We are a loving nation, open armed and understanding.  But, as the inflow of foreigners entering our country threatens to accelerate and as our schools become less American, the teaching of American History is hitting new lows.  With the loss of our history is the loss of national identity. With this unchecked inflow, and the lack of teaching of our history, we decline. Yet we allow it. 

There is a fictional bird called the Thorn Bird. 

“A mythical bird that searches for thorn trees from the day it is hatched. When it finds the perfect thorn, it impales itself, and sings the most beautiful song ever heard as it dies.”

I ask the question, are we, as a nation, casting ourselves on a thorn?  Are we so enthralled with the notion that we are a sanctuary for the downtrodden and refugees that we will risk our very existence to extend the courtesy?  And, in so doing, do we commit to our own demise?  We seem to be casting ourselves upon a thorn as we sing our song of sanctuary and acceptance.

There are two waves of influence on our nation that are particularly bothersome and spring from our generosities. They are deeply connected and lead to an ultimate end that can only result in an evisceration of national pride and continuity.

First, and obvious as it is destructive, is the unmonitored and unmeasured inflow of illegal immigrants to our country.  Gone are the days of measured and monitored legal immigration.  Heralded and encouraged is the flow of overstayed visas, for the jobs apparently Americans “can’t do” (we are told), and border jumping for the jobs Americans “won’t do.”

Our universities solicit foreign students, tapping into grants and pots of money and crowding out the sons and daughters of legal residents and citizens.  Eminently qualified students are told there is no room for them at their state university.  Often classes are taught by professors speaking broken English that many students have difficulty understanding.  A multinational faculty is the chic trend.

Meanwhile, The University of Illinois, which has solicited students from China, is now broadcasting its football games in Chinese.  Is this what assimilation looks like?

“The campus has more than 10,000 international students, almost a quarter of the total enrollment of 44,000. This fall, 5,295 of those students are from China.

“That’s largest group of international students on campus and a fivefold increase in Chinese students over the past decade.”

Muslims in New Jersey taunt that they soon will be the majority.  That is a warning of non assimilation, of “we will have it our way” soon, in your country.  Are “no go” zones, as in France, inevitable?

A second manifestation comes from another direction, but is closely related.

The Civil War Trust, an organization deeply committed to American History, recently published these results. 

“82% of the nation’s 8^th graders did not even score ‘proficient’ in American History.”

Why the sudden drop off of the teaching of American History?  Is this a deficiency in the teaching or the student? Is it a result of a drastic change in the demographics in our schools?  Or is it from a deliberate change in the curriculum?  If so, by what authority? There is good cause to believe that is the case. And is this at least in part a response to the change in student composition?

Just as the student population has changed in demographics, so have the demographics of the teachers, and the school boards.  The inherent interest in American history drops off sharply with those not of this country.

Add in the defiling of the figures of American History and the new “embarrassment” of being an American. This is manufactured and deliberate. Old men in bad wigs who owned slaves, and a nation built on slavery is the lesson today, as noted by Bernie Sanders. 

Unheralded is the wisdom and conceptual construction of our form of government, the incidents of bravery and sacrifice in our nation’s history, and the critical events that formed our nation.  Far be it from the man on the street to know about the Federalist Papers, Antietam, Guadalcanal, Chosin Reservoir, or the Constitution.  Today it is a victory if a college student can name the Vice President or a Supreme Court Justice.

With the tremendous surge, the uncontrolled and unmonitored immigrant influx, we not only begin to loose the institutions we have built, but also the ability to control how they operate.

American History must be taught, understood and revered.  If it is not, if the unassimilated gather and maintain their cultures in our schools and on our soil, we will be lost as a nation.  We will have died by our own design, upon the “thorn” of good intentions.

Give us your huddled masses, but have them come in over there, on Ellis Island (now closed). Have them sign in and have them learn about this country and respect and learn our history.  There is wisdom in a citizenship test and oath of loyalty.

Make the foreign faculty members teach our history.  Maybe they will learn something.  And do not recruit foreign students to crowd out the qualified state residents at the state institutions.  They likely are the progeny of those who actually created this country and contributed in those unremembered historical events.

How do you say "touchdown" in Chinese?