This isn’t to say we haven’t had our moments.
Our Declaration
of Independence was a wake-up call to the world that kings could be defeated
and that free men could and should decide their own destiny.
Our Constitution
has for two hundred years been the envy of people everywhere.
Our laws
have protected workers by giving them better wages, better working conditions,
and a means of enjoying the fruits of their labor once they retired. Our laws
allowed children to go to school instead of working in mills.
As alluded to
earlier, helping to save Europe from the threat of Nazi totalitarianism in World
War II is something we can be rightfully proud of.
Unfortunately,
the things we have been first in are not always the things that “America First”
prides itself on. Or shouldn’t pride themselves on if they were paying
attention.
America has
the highest rate of gun ownership in the world with 120.5 guns per one hundred
people, more guns than people. Just as we have a bigger military than the next
ten countries combined, our lead in gun ownership is not even threatened by the
second-place nation, Yemen, with sixty guns per one hundred people. And Yemen
is at war with its neighbors and has been for years.
Much of the
world has less than one gun per hundred people, so yes, America, we’re first by
a long shot.
While not on
top, we are close to leading the world in infant mortality rates. Only four OECD
(Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) nations have higher infant
mortality rates than America. So, we are close to America First in this
category. If it is any consolation, Mississippi, with a rate twice the OECD
average is ranked with those four countries ahead of us. Mississippi First!
America has one
of the highest incarceration rates in the world followed by nations like Russia,
Rwanda and Cuba—generally thought to be nations where simply speaking out
against the government will get one thrown in jail. To our credit, with only
4.4% of the world’s population, we do have over 20% of the world’s prison
population. America First.
One has to
wonder why Republicans keep reviving the America First concept, when as Woody
Guthrie sand, “When they say America first, they mean America last.”
