This threatens to be the Year of Fear on the campaign trail as Donald Trump meets every effort to demonize him with an opposite but equal effort to stereotype Hillary Clinton. Once upon a time, when there was far more to fear about the future, a president named Franklin Roosevelt proclaimed that we have nothing to fear but fear itself. Instead he raised the bright banner of hope and, under it, brought the country through the Great Depression and then a great world war. His was the voice of hope. It still resounds. Want to hear it? Then attend a citizenship ceremony at any courthouse, municipal auditorium or amphitheater near you. Like the Old State House Museum in Little Rock, Ark., where a hundred new citizens were sworn in last week.
Just try to tell these new Americans that they should be afraid, very afraid, of the future. They're not buying it. Listen to the youngest of these new Americans, 19-year-old Eduardo Flores from Mexico, who crossed the border with his parents when he was 2 years old. He says he's looking forward to casting his first vote in a presidential election this fall. "I always felt I was a part of this place," he says. Now he's got the papers to prove it.
His three younger sisters all ran to meet and hug him as he walked back to join them. His proud father, who was a poor campesino back in Mexico, now works at an eye-care clinic. He's a typical example of what's called upward mobility, which has brought millions to this Land of Opportunity from all over the world through the years--and centuries. "I love the United States," says Dad. "It has opportunity for my family."
Young Flores, now a full-fledged American, has big plans, and they may get bigger. He's already a high-school graduate and hopes to become an engineer or maybe a nurse--two honorable professions that need the best talents they can attract. There's no telling what the future holds in store for Eduardo Flores or he for it. Immigrants have a way of exceeding even their own expectations in this country, where Lady Liberty still raises her torch to illuminate the darkness of the Old World and dispel fear.
Meanwhile, back on the muddy campaign trail, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump peddle fear--mainly of each other. Even while they repeat the standard banalities about America the Great, each pictures the other as a clear and present danger to the future of the Republic. The time when presidential candidates treated each other with at least an outward respect and set out to talk sense to the American people may have passed with Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson. Now the standard-bearers of both parties no longer speak but shout.
Forgive any lack of enthusiasm on the part of a cynical electorate, but it's not as if Hillary Clinton were setting a precedent for women from Arkansas. Not in the home state of Hattie Caraway, the first woman elected to the United States Senate. She's just furthering a proud tradition here in the Wonder State.
Arkansas' governor, Asa Hutchinson, showed up to welcome these latest Americans. "I would encourage each of you," he said, "to participate in our democracy, to vote, to learn, and to give back to this great country, which you have embraced today." Something tells us they will--just as this great country has embraced them.
This year's presidential election may not offer the most appetizing of choices, but duty calls and should not be shirked. America the Beautiful is about to get more so as the next America comes at us in technicolor. For all the colors of the rainbow are now to be added to America's ever growing and ever more hopeful population. So stick around. You ain't seen nothin' yet.
Paul Greenberg is the Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial writer and columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Editorial on 07/31/2016