Our Direction

  Yesterday, I was happily viewing my statistics for this blog and I was quite surprised (and elated) to discover that I had two page views in China.  CHINA!! Wow!  That started me thinking about how far this blog has come in such a short time, and where I'd like it to go.
It still blows my mind that I can share my thoughts with people all over the globe.  This blog mainly deals with politics in the USA, but let's face it.  Our politics impact the world.
   I am reminded of a quote from Edgar Mitchell, an Apollo 18 astronaut, who said in People Magazine in 1974 when looking back at the Earth from space, "You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world and a compulsion to do something about it.  From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty.  You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, 'Look at that, you son-of-a-bitch.'"
   I also started thinking of the miracle that facebook really is.  Not just facebook--all social media.  I'm in awe that I have friends all over the world.  I've never been in their presence, nor they in mine.  I've never been invited over for dinner, but I'd invite them if they were in town.  They're not just words on a screen, or a photograph.  They're real, living breathing people; and they have changed me.  I'm friends on facebook with a man in Greece.  He's brilliant, endlessly funny, and has introduced me to a world of ass-kickin', angry music.  He's made my world a little bigger.  And I can no longer turn a blind eye to what's going on in that country.  I have a friend in Nepal who is studying her ass off to be a physician.  She is bright, articulate and has the biggest heart.  She's going to do great things in the world!  I have friends as far away as Indonesia and India, in France, and Britain.  Social media has made the world smaller and obviously, more connected.  
   So--that's where I want to go.  I want to take the craziness that is American politics to the world, right here on this page.  I want us to share our points of view from across the world.  I want to shine a light on how others in the world view us, and view our policies and share what's going on in other countries too.  
   It's become "patriotic" to embrace American exceptionalism, and I call bullshit on it.  How arrogant of us as a nation to believe that we have nothing to learn from other countries.  Let's face it, in the grand scheme of things, The United States of America is in its infancy.  We have much to learn from the adult nations around us.  Yes, we are a world leader, and we do things differently here in the US, but we're still just a small part of a larger whole.  
  I encourage you to be part of the conversation.  Share your thoughts and your criticisms. Don't hold back.  Respect is necessary, but polite is not demanded.  Perhaps, if we share our views from every corner of the globe, we can make a difference, because it doesn't just matter to Americans--it matters to everyone.