| | The pen is mightier then sword. Its amazing how few people really realize how much influence writers and scholars have on the world around them. From revolutions fought to help the poor in the name of Karl Marx to the widespread genocidal influence of Nazi propaganda - the written word is a powerful tool in influencing the mind of man. U.S. domestic and foreign policy is influenced by very educated people but like others before them they are restricted by their humanity. Samuel P. Huntington is well-known for his work that has set the pace for U.S. foreign policy. His work entitled "Clash of Civilizations" is credited for helping set the stage for the war on Islam. Indeed one can often hear U.S. statesmen, etc. make the off comment of the wars in the middle east being "civilizations clashing". Were it not for the fact that the work of Samuel P. Huntington is so highly regarded among politicians you might be able to brush them off as the mad ravings of some bigoted fool. However, his work is very influential to those creating this nations laws, and after reading this, that should be a scary thought - particularly for those of Mexican descent.
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The Hispanic Challenge, By Samuel P. Huntington
The persistent inflow of Hispanic immigrants threatens to divide the United States into two peoples, two cultures, and two languages. Unlike past immigrant groups, Mexicans and other Latinos have not assimilated into mainstream U.S. culture, forming instead their own political and linguistic enclaves—from Los Angeles to Miami—and rejecting the Anglo-Protestant values that built the American dream. The United States ignores this challenge at its peril.
America was created by 17th- and 18th-century settlers who were overwhelmingly white, British, and Protestant. Their values, institutions, and culture provided the foundation for and shaped the development of the United States in the following centuries. They initially defined America in terms of race, ethnicity, culture, and religion. Then, in the 18th century, they also had to define America ideologically to justify independence from their home country, which was also white, British, and Protestant. Thomas Jefferson set forth this “creed,” as Nobel Prize-winning economist Gunnar Myrdal called it, in the Declaration of Independence, and ever since, its principles have been reiterated by statesmen and espoused by the public as an essential component of U.S. identity.
By the latter years of the 19th century, however, the ethnic component had been broadened to include Germans, Irish, and Scandinavians, and the United States' religious identity was being redefined more broadly from Protestant to Christian. With World War II and the assimilation of large numbers of southern and eastern European immigrants and their offspring into U.S. society, ethnicity virtually disappeared as a defining component of national identity. So did race, following the achievements of the civil rights movement and the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. Americans now see and endorse their country as multiethnic and multiracial. As a result, American identity is now defined in terms of culture and creed.
Most Americans see the creed as the crucial element of their national identity. The creed, however, was the product of the distinct Anglo-Protestant culture of the founding settlers. Key elements of that culture include the English language; Christianity; religious commitment; English concepts of the rule of law, including the responsibility of rulers and the rights of individuals; and dissenting Protestant values of individualism, the work ethic, and the belief that humans have the ability and the duty to try to create a heaven on earth, a “city on a hill.” Historically, millions of immigrants were attracted to the United States because of this culture and the economic opportunities and political liberties it made possible.
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