Chapter 2 The Exodus of "American Nora"

Brother Lu: Hello! I told you in my last letter that I did not figure out "what is the President of the United States" until I lived here for many days.However, for a long time I still wondered how this happened.In our concept, how did the "head" of this world power with supreme authority fall into the position of a "chief executive"?But no matter how confused I was, I could only trust my eyes.Because this is what I see, not from some theoretical calculation. When we were in China, we were no strangers to the term "separation of powers".The theory represented by this word has been chewed by everyone in China for hundreds of years.Otherwise, you and I are both ordinary people (God) who are non-experts and scholars with different levels of sequences.God is the only monad who created monads. , How can such a professional word be treated as a common word.However, if I thought that being familiar with the word and its theory could really figure out "what is the president of the United States", I would not be surprised to come here.

But why in the hearts of ordinary people like us, the theory just can't calculate a supposedly inevitable result?What is the obstacle that makes us seem to be instinctively and stubbornly unwilling to follow the guidance of a theory and believe in a real world?Let me go back to America first.Talk about the "president" of the United States who is running for office. I remember one time when I first came here, I saw one of our American friends watching the president on TV with a pitiful expression on his face. He shook his head and said, "Poor guy."This scene really baffled us.But later, we have become accustomed to this situation.Sometimes we all watch Clinton on TV and say "poor guy" involuntarily.Because don't say that the president of the United States has only one "administrative director" authority. Even within the scope of the executive agency's authority, he is still subject to supervision and restrictions everywhere, and often runs into walls everywhere.

Take a simple example.That was three years ago, when President Clinton had just come to power, he was gearing up and planning to do something big.Anyway chosen, he can at least form in England in his administration.Moore was the forerunner of this school of thought, later expounded by Wittgenstein, showing his leadership skills and work efficiency.The first step he has to do is to build a reliable and effective team.And it is precisely within his purview to appoint the leaders of various departments of the executive agency.In my opinion, although this can't give all the "brothers" under him the title of "teacher and brigade commander", but this is really a very happy time to exercise power.Who would have thought that things are not that simple.

When Clinton proposes a candidate leader for each executive branch, he must submit it to Congress for approval according to law. Before Congress approves, a special agency will conduct a rigorous review of each candidate nominated by the president.In case the president uses power for personal gain. I know that when you see this, you must be secretly laughing there. I can almost hear your distant laughter.If we were sitting in your small, cramped room right now, you would be telling me with a sly face, you take this bit of American tricks seriously?Can they call the president's nomination to go to trial?That is to go through the motions.

To be honest, when I wrote the above paragraph, I felt that it was too serious, too serious to be true.Because, I have had the same experience as you.It seems that the words that are too high-sounding are a bit unreal, and the "discriminators" represented by Hui Shi and Gongsun Long, who are represented by Hui Shi and Gongsun Long, always look a bit like a perfect pair made to confuse the public. Masks. But if you're like me and have seen a Congressional hearing televised live across the United States, you've put your smile away. The first time I saw it, I was also surprised. Who Can you imagine that the Americans are playing there for real?

Generally, Congress has a special agency to conduct the review of the nominee for a certain position proposed by the president. If any relatively large and controversial issues arise, Congress will request a hearing.At this time, the structure of the hearing is exactly the same as that of the court.Both parties who disagree with the nominee will provide witnesses to testify at the hearing.At the same time, the nominee under scrutiny must also testify and answer questions, no matter how embarrassing they may be.To tell you the truth, it was the first time I watched such a hearing, and I couldn't help but mutter in my heart, why the review of nominees in the United States is like a trial of thieves.

Congressional hearings, like most events in Congress, are televised nationally.The entire hearing process was under the watchful eyes of the American people, and it was as orderly and meticulous as a court.The difference is that in the end, instead of a jury making a verdict, members of a congressional review committee vote to decide.However, no matter how serious the problem of the judgment is, this judgment only affects the denial of the nomination and has nothing to do with the judicial decision.Once a congressional review committee confirms or rejects the executive nominee, the process is over.Only when necessary, will legal proceedings be triggered, transferred to judicial-related departments, and entered into another procedure of a completely different nature.

