Daniel Brown: Home of the brave? Not so much anymore
I watched the Academy Award-nominated short documentaries at the State Theater not long ago. Three of the five documentaries were about the plight of the people in the Middle East. This made me think how much we Americans are responsible for their fate. George W’s ineptness in Iraq destabilized the region while giving rise to belief we would step in to support the Arab Spring brought forth by those who had lived beneath the heavy hand of dictators for too long. This led to the rise of ISIS and the total mess that is now Syria. We are culpable for all the suffering we see in these documentaries.
But what is our response? We shut our borders to those who seek safety from the terror we released in their homelands. We fear one of us might die in their place. When did we become such cowards? Cowering behind our wall is not the image Francis Scott Key had in mind when he wrote the phrase, “home of the brave.”
Daniel Brown, Modesto
This story was originally published February 22, 2017 at 9:18 AM with the headline "Daniel Brown: Home of the brave? Not so much anymore."