My grandfather was born into a lead, zinc, and coal mining family in SW Missouri. He became deaf due to a childhood illness and due to safety issues was not allowed to work in the mines. He was fortunate to have a taxpayer financed state school for the deaf to attend. There he learned a trade and, after graduation in 1911, he started his own business. He grew his business through hard work and government contracts. During the Depression and WWII he was able to provide many much needed jobs, even employing his own children and their spouses. After the war he sold his business and returned to his school to teach his trade to other deaf children so they would have the opportunity to be employable and self sufficient.Yes, his ingenuity and hard work played a major role in his success but it only was made possible because WE, as a team, provided the tax dollars for his education. Not to mention the government contracts.
My father, also born into a mining family just across the border in Kansas, became a heavy equipment operator and through his life worked on Hoover Dam and many other dams along the upper Missouri River. These dams provide electricity to millions and protect many of these same people from devastating floods. Towards the end of his life he was helping build the first Interstate highways. This Interstate highway system that allows the products of business to move freely and with ease to markets. He worked hard and was proud of his role in these projects but he didnt build them by himself. WE, as a team, built them.
After my father passed away my mother and us 6 children moved in with my grandfather. A year later my grandfather retired and my mother took over his position teaching. She then taught for over 35 years. Former students often visited and grandpa and mom were proud of the success of these former students. They led productive lives and had families of their own. And it was not just my grandfather and mom who helped with these success stories. WE, as a team, built the educational system to make this possible.
When Americans, as a team, accept the often daunting burden of resolving the challenges that life presents us, we shine like no other culture before us. When it is all about "WE" and not "I". We have in the past resolved to help the elderly, the poor, the hungry, the children, and the sick. As a team we have built Social Security, Medicare, Obamacare, TVA, Interstate Highway Act, NASA, Armed Forces, ....the list goes on and our life is much the better for it.
And now the Republicans want to drown these achievements in a bathtub. The examples of lies, treason and selfishness is appalling. WTF? It never ceases to amaze me what the pursuit of power and money is capable of. It is of the utmost importance to defeat these powers that threaten the very essence of what has made America great. We must not allow them to disassemble what WE built.