The hearing that I watched for the first time, the hearing process was very long.Americans watch the progress every day like watching a TV series.Finally, the committee announced the result, denying the charges against the nominee.At that time, a general review of the nominee's response," "The Class Question," "Why We Talk About Socialism."See, not unlike how a suspect reacts in court when he is acquitted.His relatives and friends also hugged and jumped in front of the TV.I think at this time, they probably don't care about "becoming an official or not".Being able to cleanse myself has become a top priority.I had only been in the United States for about a month at the time, and I didn't quite understand how this happened.However, the impression left was very deep.

Still stepping back, let me continue to tell you the story of Clinton's appointments to the administration. As I said earlier, "legislative, judicial and executive" are the three branches of the entire power structure of the US government.However, under the agencies that belong to the executive branch, there is also a Ministry of Justice.This has nothing to do with the "judicial branch" of the US government.The "judicial branch" of the government power structure refers to the court system.The Ministry of Justice, under the "executive branch" run by the president, is an administrative agency that deals with day-to-day affairs related to the judiciary.Incidentally, this is also a matter of language translation.What Americans call the Department of Justice, the Attorney General and the judicial branch of the government, the three "judiciaries" use three completely different words, and it is clear who is who. Chinese is not so particular about this aspect, so I can only A little wordy.

The U.S. Attorney General's basic contingent is a large group of prosecutors.Their daily work is to represent the executive branch of the government to request investigations of various criminal acts, and start the investigation after obtaining the approval of the court.And, relative to the scientific objective world at the time they had the evidence.The world that people directly experience in their daily lives.He admitted that he would file a lawsuit with the court, that is, with a branch of the U.S. government that really holds the "judicial power". In the United States, this department is extremely important to the president.The Minister of Justice is in charge of law and order, and the improvement of law and order is a major achievement of the president.What's more, as I mentioned earlier, the "president" is not the "emperor".He's just the "administrative head" of the US government.That said, the President himself, along with all other department leaders, and all civilians on this land, could also be the subject of a legal investigation brought by the Justice Department.At the same time, it is entirely possible to become the object of a lawsuit.After all, the president is the leader of a large branch of government power and has always been the target of public criticism.He uses power all the time, but his power must be restricted everywhere, and his every move is under various kinds of supervision to prevent him from breaking the law and exceeding his power.Therefore, the President of the United States can be said to be dancing on a grass covered with landmines. The possibility of him getting into a lawsuit is much greater than that of an ordinary American civilian.

Of course, even if the Attorney General is a confidant arranged by the President, under the supervision of Congress and all parties, he cannot be free to the President as he pleases.However, there are always some edge cases that can go up and down, and can go in and out.In this case, whether the Justice Department pushes or pulls is still crucial for the president.President Clinton always felt like he was hanging on a tightrope. He and his wife were both lawyers. Of course, they knew the key points, so they didn't dare to take the candidate for the Attorney General lightly. Then again, in the United States, it is not so easy for the president to place a cronies in such an important position.Because the minister of justice of a big country must at least have complete legal qualifications.This kind of personal "fullest freedom" can only be achieved under this technical qualification system.Ideas and riots are, and will be, rigorously questioned by Congress.In this way, the possibility of cronyism is greatly reduced.To be honest, it is not easy to find a person like this who is a trusted confidant and can meet the technical requirements of the Minister of Justice. How can it be possible to find a few candidates for backup? After much deliberation, Clinton chose a woman as his nominee for attorney general.After it is sent to Congress, it is expected that there will be no problem with its technical qualifications.However, the investigation and scrutiny of such candidates by Congress has far exceeded my expectations. No one thought that this lady could be said to have "capsized the boat in a small river ditch". Her technical qualifications in the law are perfectly fine.As for personal moral character, I believe that before Clinton pushed