WHY us?

Simon Sinek "The WHY of the USA"

Two years ago, I did my Sunday blog during the Fourth of July holiday weekend, and I called it 

The Declaration of Dependence. 

This morning, our good friend Simon Sinek of Start with WHY fame was my muse for today's holiday blog. If you have not watched Simon's TED.com talk, you should. Today is Sunday, tomorrow is a holiday. No excuses - go watch that TED.com talk before your next day at work. 

Why America is NOT the greatest country in the world, anymore?

Remember this one? HBO is a major media provider, so there is a good chance that you have seen "The Newsroom" series. YouTube says this video has well over 4 million views. So, if you are reading my blog, that you probably have seen this clip more than once. 

If you did not watch Simon's video above, and if you truly never watched the above clip from "The Newsroom" you can continue reading, but it will make more sense if you have watched them. So please, go ahead, I'll wait.

OK, ready?

I found this on the Internet. Now, some of you are cheering and shouting YES! And some of you are now violently ill. I get that. But let's break it down:

• This "hat" assumes that we can "make" our country (or any country) great.
• This "hat" assumes that our country once was great, but for some reason stopped being great, but (have no fear) it can be fixed and made great again (like we took a wrong turn on our family vacation, while driving to Yosemite).
• Did anyone actually look up the definition of the word again before they made this hat?

Examples from Cambridge (get it?  USA <> UK? Oh never mind...) Dictionary Online:

• If you think it's wrong, cross it out and write it again.
• "I never want to see you ever again, " he shouted as he stormed out of the house.
• I'm not going to let him repair my bike again because he made a really bad job of it last time.
• I was very nervous about driving again after the accident.
• If the phone lines are busy, please try again later.

From what I can see, the word "again" is often associated with errors. Mistakes. Negative experiences. Experiments gone wrong.

The Great Experiment is often a reference to the United States. I love the word experiment. A procedure undertaken to make a discovery, test a hypothesis, or demonstrate a known fact.

Two years ago, I blogged on "Dependence Day" in an attempt to tie all things technology to our everyday world. You would not be reading this blog it were not for the Internet. You would not have HBO, or YouTube, or the iPad or laptop or tablet that you are using to read this post (hopefully from the beach). Colleges and Universities would not be "in the cloud" and there would be no Telemedicine, no Netfllix, no Uber and certainly no self driving cars. 

If it were not for "The Great Experiment" of the USA, we would not have 99% of the things that we take for granted. Sure, many other countries might have followed our path. Many others might have eventually went to the moon, and cured polio, and invented the laser. But we did it. The USA. The land of the free, the home of the brave. 

And with our "laboratory tools" such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, our WHY, our HOW and our WHAT have become an amazing TED.com talk with "Ideas Worth Spreading". 

I'm not sure if America needs fixing. I'm not sure if it was ever broken. I am not sure if it was ever great, or if ever stopped being great. What I am sure of is this: I'm glad it exists. 

Is TED.com a good thing? I think so. I guess someone out there probably hates TED.com and says it is a terrible idea. But for me, the fact that TED.com was created, the fact that TED.com was "born" and that TED.com then "spread" is a good thing. It was a good experiment.  

We should always seek out and support and spread the good experiments. But the only way to get to the "good experiments" is to go through the pain and suffering of the bad ones. 

And now, through the miracle of "The Internet" (Thank you, USA) here are the last minutes of "The Newsroom" to bring it all home for you. Enjoy. 

What makes America the greatest country in the world?
You do.

The Internet is the global system of interconnected computer networks that use the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to link billions of devices worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks of local to global scope, linked by a broad array of electronic, wireless, and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries an extensive range of information resources and services, such as the inter-linked hypertext documents and applications of the World Wide Web (WWW), electronic mail, telephony, and peer-to-peer networks for file sharing.

The origins of the Internet date back to research commissioned by the United States federal government in the 1960s to build robust, fault-tolerant communication via computer networks.