Are we all in?

I feel like I'm dancing awkwardly over a line drawn in the sand.
My bare foot sinks deep as I step, and I fumble, coming up with a mouth full of dirt.
It's the Politically Correct Tango, the Liberal/Conservative salsa.
Pro-gay rights, pro-choice, I'm a likely target for conservatives.
But my assertion that "illegal" alien is a term for people breaking the law, my respect for the American melting pot over American multi-culturalism? Ah, I must be a conservative.
My voter registration card won't give me away.
I am neither.
I vote.
Not down party lines and not at the caucus.
I do my job as an American every November. I cast my decision. Mine, not anyone else's.
But I struggle with my American values. I want to know why I must choose one or the other.
Why does a call for people of all faiths to respect one another put me on the outs with religious groups?
Why has America become the land of the brave and home of the "well, you better support 'em's"?
We've crossed the line from respect to kowtowing. One can whisper racism and draw hundreds to the fold to throw stones at the accused.
I'm not saying that racism doesn't exist. I have seen it against blacks, against whites, against gays, against straights, against Jews and Christians and Muslims and Hindus.
Were there are two people, there will be disagreements. Where there are differences, there will be judgement.
The trouble comes with more than two people, when two face off against one, when the rules become: "you dislike my brother, therefore you are my enemy."
Brotherhood and unity are one thing.
Picking a fight for someone else is quite another.
The fight against true injustice is being dulled by sparring matches with phantoms.
Want to be American?
Stand tall, together.
Cultures are not to be lost but melted into American life.
Hispanics can speak Spanish at home, children can learn Spanish in school, but the street signs in West Nose Pick, Nebraska should remain in the official language of the country.
Orthodox Jewish women can dress in long skirts or Muslim women in headscarves, but their husbands shouldn't expect it of the Protestant living down the street.
True acceptance comes in balance.
It is not all or nothing, it is without all, we have nothing.
That is the American dream.