her out, the White House had already conducted a strict review of her.Because, if there is a problem with the nominee introduced, it is not only a waste of time, but the tool is a computer.See "People" in "Computers and Automatic Control", which will also damage the reputation of the President himself and the pool he manages. As a result, no one thought that the questions raised by Congressional review are, first, this A woman once illegally hired an illegal immigrant who did not have a legal work permit to work for her. Second, during the employment period, as the employer who hired the illegal immigrant, she did not pay the tax that the employer should pay according to law. Let me explain to you by the way.In the United States, when an employer hires a worker, he will deduct the income tax payable by the employee in advance for his employee when he pays the salary, and hand it over on his behalf.At the same time, the employer himself must pay a tax that must be paid due to the employment. In this way, the nominee for attorney general proposed by the president is actually "double illegal"?Immediately there was an uproar in public opinion and it became a big news.All kinds of follow-up reports came out one after another.In the United States, such a ministerial appointment process cannot be made into a "black box operation".Through all-pervasive journalists, everything is public. Although Clinton felt ashamed, he had no possibility of preventing Congress from publishing the results of the investigation and changing another nominee in private.He could only blame his own team for not doing a detailed review beforehand, and there was a big flaw.Because, what could be more ridiculous than the Attorney General breaking the law? Maybe you are also curious.What kind of staff does that lady employ?Let me tell you, she once hired a little Mexican nanny who didn't have legal work status.Is it "a boat overturned in a small river ditch"?You will definitely say, what is this?But in the United States, if it is found out, this is definitely a matter of principle.This has already been introduced in the letters I wrote to you last year. There are only two concepts here: "legal" and "illegal". The nominee for the Minister of Justice can be said to be "clean and clean".Because if she had other problems, it would have been found out long ago.However, it was such a "little nanny" problem. Not only did she not become an official, but the tax bureau immediately came to her door, and in addition to paying taxes, she also paid a fine. Clinton's first nominee for attorney general, which he picked with great difficulty, was just rejected. It's useless to complain in my heart, Clinton can only regroup and put forward a second nominee for attorney general.This time it was a woman again.However, it is really bad luck.Who knows, Congress is still reviewing it, and this lady who almost became the future Attorney General raised her hand and surrendered.It turned out that her family also had a babysitter in Mexico! I figured that before Clinton sent his second nomination to Congress, the White House vetting agency, having learned from the previous nomination, would have questioned this woman about the hapless "nanny problem."Is her "official addiction" too big to conceal the truth?Or were the White House censors taking a chance because they thought the nanny was long gone anyway?I don't know.However, no matter which side of them made the decision to "break through the barrier", in short, the facts have proved that the barrier of congressional review is not easy to break through. Here, I would like to mention it by the way.In today's American society, the most common is the temporary babysitter who takes care of the children temporarily.The reason was caused by the legal provision that "children under the age of twelve shall not be left alone".As long as there are children under the age of 12 in the family, and the parents need to go out temporarily, they will find someone to show them temporarily, and they usually have to pay wages in accordance with the federal minimum wage law. At that time, it was four yuan and twenty-five cents per hour. Of course, you can pay higher. , it is illegal to pay less.Therefore, it is not very common to hire a full-time nanny at home.As for families with many servants, there are probably only a handful of them. Today, it is indeed difficult for ordinary working families in the United States to hire a full-time nanny with legal status.The first is that legal residents have many opportunities in the United States after all.Among the many opportunities, being a nanny is definitely not the best strategy in terms of income and personal future.Even with the same low wages, legal residents will choose a job where they can learn some skills.Even if someone becomes a nanny, it is generally a stopgap measure. When encountering a good job opportunity, they will immediately leave.If you want to pay a wage that is also attractive to legal nannies, it is simply impossible for ordinary working families to bear the burden. Even for the two ministerial candidates nominated by Clinton, and such families with high salaries and incomes, relatively speaking.The