I was recently made very proud, and also very humbled, by receiving the Ronald Reagan Award, given at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference by the American Conservative Union.
Regarding the award, ACU says: "The winners of this award, our highest honor, are not household names, but the men and women working in the trenches, who sacrifice and, in so doing, set an example for others."
I write about this at the risk of coming off as the opposite of humble. After all, Star, really -- announcing your award to the world?
I'm writing about it because of the chaotic time we are in now, and because, no, it is not about Star Parker. It is about America and working to save our country.
It is important that Americans, and particularly minority Americans, see that there is a hardworking American black woman who shares the ideals of Ronald Reagan and believes that America is an anointed nation with a mission.
What are those ideals? Traditional values, limited government, free markets and a strong national defense.
But let's specifically talk about race and the vision of America as a free nation under God.
Nothing has torn this nation apart more than race. We fought a bloody civil war over it. And even today, 240 years after the nation's founding, it continues to tear us apart.
Too many black Americans don't sign on to the idea of America as a free nation under God. They are consumed with anger and cynicism because of a genuinely brutal American history toward people of color.
Instead of seeing the nation as one founded on eternal truths imperfectly applied by men of flesh and blood, they choose to see the nation as fatally flawed from the beginning. So they participate with enthusiasm in the project of the left to transform America from being a free nation under God to a secular, welfare state. And sadly, the more the USA becomes exactly this, blacks themselves pay the highest price for these distortions of human truth.
It is particularly sad that black Americans, who attend church with greater frequency than any other ethnic group, who, more than any other ethnic group, tell pollsters that religion plays a central role in their lives, sign on to the party of meaninglessness and nihilism, the party of abortion, homosexuality and socialism.
The civil rights movement was supposed to be about freedom. The dream, in the words of Dr. King, was "free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last."
Then instead of it being about freedom, it became about payback. It became about government, welfare and diversity as an ideal unto itself.
The culture of blame and victimhood has now moved beyond blacks and is capturing the spirit of the whole nation. But still, blacks pay the highest price. Broken families and a spirit of helplessness have frozen black unemployment and poverty at twice the national average for half a century.
Failed public schools are destroying black children. Yet black support for Hillary Clinton is as strong as ever, despite her support of these public schools and self-serving teachers unions. Clinton stands against parental empowerment and school choice.
Look around. America is proof that anyone with a healthy spirit and the right values can rise above the worst circumstances and that even the best circumstances cannot save a sick spirit and sick values.
Our national soul has become dangerously mired in negative energy. There are far too few people turning eyes upward to the heavens, taking responsibility for their own lives and respecting their neighbors as God's unique creations.
This is what America is about. This is what President Reagan was about. And it's also what Star Parker is about, which is why I am humbled to receive the Ronald Reagan Award.