Karla's Kolumn: Like MLK Jr. I too have a dream

There has been a lot going on in our country and I have pondered how to address the issues. I certainly have opinions regarding many of the things that have been happening but as I have watched things unfold, I have been left with a feeling of sadness and near despair.

I look at where our country is and I wonder how we got to this point. I think of those first pilgrims when they arrived, and I imagine they had feelings of joy and relief to be given a chance at a new start in a new country, with new freedoms.

That same country now is filled with hate and fear mongering. It is divided now more than any other time in my lifetime. It didn't happen overnight, it didn't just happen the past two years, it's been getting more and more every year for many years. It's hard to pinpoint what changed to make people hate their fellow man so much.

I don't know the answers of what changed or what we can do to heal our country, but I do know that I, like Martin Luther King Jr., have a dream for this country.

•I have a dream and a hope that someday we will again have a respect for the presidency no matter who fills that role. My dream is actually that we continue to have and elect presidents. There have been multiple presidents who have defamed the Oval Office, so let's not point fingers at our current president. The president is elected by the people through the process outlined in our Constitution that has been approved by the people. The office, not necessarily the person in office, deserves respect ... in my dream.

•I have a dream and a hope that journalism gets back to the basics of reporting the news, reporting the facts without inferring opinion within the story, without blatantly showing bias in stories, without sensationalism.

Even the fictional Murphy Brown has this dream as she said on her premier Thursday night. Murphy Brown launches a new show that she wants to be real news with real facts and instead gets in a battle of words on the air with President Trump's Twitter feed. Her son Avery says, "I watched your show, it was good television." To which Murphy replies, "There's a difference between good television and journalism. This is why people don't trust the press anymore."

My dream and hope is that journalists get back to true journalism and people can again trust the press to tell them the truth.

•I have a dream and a hope that while we can sympathize with an accuser of a crime or attack that we still hold to the presumption of innocence whether in court or in the court of public opinion. Innocence, at least the presumption of innocence has been lost over the past few years. A person makes an allegation and with or without evidence, the public only needs to hear the allegation to make a determination.

Perhaps that is why so many people have been angry with some juries' decisions on public trials, because they have already been judge and jury without hearing facts or hearing from all sides.

•I have a dream and a hope that they only time we are judging people is in a court room.

Matthew 7:1-5 says (NIV), "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye."

We should not judge others because we do not know the circumstances of people's lives, we haven't walked in their shoes or lived their experiences, we have only lived our own life and thus can judge that.

•I have a dream and a hope that people realize in order to advocate change you have to start with yourself, you can't make others change. You can lead by example. Michael Jackson wrote, "If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself, and then make a change."

•I have a dream and a hope that people won't be easily offended, whether it be by objects or history. We do not have to be offended by the past or things that represent that past, but we can learn from the past and we can grow from our knowledge of the past.

In that dream my hope is we are not offended by what others eat, what others believe, what others think. We should respect one another and we should respect one another's beliefs just as they should respect ours.

•I have a dream and a hope that one day we will once again be able to respect one another's opinion civilly, that we can have open, friendly dialogue on matters of importance without anger and violence.

I have a dream and a hope that one day we will follow the golden rule and treat others as we wish to be treated, that we will treat our fellow man and woman with respect and love, not hate and indifference. It is my hope that we will one day see each other as Americans not as a person of a specific skin color, or specific gender, or specific religion, or specific ethnicity or specific sexual orientation. My dream is I see you as you, a real person with real feelings, thoughts, hopes and dreams and you see me the same way.

That is my dream. My hope is that it is not only a dream but that it may someday become reality.