America is flooded with the words of ambitious people. We are having a hard time dealing with the galloping rush of technological change, particularly with communications systems like Facebook that ride the internet.
We are often unable to figure out what is true, what to believe, and what the motives are behind much of the messaging that bombards us. So we choose sides. As Paul Simon said, “A man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest.”
Politicians are, by their nature, ambitious people. Ambition is not necessarily bad, and some politicians are in fact very good people. During the birth of our nation, Benjamin Franklin commented on two kinds of ambition as follows:
“Ambition to be greater and richer, merely that a Man may have it in his Power to do more Service to his Friends and the Publick, is of a quiet orderly Kind, pleased if it succeeds, resigned if it fails. But the Ambition that has itself only in View, is restless, turbulent, regardless of public Peace, or general Interest, and the secret Maker of most Mischiefs, between Nations, Parties, Friends and Neighbours.”
The point he makes is as pertinent today as it was in the days of George Washington. We were blessed by having that gentleman as our first president. He clearly embodied the “Ambition to do more service to the Publick.”
Here in the present, many of the politicians who we elect as our servants seem to exhibit the turbulent “Ambition that has itself only in view.” They scorn the thought of working for “We the People” rather than themselves and their particular political party. They spend their time admiring themselves in mirrors that distort who they really are, mirrors that whisper, ‘You are the fairest of them all.”
You and I elected them into this sad state of affairs, whether in an afflicted town in Lewis County, in the Congress or presidency of our national government, or at any level in between. Some of us elected them by voting for them, others helped elect them by not voting at all.
Consider the actions of Russia as that nation clearly waged cyber warfare against all the citizens of America during the presidential election of 2016. Then, please read the first sentence of Article III, Section 3 in our Constitution. Google it if you have to. Contemplate what kind of American would provide “aid and comfort” to those waging cyber warfare on us. What term would George Washington use to define their actions?
Recognize that compromise promotes progress, while fanaticism is, in fact, evil. Please vote for people who, through their life-long actions, demonstrate “good” ambition. And please, vote.
Recommended reading for perspective on these troubling times include “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany” by William Shirer. Not a happy read, but it does provide perspective on the goings-on that are going on, right now, right in front of our eyes.
Michael Croxton
Toledo