installment payment of their house, car, etc., that is, the monthly fixed expenses will increase significantly, and other consumption will also increase, and it may not be easy to hire a long-term nanny.So in the United States, a kind of housekeeping company came into being. They come to two or three people regularly, for example, once a week.They bring detergents and tools for various purposes, unannounced vacuuming and cleaning.As for the usual sporadic housework, I did it myself.Since the American "home" is very large with a house and a garden, there are enough housework. Under such circumstances, a large number of illegal immigrants pouring into the United States like a tide, as well as foreigners with legal status but no work permits, naturally become a source of nannies.They are willing to accept lower wages and are not easy to change jobs. In order to keep this good job for them, they will relatively work harder.This is not only the best choice for families who want a stable and good nanny, but almost no choice. The only obstacle is the law, and in the United States, it's arguably a big one.I mentioned in last year’s letter that almost only Chinese restaurants accept Chinese students working illegally here, and restaurants run by Americans generally do not accept them.The obstacle, of course, is the law.The situation of nannies is different. On the one hand, there are almost no other stable sources.On the other hand, I always feel that my home is not considered a work unit, and finding a babysitter is always different from illegal recruitment. In addition, a very important one, workplaces such as restaurants may be subject to surprise inspections by the immigration bureau, and the immigration bureau will have a lot of trouble if they want to enter other people's private houses. They will never do it for an illegal babysitter Get into this trouble.So no one has heard of any family in the immigration bureau to check for illegal immigrants.As a result, such cases of hiring nannies who work illegally began to increase.And it basically happened in some working families with higher incomes, that is, the families of the two "nominees" of Clinton.Therefore, this is why Clinton may run into two "nanny problems" in a row. In any case, the well-planned appointment of the Attorney General by the dignified President of the United States fell into the hands of two little Mexican nannies.Therefore, what we see now is that the US Attorney General Reynolds under the Clinton administration is actually the third candidate he was forced to launch. Things like this are indeed happening every day on the big stage of the United States.Ordinary people in other countries, perhaps in their lifetime, may not even see embarrassing incidents encountered by national leaders in newspapers once.When they frequently read all kinds of "scandals" about the president of the United States in the newspapers, they must wonder how Americans tolerate such a president.They will even come to the natural conclusion that "the United States is a corrupt country" because of this.Do you think that even their president has frequent problems, let alone others? However, it is commonplace in the United States to read all kinds of negative news about the president in the newspapers.It is very difficult to find a praise article.You also know that since Clinton took office, there have been constant lawsuits.At first, we also felt strange about the attitude of the Americans around us.They are not as sensitive as we are to read negative news about the president.It was later discovered that this was because they often saw such news, knowing that the president was being watched by a large group of "professionals" such as Congress, the judiciary, the opposition party, and journalists all day long. .Furthermore, they also know that the group of people who are staring at the president will dig into these issues from all directions until they find out the truth, otherwise they will never stop.They just have to wait for the results to decide whether to vote for him next time. We have gradually become accustomed to living in such a country.We used to hear people compare power structures to a web.In this country, as far as the entire power structure is concerned, it seems that a strong net has been formed.However, we gradually feel that this seems to be another kind of network.Because all links on this network not only did not collude as we imagined, the so-called "officials and officials protect each other" like a fishing net to catch common interests, but instead not only involved each other, but also all involved in different directions.In the end, like a spider web, all forces are balanced and balanced, and every link is caught without slipping through the net, so it is difficult to take any special actions.It is impossible for anyone to break free with one hand, condescendingly cover the sky with one hand and make a fortune, and the president is of course no exception. We naturally ask the question at the beginning, how did all this come about?Since the President of the United States is not an independent top figure here, but only a part of this government structure, it does not make