I Am An American

I am an American. I am third generation.I am the result of the dream of two entire families' dreams to come to the "land where the streets are paved with gold."
 My paternal grandfather was Russian, my maternal grandfather was German. Paternal grandfather came here in 1914, by himself on a boat (the last boat before the war),  at the age of 14. By the age of 19 he was drafted into the army. By the age of 20 he was married to another Russian emigrant, and a naturalized American citizen. He got a job at Chrysler in Detroit, Michigan, and raised three children.
 My father, one of those children,drafted into the Korean war, where he met my future uncle, who died in Korea. My future father, after his discharge, went to meet my my uncle's sister, fell in love, got married, and had five children. He worked at General Tire and Rubber most of his life, going in at three a.m. and coming home twelve hours later, in order to support five children.
 Me, one of those five children. I met my husband, and we fell in love, got married, and are raising our own children, while he works for the auto industry, as my grandfather did, while struggling to raise our own children and live the American Dream.
 The American Dream, you say? It still exists, it still lives. It still thrives.
 We, the rank and file of Americans, are still here. We work, we live, we laugh. We Vote. We walk picket lines, we give to charity, we believe in God. We shop at local stores, we support our neighbors, we help where we can. Do not discount us. Do not forget us, or think we are worthless, for we are Americans. We built these United States, we fought for them, we stand for them. We are America. I, we, are America.

Election Season Rant

Like most people who use the internet, I have certain websites I like to check in on regularly. One of these is a blog, written by a Christian woman, who does a great job of dedicating every single thing she does, big or small, to the Lord. It inspires me to keep trying.
I agree with her on a lot of the issues she writes about, but on a few things we disagree. Like politics. On a recent post, she wrote that "Liberals are deceived" about a certain issue. It just so happens that I consider myself a Liberal. I also consider myself a Christian and, unlike many Conservatives who happen to be Christian, I don't think they're mutually exclusive. In fact, on many political issues, I think that most Conservative Christians are very deceived themselves.
A few issues that come immediately to mind are the recent fight about the Ten Commandments in the courthouse, and the "Under God" in the pledge of Allegience, or voting for a man who claims to be a Christian, but who has proven himself to be a liar who only cares about money.
I still believe we should follow the Ten Commandments, and I still believe that our Nation is a Nation Under God. I also believe that we should vote for the person who seems to follow Gods laws, and the laws of our country, first, before we vote for someone who follows the law of the almighty dollar.
Do we really feel that leaving a copy of the Ten Commandments posted on a courthouse wall will win any one to God, when the judge sitting under them is upholding the laws of a corrupt government? Will making a Muslim or an Atheist pledge his allegience under God make it so? Will voting for a man who claims out loud, in words, to be a Christian really show the world who we are?
Or should we show the world who we are by our actions instead? Shouldn't we just live the Ten Commandments? ("Thou shalt not kill" pops to mind.) Shouldn't we live as a nation under God, as we used to do? ( "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..." from The Declaration of Independence) Shouldn't we just vote for the person who acts the most like a Christian, if that is our point of view? (If all of the candidates were stricken dumb, and we had to vote based on the candidates life and political record, who would we vote for? I suspect that almost none of the people now in office would remain there for long, if this were the case!)
I, for one, am heartily sick of all of the political claptrap,spouted by people who I am in fear for, that they are living their lives deceived by the devil into thinking they are doing "the right thing". I beg of all of you who consider yourselves Christian, to put aside all the advice received from well-meaning leaders and friends, and vote for the person who lives what they profess to believe. ("They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him..." Titus 1:16, New American Standard Bible)
If you do that, if you vote for the person who lives what they claim to believe, then it won't matter at all what you call yourself-conservative, liberal, whatever. (And on a side note, if you are a Christian, and you haven't been praying for our government lately, you might want to start. Start by praying for wisdom for our leaders. They could all use a hefty dose of it, I think.)