Last Thursday night, standing in a neighborhood bar with friends, I rode the once-in-a-generation highs elicited by Barack Obama’s acceptance speech. It was a moment that finally opened my eyes to what really makes this a great nation: the millions of life stories and experiences that, when woven together, create what we all collectively recognize as the American Dream.

Then earlier this week, as I tuned in to the Republican National Convention, I was struck by one theme that constantly hung on the high-tech monitors around the edges of the arena: Country First. There were speeches and gestures and ceremonies and rituals that all focused on the potent power of patriotism. Men cried as they said the Pledge of Allegiance. They prayed in earnest for God’s protection over the United States, all with a striking absence of people of color.

It was as if a chasm opened up before my mind.

On one side are people like me, those who believe that America’s diversity lies at the core of who and what we are as a nation. There is no America without the Americans who have come from every corner of the globe and every path of the human experience to forge a true land of opportunity. We strengthen America by strengthening its citizens; we grow by constantly adding to the melting pot, enriching ourselves while creating a more diverse country for our children. America is dynamic – it is special because it is unique.

On the other side are those who believe that the concept of America should be placed above the needs of everyone except the majority. They believe that a piece of cloth with stars and stripes is so sacred – so holy, perhaps – that it deserves more legal protection than some of the human beings who live beneath it. Anything that goes against the grain of the status quo is to be feared; outsiders are welcome to live here, provided they accept an institutionalized second-class status, so long as it doesn’t create inconvenience for those who rely on their services. It’s Country First, People Second, and anyone who falls outside of the norm – or who questions the norm – is marginalized, ostracized. You can even have your rights legally stripped away from you based on who you choose to love.

When presented in these terms, there is no middle ground in this chasm. There can be no purple in the sea of red and blue. But can that be?

Here’s where I struggle: being a God-fearing, traditional-values conservative in this country doesn’t automatically mean that you’re a Bible-thumping, hate-speech-spewing bigot. I cannot assume that people who believe in Country First are prone to dislike/hate/marginalize me simply because I am a gay American who doesn’t believe in Abraham’s God. Even so, the differences between left and right are so stark at this point in history that I feel as if I have been conditioned to react to scenes of Republicans gathered en masse, praying and waving flags and preaching about conservative social values.

More importantly, the people who take pride in praying the another hurricane would drown New Orleans earlier this week (because the city was hosting the same gay mega-event that Katrina halted), those crackpots are just as much a part of the American story as the crazy Lefties who would have the government legalize all drugs, eliminate the drinking age and outlaw the military.

I struggle to find the middle path, plain and simple. I rationalize the way I feel by asking myself about the following scenario: what if today’s Democrats were the polar opposite of today’s Republicans? How different would the Democratic Party’s convention have been last week? It’s hard to imagine – so hard, I think, because the majority of America’s liberals aren’t speaking from the far fringes. There is no mainstream discussion in liberal circles of a nationwide gun ban, or realistic talk of legalizing all drugs, or of the government forcibly nationalizing ExxonMobil, though you do hear conservatives openly talk of an amendment to the Constitution banning marriage equality while promoting Christianity as a quasi-sanctioned state religion and providing unfair tax benefits that keep the rich wealthy while the poor continue to slide backward.

See how easy that was to rationalize? Insanely easy, I think.

Have been pretty deep in thought lately, mainly about a comment made here last week by a dharmamonkey.com reader regarding the bainian guochi.  Can’t really put my thoughts into words, because I also keep kicking around the little-noticed news that His Holiness may finally return to China in October.

I have to wonder to what extent we, as in, everything encompassed by the term “the West,” have hindered the process.  How have our actions, bent on forcing the Chinese to accept the return of the Dalai Lama, affected the opinion of the Chinese man-on-the-street?  Did we indirectly create a populist appeal that played perfectly and directly into the mind of the Chinese populous?

Something to think about, though I probably won’t write about it, choosing instead to let it inform what I write in the future.

I said I wasn’t going to do it, and I honestly thought I could resist. But in the end, like most of the rest of the world, I caved. I watched the Olympic Opening Ceremony. Not once, but three times.

I have had a fascination with Asian history and culture for the better part of my adult life. I’ve formally studied Japanese and Mandarin (though not in the quantities or with the success I would prefer). I have practiced Vajrayana Buddhism for more than five years, which in the early days included a lot of reading about the intersection of classical Buddhist, Confucian and Taoist thought, teachings, history and culture in ancient China.

I have sought to understand the actions of today’s Chinese government against the backdrop of the same government of 30 years and 50 years ago, trying to recognize the complexities of something that is so far outside of my normal experience that I cannot help but to react to it through a lens of what is, on many levels, based on ignorance.

