The quest to save America.

It is amazing to me that so many people are on a quest to save America. We are the richest nation on Earth, with the strongest military, a strong currency, a democratically elected government, with land and resources that are the envy of the world. And yet the tea party, the occupy movement, Mitt Romney, the Koch brothers, and many of our religious leaders, just to name a few, think America needs to be saved.

Save America from what? Sixteen trillion dollars (and growing) of national debt, a weak job market, paying entitlements to our elderly and infirm citizens, allowing illegal immigration, having more citizens imprisoned than any other nation, growing drug addiction, avaricious banks and bankers, fracking, obesity, inadequate care for our returning troops, gay marriage, rampant political advertising and debates. You name it. If there is anything about America that does not meet your standards, the nation needs to be saved from it.

One small problem. Almost everything we want to save America from is something that other citizens want to keep. Too much money in the hands of the one percent? That's what a capitalist nation is supposed to have. A lot of people out of work? More leisure is what some of us have been looking for our whole lives. The pews are empty? We are finally ridding ourselves of that Medieval claptrap. Too many citizens in prison? Well, at least that helps the job deficit problem. Fracking is good for everyone until we need that groundwater. And why should anyone worry about gay marriage? After all, they don't reproduce.

So lets concentrate on saving America from terrorism. There is wide agreement that terrorism is bad for America. The people who want terrorism in America are mostly elsewhere. America is an easy target with all those open borders and shops where guns and ammonium nitrate can be purchased. And we have so many tall buildings to topple. Our cell phones and cable networks facilitate communication in terror networks and attacks on our electronic controls. And our government is behind on protecting these facilities because it can't afford to hire the best.

There are several tracks we could take to save America from terrorism. We could hide in bunkers and minimize our interaction with the rest of the world. We could train every citizen in anti-terrorist self defense. We could invade any nation that sends terrorists our way or even gives them safe haven. Or we could join the terrorists as a few of our citizens have already tried to do. What we need is a leader to tell us which way to go. What we have is leaders of many stripes pointing to many different paths. We must save America from its leaders!