FREE-DUMB

Buckle up and hold on – this one’s a full on rant.

I heard on the news about the Freedom Towers being built at the World Trade Center site. I was shocked because I always thought when I heard ‘Freedom Towers’ it was just a joke that would never actually stick. Like when my mom says the word Horse-pital instead of hospital. Sure, I use the word, but would never use it in a moment of seriousness. “HELP! I’m bleeding! Take me to the horse-pital!”

At home, my husband calls me Hooch Manelli and I’ll answer him. But I can’t imagine being in a doctor’s waiting room and hearing, “Mrs. Manelli…Hooch? The doctor will see you now.”

So why would we impose a made up use of a word on a serious tragedy? Our memorials from World War II are simply called War War II memorials. And our Vietnam Memorials are called the Vietnam Memorials, not the War-We-Shouldn’t-Have-Died-In Memorial. In this day and age the word Freedom is more of a marketing term than anything else, so it would be less offensive to see the site called ‘World Trade Center Memorial – Sponsored by Pepsi.”

Let’s reflect on the word freedom over the past several years.

I’ll start with the most shameful first. When there was an actual effort to start calling French Fries “Freedom Fries” instead. I’m confident that historians will look back and consider this the lowest point in American history. Three House office building cafeterias actually held a press conference to announce the new menu with Freedom Toast and Freedom Fries. How humiliating. I’m still blushing.

It would have been less embarrassing if we had sent a few ships over to France, only for the sailors to moon them. At least then, our government would be acting like mature sixteen year-olds instead of five year-olds.

Then there’s Iraq. Some brilliant marketing person realized that if we fight for freedom, Americans will rally behind the government. Because fighting for freedom sounds much catchier than fighting for oil. And the irony here is of course that the people there still aren’t free.

And then there was the wire-tapping for freedom. I could go on and on. But I won’t.

Even after all of the shameful acts and embarrassing cover-ups, I’m still proud to be an American. America is like family. Sure politicians do stuff to humiliate me and I think, “I can’t believe I’m related twice-vote removed to that person,” but I'm still part of the American family.

So while I enjoy ‘Freedom’, I wish I could have more of the free with less of the dumb.