much sense to talk about the US election in isolation from this overall structure.So I thought.We still have to make some effort to find out what happened. If I go to explore the source of all this, a sentence pops up in my mind.This is a question raised by Gu Zhun in the "Gu Zhun Anthology" given to me by an old friend this year: "What happened after Nora left". A woman who was raised at home by her husband a hundred years ago like a doll, ran away without foreign aid, just for her personal ideals.No matter how you look at this event, it has a "revolutionary" meaning.It is no wonder that the same Nora has been seen by different people and societies in various, even different, "revolutionary meanings" from her departure for more than a hundred years. After Nora was "brought" to China, I don't know how many new women decades ago have absorbed infinite spiritual power from this foreign role model, and rushed out of their different families one by one, creating countless "Chinese Noras". ".Nora is not only revolutionary in her act of running away, but also in a broad sense of spirit.As a result, Nora, a Norwegian woman who has no power to restrain her, has become synonymous with a "revolution" full of masculinity. In this "revolution" of Nora, everything else can be regarded as the "price of the revolution" and ignored. The future Nora herself!As a result, many topics have been raised.In China, we were very familiar with Lu Xun's emotion after Nora left.It seems that he is worried about the large number of "Nora after leaving".He feels that "running away" is not the most urgent thing, the most urgent thing is to transform society.If the social environment is dangerous, then a weak Nora alone will end up crying and returning home, or wandering in prostitution, which may not be a good result.In this way, everyone's good mood of cheering for Nora was ruined. In fact, Lu Xun just reminded everyone that we should not only care about whether "Nora" as "Nora" "runs away", but should care more about whether "Nora" as a social symbol has undergone changes.This is the deeper meaning that "A Doll's House" can explore.Under the reminder of Lu Xun, everyone pinned all their hopes on a social revolution, believing that this is the only way out to solve the problem fundamentally. When realizing a social revolution, because its process is very long and ups and downs, it is full of hardships and sacrifices.A revolution often requires the succession of generations.After experiencing numerous failures, people are almost close to despair, and each time of near despair strengthens a new desire.Thus, in many revolutions, after such successive stimuli, the revolution has quietly changed from a means to an end to an end itself in people's minds.People are like sitting obsessively watching "A Doll's House" in the theater, and they have nothing else to ask but to "get away". Therefore, the victory of the revolution finally became a day and a breakthrough point that everyone dreamed of.When this day came, everyone was drunk in the carnival, and everything they could see was shrouded in colorful halos. Once again, everyone clapped their crowns to celebrate and toasted each other, saying to each other: This is it. Such celebrations have appeared in the squares of different countries in the world to celebrate the "revolutionary successes" of different natures in different ages.I sometimes feel a deep sense of doubt.I don't know why such a celebratory drink lasts so long in some places.Because, after all, there are all kinds of people who are intoxicated by it, and many of them seem to shouldn't be lost in such an illusory halo for a long time. The longer this atmosphere of celebration lasts, the heavier it becomes when questions arise. "Is it really all right now?" In China, someone finally asked "What will happen after Nora leaves?"But this time the question is more than a hundred times heavier than Lu Xun's heavy question back then.Nora has been sublimated into a symbol, and the "exodus" of earth-shaking social changes has been completed. Now that is the case, why can't we get rid of the same problem? It suddenly occurred to me that more than 200 years ago, didn't the United States also experience an independent revolution like "Nara ran away"?So, what will happen to this American Nora after she “runs away”?Wasn't every move of this "American Nora" at the beginning the root cause of all the phenomena I see in America today?This association aroused my curiosity. I found that American Nora did not think carefully about the consequences of "what will happen to her in the future" before experiencing "running away".She also sat down quietly due to reality, and seriously considered this issue very rationally and realistically. What was the state of the United States before the "revolution".It doesn't have a deep cultural heritage with four-figure years to boast about.Yes, its early immigrants came from England.However, because of this, it really does not dare to pull up the banner of tiger skin and draw an equal sign between its own culture and British culture or European culture.Before independence, they brought some "culture" from Britain intermittently, but even this little