by Ed Sperry, Col USAF (ret), Stevensville
Cogito, ergo sum (I think, therefore I am). This was the wonderful motto of an Air Force unit to which I once was privileged to serve. At another time, way back when we developed the Minuteman Missile, we didn’t bother with Latin but we all understood that failure was simply unacceptable. Progress, improvement, personal accomplishment, all meant something. To be able to lead, to have ideas and even seek to bring them to fruition, was a mark of success, even honor.
Of course, this was true of all walks of life whether civil or military. The concept was ingrained in the Constitution when It proclaimed that all men are created equal. It meant that all of us had a God-given right to seek and attain pleasure. Whether we did or not was up to each of us.
That simple truth built our nation. The greatest nation in history! Now it seems to be attacked by suggesting that equity is more important than equality. This concept of everyone being happy and the same will destroy us. For example, how dare teachers in Virginia decide to deny the accomplishments of their students? It is theft and exemplified in the failure to tell students that they had won national scholarly recognition. I hope those schools and any like them are sued to hell and back!
It is nothing new. We simply refuse to remember or to learn. I’m not going to expound on this issue. That’s for greater minds than mine. I only deal with simple truths. Let me merely give you a quote from a previous time that was hauntingly similar to our era. I quote from the book “Anthem” by Ayn Rand, writing in 1938. In her book, society was structured for total equity. A band of free thinkers fled the governing herd and here is how they expressed their rebellion.
“I shall rebuild the accomplishments of the past, and open the way to carry them further, the achievements which are open to me, but closed forever to my brothers, for their minds are shackled to the weakest and dullest ones among them.”
Dear reader, give this a little thought. Is equity being taught in our valley? If so, we are once again near the edge.