I believe that I live in a country that is just as flawed, but in different ways, as most others in the world today.  One of the most serious flaws is that we have an inordinate love of our guns. Our culture is primarily centered around violence. We are four percent of the world’s population, yet own almost fifty percent of the world’s guns.

But there is one characteristic of this country that leaves me with hope and pride and a feeling that we can survive just about anything that the world throws at us.  That characteristic is that we as a nation of people settle our differences at the ballot box instead of with bullets.

I know in the middle of our three hundred year existence that we managed to kill a half million of ourselves over the idea that one human being can own another.  Thankfully that war ended on the moral side of things and even more so that it is the only time we have taken up guns against each other.  We are pretty unique in that regard and all you have to do to see that is look at the history of just about any other country.

Resolving our conflicts with our ballot instead of bullets does result in two and four year periods where we have to put up with our serious mistakes. This is one of those periods. We will start remedying that mistake this coming November and finally drive the unstable narcissist out of office in twenty-four months after that.

Yes, I am extremely proud that we settle our major differences with our ballots instead of with our bullets. That fact alone makes me proud to call myself an American.