I Was Not Looking For Paradise; I Was Trying to Escape Hell

The above quote is from the new Svetlana Kunin: Perspectives of a Russian Immigrant series which runs from time to time on the opinion page of the Investors Business Daily newspaper. Many of you do not get that fine daily so I run the links here as an ongoing feature.

Readers from all over the world come to this small blog to use the links so they can benefit from her fine editorials. It's not an exaggeration. Some return over and over and others come across this blog by "googling" her name. I am happy to provide the service even though my writing suffers embarrassingly by comparison to hers. But I have to "class up" the site somehow so I frequently try to associate myself with talented writers and thinkers.

The title comment was made to Kunin by a friend of hers who also emigrated/escaped from Russia and came here, not with hopes of Utopia, but simply seeking a freer life. It's the same reason the vast majority of people immigrate to here and why so few leave. These people know what many native born Americans have forgotten or never were taught, namely, that simple but eloquent statement Ms Kunin made in her first "letter to the editor" which has graced the top of this page for a long time now.

"There is no perfect society. There are no perfect people. Critics say that greed is the driving force of capitalism. My answer is that envy is the driving force of socialism. Change to socialism is not an improvement on the imperfections of the current system."

The new editorial, which ran today in the above named paper deals with the problem of the unbalanced education system here, a system that gives short shrift to history. That problem could explain why only people who have escaped from tyranny can appreciate how dangerously close this country is to sliding beneath the waves in an ocean of lost potential and lost souls.

It only takes one or two generations for national memories to fade into meaninglessness, and from there into the fate which has befallen every free society in history when security becomes more important than freedom. It's individual liberty and personal responsibility which made this nation exceptional, not a government nanny with a bushel basket of carrots and sticks.

And it's more than a shame that few but the immigrants know that in searching for paradise we may very well get lost in hell.