America, the Good Nation

The United States is not a perfect country. That’s what makes it great.

President Ronald Reagan speaking at the Brandenburg Gate, Berlin in 1987. Public Domain photo.

It was the fall of 1983. I was a freshman in high school in Michigan. That fall I decided to try out for the cross country team. I wasn’t a great runner. I was truly, truly bad.

I was running in a cross country meet in the town of Swartz Creek, just outside of my hometown of…