The Message of “Hope”

 

By: John MacDonaldMay, 2015

I often talk about leadership and wonder where the next great political leader will emerge from within the United States.

What Governor, Congressman, Senator, educational or business leader will emerge as a leader and actually fix what is most in need in this country, which is a positive attitude as much as it is a positive direction. Surprisingly the heroic action and words of the late Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 Indianapolis didn’t sink in on any of our current crop of leaders, while the nation watched gangs loot, burn and brutalize Baltimore.

Who stood up or stood out? Certainly not President Obama. The President has failed on so many occasions, why bother to even list them anymore? It’s far too depressing.

As we’ve experimented with the President’s extreme progressive (regressive?) policies, we yet again see the colossal failures of what good intentions and dependence on government does to cure society’s problems. We’ve seen how Progressive policies have negatively impacted diplomacy and our standing around the world. I wouldn’t say that ultra conservative policies are the answer either, but under Progressive leadership things have certainly gone from bad to worse. Especially in the poorest of our communities.

How has the President been a leader in the African American community?

What has he done to inspire a community of people he calls his own? What has he done to ease racial tensions? What has he done to show that we all can work together? What has he done other than prove he could get elected? Elected with the help of all Americans by the way. The proof is before us and the answer is little to nothing.

I do believe in the President’s original message of hope. However where we differ is perhaps our definition of what hope means and how it will help in the poorest neighborhoods and communities in our country. As the President has shown through his policies, hope means giving everything away in the “Hope” that people will take it upon themselves to do something in return. It doesn’t work. Not in Baltimore and certainly not in Detroit, where we’ve seen decades of liberal policies fail the city and turn it into a third world environment.

I believe hope means that we show people a path to prosperity. Government can be in a position to help lift you, but with a mutual effort on the individual’s part. Jobs provide people hope. Success provides people hope. Positive examples provide people hope. Education provides people hope. And in the poorest of our communities, this is where hope needs to be planted.

Government public works jobs could be a start. Work to improve our infrastructure in exchange for a hand up. Every able-bodied person could see how work was the path to success. Rather than the President’s brand of dependence on a monthly government check to stay home and hope that circumstances will somehow change. Military service, mandatory for those convicted of minor crimes. Military service teaches leadership, life and job skills, which can be translated into hope.
Who amongst our leaders has the courage to speak such language or show such a path? I’m not sure, but I’m still hopeful.