What Does it Mean to be an American?

America is seen to be many things. From the bad things like being arrogant, but also good things like America being the land of opportunity, the freedoms we have, and the excellent democracy. Sometimes it can be difficult to live up to these high standards. But these standards were set because they are true. Our founding fathers created such an excellent constitution; that is why we have such high standards.

People come here with expectations almost as high as their dreams, which they expect to achieve. And it is possible to achieve these dreams. Take us for example. 10, maybe 5, years ago no one would have thought that a program would have been invented where you do 4 years of high school in 2 years then go to college for 2 years! This is just an example on a small scale of things that you can do.

The government is a favorable aspect of our nation. Our founding fathers created the Bill of Rights. This is a document that has rights that the government can not take away! Some of the most favorable rights are in the 1st amendment. This includes but not limited to: the freedom of religion, the freedom of speech, and the freedom of assembly. In many countries today if you disgrace the government by stating your opinion the punishment could even be death, this is also the same for assembly. Also in many countries you can worship only the God that they tell you to worship. We, as Americans, might wonder why people love this country so much. That is because we quite often forget how rough other countries have it. Some of us will go to church, others a temple and others may not even worship at all. We don't see it as too big of a deal. But in other countries there can be serious repercussions for being X religion. This fact in itself may be why many people chose to come here.

Besides the opportunity this country can provide and the freedoms, our government is another thing that makes our country more favorable than others. Our democracy is partly based off of the Roman government. There are two principals that make our country different from the rest. Separation of powers and checks and balances. Separation of powers is why we have 3 branches of government, not 1. This is made so not one person has too much power. The second fundamental is checks and balances. This is so one branch can "check" another. For example, if the president wants to make a treaty with another country, it must first be approved by 2/3 vote of the Senate. This way the president can't do one thing without making sure the majority agrees with him, therefore it is most likely a better decision.

With the opportunity, freedom, and democracy this country provides; it attracts many people each year. Sometimes, if you live in foregin countries, your biggest enemy could be your very own government. America's founding fathers made sure that we would not think that way. By creating a great democracy, set of freedoms and unmeasurable opporutity this country has a lot going for it.

Diary entry

Dear Diary,
Today I nearly escaped death. The white men who have been stealing our food, killing our men, scaring our women and children and kicking us out of our towns came to our fort today. I guess we should have seen it coming, or at least been more prepared. They surrounded our fort at about mid-day with their guns. the barged in with us completely unprepared. We thought we could win because the first 20 men we killed right as the ran through the door. Their muskets shot our men down. I was on the 2Nd level next to the door. I killed about 4 men. Even one of the meanest who ran through shouting then shot my brother. I ran to go help him then the same man who killed my brother shot me in the calf. I was unable to help my brother but had the strength to kill the evil white man who killed my brother. Then my best friend Tonto helped me use a ladder to climb outside and escape. By that time they had just set fire to the place and would give no mercy to any children. Tonto way up in a tree; by then a the sun was setting. We walked what felt like forever because of my leg but it was at least out of sight of the fort but close enough so I could see the smoke rising from it above the tree tops. Luckily Tonto was a medicine man who also knew a lot of white man practices. He saved my life.
That was about 1 years ago and we are now at a village, closer to the Spanish than the English, named Waccaca. Tonto lives next to me and I now have a woman and one baby on the way. I couldn't write in this because I lost it then re-found it in my old food sack.

From,
Chandrak

Political Cartoon

This political cartoon states how the first colonists came here what we would consider today, illegal. We didn't really care because we weren't the ones who were being massacred and being treated unfairly and dishonestly. We fought a lot of battles then we mutually settled to give them the land between the Appalachian mountains and the Mississippi river. Then we tricked them out of that through something they didn't understand: politics. And we took advantage of that. What's done is done, but we are basically hypocrites.