Yesterday I posted about the protests going on at Independence Mall. This is a follow up.

The young man I spoke with at the Veterans for Peace demonstration at Philadelphia’s Independence Mall wore a black bandanna and a baseball cap as he held a sign proclaiming “When Injustice Becomes Law, Resistance Becomes Duty.”

I think he believes it fervently. I was struck with how passionately he spoke. How much he seemed to care for our nation as he answered my questions.

One answer in particular I had to put up today – Independence Day. I asked if he had anything to say to help bring our people together – to start to heal the sharp bitter divisions dividing us today.

He said, “…I am neither liberal or conservative. I think that the partisan turbine that everything is spinning into lately has befuddled everybody’s vision and befuddled their ability to make decisions because they are so concerned about – you know – sticking to their party or sticking to their morals or sticking to their isms or their ists…

“…The best advice I can give to a conservative or a liberal is to put aside all party uh morality or all party – you know – rules and just think about what is truly best for everybody.

It’s no argument that conservatives love the country as much as the liberals do, but if they’re fighting, nothing is happening for the benefit of the country. And the only way this is going to get any better is to solidify and realize that a nation divided upon itself can never fix the wounds that are caused by that division itself…”

OK. Maybe there’s no great political insights here. No deep analysis. But this guy really, really cares about his country and people. He isn’t giving up the fight to make things better. He’s not jut doing a dance for the media.

There’s great hope in this, I think, that there are still citizens out there who aren’t jaundiced and cynical about America. And truly want us to be what our founders wanted us to be when they declared independence.