A Simple Plan to Save America and the World
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!—Emma Lazarus, The New Colossus
I recently saw the the Statue of Liberty for the first time in my adult life, and all I could think was:
“Wait, that’s it?”
Sure, I probably shouldn't have expected it to fill me with the same sense of wonder as it did when I saw it as a wee lad, but nevertheless one of my country’s foremost monuments filled me with no awe, no pride, no sense of majesty, and certainly nothing like patriotic sentiment.
Today, there are hundreds of buildings taller than the statue in New York City alone, but at the time of its completion in 1886, it was the tallest structure in the city and one of the tallest in the world. How spectacular it must have appeared to those huddled masses! Put yourself in their shoes (one of the 12 million souls who immigrated through Ellis Island from 1892-1954)—fleeing from famine, poverty, persecution, or some combination thereof, you arrive at Ellis Island after a week-long transatlantic journey and the first thing you see is this New Colossus, a towering emblem of your new home’s commitment to liberty that is also likely several times larger than any building/structure you've ever seen in your life. Imagine the immense gratitude you would feel to this nation for taking you in! How inspired you would be to make a name for yourself in this “land of the free and the home of the brave”!
You, American born can never imagine how we, we lived under all kinds of “isms” felt when we in the early hours of a very cold January morning saw you, The Statue of Liberty. To us, this meant real freedom. Thank God we made it.
Pondering all of this as I gazed across the water at Lady Liberty, a most glorious epiphany occurred, a rapturous galaxy-brain moment bordering on orgasm.
And in a flash, it was known—a simple plan to save America, and therefore the world (seeing that we are the planet’s flagship enterprise and all).
Make it Bigger.
We must sextuple the Statue of Liberty's size. Maybe sextuple is not enough, I don’t know—I want Lady Liberty to be so tall that her vagina (the freedom pussy) is higher than the biggest skyscraper in NYC. I don't care how we do it—give her high heels, give her stilts, make a new statue with a great rack and a rockin’ bod—whatever it takes, let’s just make it happen.
Why would we do this you might ask? How will this solve any of our country’s problems, serious as they are numerous? Contrary to popular belief, our problems are not political, economic, or social—what ails us can only be described as spiritual, but perhaps also as inspirational and aspirational. We Americans have forgotten who we are: Gods of Freedom, ruling over this pale blue dot with a wisdom, strength, and insufferable arrogance that the other lowly nations of the earth can only dream of possessing. All we need is a small reminder of our divine birthright as citizens of the greatest nation in the Milky Way (the universe?) and everything will sort itself out in due time.
But we mustn’t stop there.
The Washington monument is also looking a bit flaccid these days.
The solution:
Make it Bigger.
Make it longer, make it girthier, make it pulse, make it throb, make it vibrate.
Make it so big that our enemies shall look upon it and tremble and know that if they fuck with us they will get fucked, and fucked hard; that they will get fucked silly and fucked stupid, and that they will have the best orgasms of their pathetic little lives.
But wait, there’s more.
It has been suggested that we should revive one of the ancient wonder of the world by building another colossus—not of Rhodes, but of Miami.
To this I say: sure, why the fuck not? Imagine looking up at the giant saggy balls of the Colossus of Miami as you enter a most glorious harbor—how thrilling!
But we mustn’t stop there.
I propose that we revive another ancient wonder of the world—The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, but this time in Manhattan, where I live, the greatest place in the world forever.
Look, Central park is great and all, but how much cooler would it be if the entire area was replaced by a enormous ziggurat covered in flora and fauna from all over the planet that serves as a kind of ecological temple, a holy technological marvel dedicated to that beautiful bitch we call Mother Nature and also to ourselves for being so cool because we can just build cool shit for no reason. The effective altruists speak of megaprojects for animal welfare; I speak of creating a sacred superstructure that catalyzes a transformative revitalization of our relationship with nature, enabling us to solve climate change, end factory farming, and wild animal suffering in one fell swoop.
But wait, there’s more.
We finally achieve Donald’s Trump’s dream of building a wall, except this time we build it 100 feet high (or 30.48 meters but the metric system is a scam) and encircle all of our land and all of our waters thereby making the Atlantic and Pacific oceans moats for our divine country.
In conclusion:
The Statue of Liberty—Make it Bigger
The Washington monument—Make it Bigger
The Colossus of Miami—Build it.
The Hanging Gardens of Manhattan—Grow it.
Build a Wall—Probably Not.
The United States of America—Saved.
The World—Redeemed.
You Americans love bigness! Are you looking to a big moat (extension of the Great Lakes) between US and Canada al the way to Vancouver?? An extremely long bridge to Ha'waii?? A memorial elevator to the ISS??