A Melting Pot and A Seething Cauldron

I immigrated to the United States in 1969 at the age of seventeen, having no family, language skills, or cultural familiarity. I considered America a land of opportunity and a proven melting pot that had, for generations, received and culturally integrated many immigrants like me.

Once I found my cultural sea legs and took a closer look at the American culture, I started noticing deep divisions, played out with the assassination of political and civic leaders, race riots, global wars, economic turmoils, and internal instability, all of which led me to believe that America was concurrently a melting pot and a seething cauldron with a tendency to boil over in response to heated circumstances.

The upcoming Presidential elections, for example, illuminate some of our moral failings, such as our inability to distinguish good from evil as we abandon allies like Ukraine and Israel. The House, Senate, and Supreme Court are not operating in a manner envisioned by our founding fathers.

It is important to distinguish the 1960s student riots directed at a losing war in Vietnam from the antisemitic students in elite universities like Harvard, Columbia, and Yale rioting in favor of Hammas and Iran, shouting “From the river to the sea” and “Death to America.” 

You know something is wrong when the New York Times, instead of focusing on substantive issues, chooses to focus on matters such as gender pronouns, social justice, or the outing of internal leakers of its confidential biased Gaza war coverage. With ten million paid subscribers, the New York Times may be financially successful but has become morally bankrupt—a divided house reporting on a divided country. 

Last week, Uri Berliner, a 25-year veteran of National Public Radio, published an article in The Free Press, stating, “The network lost America’s trust when it started telling listeners how to think.” This is the type of rot that has spread from our political and educational establishments to our newspapers and corporations. Last week, Google fired 28 employees for rioting and illegally occupying its executive offices; protestors blocked access to major bridges, highways, and airports, threatening to disrupt this year’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

Add to this witch’s brew a national debt we can’t afford to pay back, inflation we can’t afford to live with, and enemies like Russia, China, and Iran, and it becomes obvious we are looking at another seething cauldron ready to boil over.

Like Obi-Wan Kenobi, “I feel a great disturbance in the Force.”

— Sina