A brand new podcast began by a army veteran highlights the range of America’s army and the contributions made by leaders in company, larger schooling, well being care and different industries because the nation nears the 250th anniversary of its founding.
Ret. U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Don L. Scott hosts the podcast US@250&YOU, which debuted on April 23 as a solution to share, spotlight how efforts to enhance range, fairness and Inclusion, or DEI, have formed the nation towards the nation’s founding aim of a “extra excellent union.”
“I’ve lived by means of 16 presidents, World Warfare II, racial segregation, the civil rights motion, Korea, Vietnam, 9/11 and the Gulf Wars,” Scott, the podcast’s creator and host, informed Army.com. “I’m a residing testomony to how America has advanced to incorporate all of its residents.”
Scott, who’s 88 years outdated and proudly “an American of African descent,” mentioned he’s grown uninterested in divisive rhetoric concentrating on immigrant and minority communities. He felt it essential to remind anybody who will pay attention that America is constructed on the backs of immigrant and minority populations.
“I’m not making a political assertion with this podcast,” he mentioned. “What my intentions are is to present the listeners a possibility to grasp what the Declaration of Independence means in the present day. I wish to give mild to the founders who weren’t inclusive in 1776, however had the imaginative and prescient to level us towards inclusion.”
Weekly Podcast Tackles ‘Nationwide Divide’
Scott’s premise for every of his weekly, 30-minute podcast episodes is that the U.S. continues to be a rustic of progress, at the same time as we pause to evaluation our founding ideas.
He mentioned he needs to guage the place these ideas are in the present day, and the place we would like them sooner or later.
He’s additionally instantly centered and invested in what he calls the “nationwide divide.”
The inner divisions inside the three branches of federal authorities in the present day symbolize probably the most severe menace to American democracy in America’s 250-year historical past. US@250YOU will present listeners with skilled commentary and perception on why DEI efforts have helped our nation evolve and notice its promise of alternatives for all.
Airing on Spotify, the podcast is a component commentary, half historical past lesson, with Scott and his company strolling listeners down reminiscence lane—together with the nation’s contradictory beginnings.
“The founders, a number of of them have been slave house owners,” Scott informed Army.com. “But they’d this inspiration that this county that we have been constructing goes to be a nation the place all women and men are created equal. That was their best.”
He mentioned that over these final 250 years as a rustic, there have been presidents and others who’ve labored to make the assertion of our founders a actuality.
“I don’t need the present political local weather to derail our progress as a nation,” he mentioned. “I’m so intent on ensuring individuals perceive the facility of America in creating alternatives for minorities and immigrants. That’s our power.”
Talking From Expertise
Talking from a spot of authority and expertise, Scott shared his personal story in his first podcast episode.
He entered the Army in 1960, at a time when there have been no African-American generals within the reserves or energetic forces. However there have been a number of, together with himself, by the point he retired in 1991.
“That’s progress, despite the fact that it was sluggish,” he mentioned. “It takes 20 years on common to rise to the extent of a brigadier basic, it doesn’t matter what colour you might be,” he mentioned. “I give nice credit score to Harry Truman, the president who built-in the army. The range you see in our ranks in the present day is due to him.”
Scott served 31 years within the Army, commanding hundreds of troops within the U.S., Germany, Okinawa and Vietnam. He managed planning for the 1996 Olympics and is a founding director of the Nationwide Civilian Group Corps (NCCC).
Scott additionally served because the CEO and deputy librarian on the Library of Congress and established The Veterans Historical past Venture on the American Folklife Middle. He earned his Bachelor of Arts diploma in graphic arts from Lincoln College in Missouri, a grasp’s diploma in counseling and human improvement from Troy State College, and an honorary doctorate from Lincoln College.
He mentioned his hope for the nation’s subsequent 250 years is a land of alternative, with out social obstacles.
“I believe america might change into the one nation on the planet the place race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation doesn’t outline who’s American,” he mentioned. “As an alternative, conduct, character, information, and a perception in human equality could possibly be the usual.
“I consider we are able to get there.”