bit of culture has been quickly blown away by the strong winds of the New World, and the taste has changed.It is reminiscent of stories like Nanju Beizhi. If there is any similarity between the American colonies before independence and the United States we see today, it is the state of "moving loose sand" of the people living here.This irregular flow not only means the internal flow of the New World, but also includes the influx of foreign immigrants to fuel the flow. Although during the colonial period, there was also a British governor's government and a set of teams.However, the people living on this land have never encountered strict control that is closely linked and closely guarded.The fundamental reason was not that the Emperor did not want to exercise strict control over his people, but that such control was technically impossible in the New World at that time. The old saying "the sky is high and the emperor is far away" has the truest meaning here.Not only is the emperor far away, but the huge management system owned by the emperor is far away, and even the culture that produced the emperor is very far away.The dispersal and flow of people made the only rule in the colony decrease rapidly from the center to the outside. Even from the point of view of the colonial rulers, it was far less organized than in the British mainland.Ordinarily, they have a long tradition of governance, and they only need to recruit a group of people, transplant a model, and copy a set of systems.Moreover, they are ruling the colonies, and behind them are already supported by various ready-made British laws and regulations.They just need to execute.However, maybe the situation is too different, maybe there is not enough manpower, maybe it is because the transportation is inconvenient.In short, just can't control it.Therefore, they have no choice but to open their eyes and close their eyes to many rules that have been tampered with according to local conditions during the implementation and let them go. What's more, the colonial government of North America had no idea how to develop and manage such a new continent.Therefore, in different periods and regions, there have been some experimental management methods.For example, there have even been "experimental developments" like Army Farms in Georgia that completely failed. Therefore, during the colonial period, North America was a place with a high degree of autonomy, and strict top-down management was never really realized.Here, people as individuals are scattered and mobile, and people as a group are scattered and even sometimes mobile.Then, these people from different countries, different classes and religious ideals have also carried out various ideal experiments in "small lands" with a high degree of autonomy.Power is dispersed.Before independence, thirteen political centers had naturally formed here. I think, if we really want to compare a large area of ​​land to "a blank sheet of paper" and make metaphors such as "the latest and most beautiful pictures can be drawn", then this place hundreds of years ago is probably the most similar to a sheet of paper. Blank paper is most suitable for practice according to the blueprint of the conception.However, from the very beginning when immigrants entered North America, most of them only strictly followed a perfect religious ideal, moral ideal, political ideal, and even an ideal of economic construction. In the end, they often hit a wall. Instead, they were some secular and easygoing practices , it is easier to continue.Therefore, looking back at the history of North America during the colonial period, it is almost a history full of various ideal experiments, but also full of compromise, concession, abandonment and flexibility. The reason why such a result can be produced is probably because the people living here must obey the ruthless laws of survival in the New World.It has just been developed here, and under the harsh living conditions, the most important thing for immigrants is to survive.Survival is first and ideals must take a backseat.This point, not to mention the immigrants who stood on the barren land hundreds of years ago, even the new immigrants who set foot on this land that has become the richest land in the world today, it is difficult to escape this law of survival.They are forced to be more practical than they are, and than people living elsewhere. Interestingly, another important reason leading to such a historical result is also what new immigrants like us must face today.That is, everyone who enters this land must learn how to deal with other cultures, how to deal with completely different people.When different individuals and different cultural groups meet, compromise and flexibility are the prerequisites for peaceful coexistence.This is also a common topic between us and North American immigrants for hundreds of years. This kind of compromise, flexibility and practicality unique to the North American New World does seem "tacky", so it has always been despised by European idealists. Seeing this, you may have to ask, in such a colony, the common people do not actually have much dependence on Britain.The relationship between the common people