To “make America great again” we should recognize what greatness looks like. When was America great? Was it the first century of our history that saw the expansion from sea to shining sea? Remember that our nation enslaved a race of people for our economic benefit. And the first Americans were herded into reservations after all our nation’s promises were broken.

Perhaps it was the second half of our history, as we rose up from a devastating civil war to awaken as a global leader of an industrial revolution that would fill the bank accounts of Ford, Carnegie and Mellon. At the same time, however, workers were treated as expendable components of their money machine. There were lynchings of people of color and forced encampment of Japanese Americans, while we led the world in defeating tyranny and then rebuilding the tyrant’s cities.

We cannot go backwards in time; we can only move forward. Greatness is not an achievement, but a pursuit. Tom Brady doesn’t seek to be great again, because he doesn’t see he has achieved it.

Like Tom, we need to keep moving the bar higher. That is what greatness is.

 

Tom Turner

Waterville

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