in North America and the United Kingdom is actually loose, so how did they maintain such a long-term relationship?To put it more vividly, I think this relationship is almost like Nora's emotional maintenance of her husband and family.Where did this start? In fact, for a long period of time, in addition to Europeans looking down on Americans, Americans themselves were also trapped in a deep inferiority complex and couldn't extricate themselves.They are not "born with rebellious bones in the back of their heads".They do not have a splendid culture themselves, so they hope to at least not break their blood relationship with the ancient European culture. To be honest, so far, in the United States we have seen, for a considerable part of architectural garden design, furniture and handicrafts, "colonial style" is still an advertising term to show off.I remember when I first arrived in the United States, I didn’t understand such advertisements.Even for a long time, we have been emotionally lumpy with such a proud advertisement of "colonial style".Ordinarily we are foreigners, and whether this land was a British colony more than two hundred years ago has nothing to do with us.How could we have such a reaction? In fact, this is a cultural and conceptual difference.In our logic, being "colonized" means a history of humiliation.Such advertising means a series of "colonial slave mentality" such as "no national pride" and "taking shame as glory". "Semi-colonial" is still unbearable, let alone "full colonial".All the things left by foreigners in the "colonial period" can only be used as teaching materials to stimulate "patriotism".This kind of logic and concept has been melted into our blood along with our cultural background.Therefore, we are instinctively resisting such a cultural phenomenon of "humiliating the country and seeking glory" from the bottom of our hearts like a conditioned reflex. However, I finally found that Americans have never had such strong and stimulating associations.For them, the colonial period is just a historical objective existence.There are good and bad colonists.Large and small colonial governors and colonists, their names are still the names of many cities and streets in the United States, and their bronze statues are still shining all over the United States.Because they are closely connected with the development and construction history of this land.As for stuff in the field of culture and art, it has nothing to do with colonization or not. They never think it is "cultural aggression" or "colonial garb" or something terrible.They are still eager to get more of this kind of culture and art.For Americans, then, history is history, and it always exists for a reason.This way, they are all relaxed.As time went on, I also relaxed.Originally, it has nothing to do with me, why am I nervous. Therefore, if Britain simply held the string across the ocean loosely and flew this "American kite", it might still be a British colony by now.However, it was probably the devotion to European culture shown by the people of the North American colonies that caused the British dynasty to have an illusion.Like Nora's husband, it thought she was weak and deceitful, and exposed a very selfish and ruthless side in front of her. Its unreasonable tax policy in the North American colonies, and its brutal trampling on the freedom of its people, etc., made a The "exodus" that would not have happened in the first place just happened. 在我们看来，这样发生的一场“美国革命”，比起世界上曾经发生过的许多其他“某某革命”，似乎总还有不少欠缺，还很不够“正统革命”的味道。 它好象没有一个系统的哲学上的理论和思考。它的领导人没有一个被后世尊为哲学家，它也没有从历史上或者同时代的哲学体系里，去寻找过自己革命的“坚实理论依据”。说句不好听的话，它看上去显得十分“浅薄”。因为它从没说要实现什么什么主义。它也没有说要追求任何一个从理论上经过严密推算的理想制度或道德王国。 这一切，和这块土地原先给其他国家留下的印象，十分相符：没有哲学，没有理论，没有思想，甚至没有文化。所以在大家的心里，这也就是一场揭竿而起的平民起义罢了。对于人类的进步，世界的文明，以及对于理想社会探求，没有什么大的意义。美国娜拉在大家眼里，只是一个乡下姑娘的形象，大家对她“出走”以后的结果也并不怎么看好。 至于这个大家眼里的乡下娜拉到底要的是什么呢？最明确的答案只有一个独立宣言。在独立宣言里，这个短短的朴素的要求，是今天我们看到的每一个美国学生都背得滚瓜烂熟的一句话，就是生命权，自由权和追求幸福的权利。 这就是新大陆“揭竿而起”时，那“竿”上的唯一旗帜。只是，和所有习惯皇帝文化的平民起义不同，他们的士兵和将领都没有在胜利逐步接近的时候，脑子里开始形成一个越来越清晰的皇帝梦，甚至都没有一个强烈的统一要求。 就象我在去年给你的信里已经谈到过的，这场“美国革命”一结束，整个军队就解散了。总指挥华盛顿又回到了自己庄园的马儿身边，恢复了“农民”的身份。军官们也各自两手空空地回到家里。其中一名校级军官还负了不少债，于是，他装了一船西洋参，辛辛苦苦运到中国，为自己卸甲之后的新生活，找到了一条出路。 不仅没有了军队，赶走了英国总督政府之后，他们也没有了中央政府，没有了总统，没有了一个新的国家权利象征。他们也不在乎什么国旗国徽国国歌之类的东西。在很长的时间里，美国人搞不清楚国旗应该是什么样的，在拖至南北战争之后，才正式地确定了美国的国徽和国旗的式样。但是民间依然按照自己的想象，在节日里悬挂各色“美国国旗”，到一九一二年，才算真正统一了国旗。美国国歌更是到一九三一年才得以确定。 在这里我们看到，“出走”以前的娜拉远不象一个深思熟虑的女子，倒确实象一个感情冲动的乡姑。她的要求非常本质，简单，对于追求自己朴素的理想没有什么宏伟的构想，但是对于自己“不要什么”却非常明确，反应非常强烈。她不要皇帝，不要暴君，所以，有了“美国革命”，所以，她也不打算捧出一个新皇帝。 好不容易拧在一起，打了这么一场胜仗的美国，迅速回复到一盘散沙的状态。并不因为有了一个“美利坚合众国”的称号，大家就从此认为有必要齐心协力。每一个人在这里，他首先是一个人，有着自己“生命的权利，自由的权利，追求幸福的权利”。对于美国人，这就够了。 这种美国人极其朴素的感情，至今依旧。 记得来美国以后，一开始，美国年轻人常问我，你喜欢什么音乐，我当时在中国已经听过一些美国乡村歌曲，挺喜欢的。就老老实实地回答，我喜欢乡村歌曲。当我反问他们，他们几乎都是喜欢摇滚乐。我没想到，时间长了，“摇滚”也变成了我最喜欢的音乐之一。也开始明白了为什么我的朋友们喜欢“摇滚”远胜于“乡村音乐”。此后，我每逢开长途，总是在几个播放摇滚乐，爵士乐，古典音乐的电台之间跳来跳去，很少再听乡村音乐。 今年夏天，我正好一个人开车穿过大烟山国家公园。我夹在山谷里，好多电台都收不到。我对付“愁肠百转”的盘山道十分紧张，也无心多去拨弄收音机。这时我的收音机里正在放着我已经很久不听的乡村音乐，我也就顺其自然。忽然，一个男声缓缓地唱出了我十分熟悉的一首歌，他唱道：这是我的房子，这是我的树，这是我的菜园，这是我的狗。这是我的院子，这是我的马，这是我的妻子，这是我的孩子。 歌声飘扬在大烟山美丽的崇山峻岭之间，我突然理解了两百多年前的美国人，他们为什么会发生这样一场“独立战争”。理解了他们为什么而“战”，也理解了他们为什么而“散”。 好了，今天就写到这里。下次的信里试着给你写写，当美国人迫不得已非得有个中央政府不可的时候，他们是怎么办的。这个珊珊来迟的美国总统是如何被锁定在今天的地位上的。 wish it is good! Linda