With all of that in mind, I can honestly say that the Opening Ceremony was the most visually and emotionally stunning production I have ever seen. Like many of the talking-head analysts who have picked apart China and these Games for the last few months, and like many of my own friends who aren’t nearly as vested in the issue, I have but one conclusion to reach: China’s bainian guochi, the 100-year humiliation of a people, society and culture that that has spent the better part of four millennia as a world powerhouse, is officially over.

Like the awe-inspiring pyrotechnic Footprints of History that marched through the skies between Tian’anmen Square to the National Stadium and directly into the minds of 4 billion television viewers across the globe, I have to believe that the Chinese Century has now made its way from concept to reality.

Perhaps underscoring my naïveté, I was surprised to see the gap between the ancient-history portion of the program, which concluded at some point toward the end of the Qing dynasty, and the start of the modern-history section, which the commentator placed at 1978, when China began implementing economic reforms after Mao Zedong’s death. Frankly, I found it strangely optimistic that this sterilized production of modern Communist history seemed to group the turbulence created under Mao, including the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, as part of the guochi, almost attempting to purge it from the world’s collective memory via the Opening Ceremony.

(I couldn’t help but to think back to the Opening Ceremony of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, which sought to reconcile both the city’s and the entire geographic region’s egregious treatment of African-Americans before and after the Civil War through acknowledgment of past sins and celebration of black America’s individual and collective accomplishments.)

The Chinese government and its people put a face of overwhelming optimism on China’s role on the world stage in the next century via what will likely go down as one of the most expensive displays of propaganda in history (in fairness, every Opening Ceremony I’ve ever seen – including the one in Atlanta – is propaganda on a grand, prime-time scale). It is now incumbent on the rest of the world to hold the People’s Republic accountable for the responsibility that comes with the new, post-bainian guochi role.

As that happens, I’ll continue to try and find my own balance when it comes to the tenuous relationship between the Chinese government, her people, their collective culture and experience, and my own effort to practice the Middle Way.

BEIJING - Foreign activists unfurled pro-Tibet banners at a key Olympics venue Wednesday and spoke out against China’s rights record in Tiananmen Square, in the first attempts to use the spotlight of the games to raise other issues.

One athlete, U.S. swim star Amanda Beard, also made a public political gesture, on behalf of animal rights.

All of the groups tangled with Chinese authorities, who are determined to make sure the communist government’s plan for the Beijing Games to be an international showcase for the country goes off without a hitch.

With the Summer Olympics now upon us, I’ve turned the question of Tibet over in my mind a hundred times, trying to reconcile the grievous actions taken there by the Chinese Communists with the fact that the world is now lauding the Chinese government with an honor that it frankly, in my opinion, does not deserve.

I, for the first time in my adult life, have actually stopped watching the news, tired of seeing a government that has caused so much harm, death and destruction — and that has apparently gone back on just about every promise it made in order to secure the 2008 Games — showcase itself as an internationally sanctioned, Olympic-worthy powerhouse of the 21st century.

I did catch some images of the Forbidden City on the news this morning; Matt Lauer was giving U.S. viewers a first-ever glimpse at a former emperor’s “retirement chamber.” Seeing the wide shots of the Forbidden City, with all its beauty and ancient allure, made a connection in my mind between ancient China and a not-so-ancient Tibet, which was largely isolated from the world until the 1959 invasion by the Communists. Two ancient-but-ultimately-interconnected societies, where religious philosophers explored the inner workings of the mind.

Again, my mind is drawn to the Tibet of old, with its great Buddhist masters who forged a path for the rest of us to explore and contemplate upon. A society — albeit a flawed one — that produced a man best described as a simple monk who has gone on to captivate an entire planet with a message of peace, tolerance and love.

Then it occurs to me that my feelings toward the Chinese government are largely based on my own attachment to something that I’ve never experienced in person, but for which I have poured out so much compassion. I have protested in front of the Chinese embassy here in Washington with native Tibetans and Uyghurs — the people who actually lost their nations and fled for their lives. Yet my attachment to the notion of a free Tibet, where Vajrayana Buddhism can one again flourish, creates negative emotions.

I know that Vajrayana doesn’t need a free Tibet — or anything in Tibet — to be the Diamond Vehicle. The Triple Gems of Buddha, Dharma and Sangha will outlast both His Holiness and the Communists. Our samsaric suffering will continue, even if His Holiness is able to return to Lhasa in this lifetime and, as he has called for, Tibet is declared an International Zone of Peace.

I can not criticize people for taking an anti-China stance on the Olympics. What’s done is done, and my ability to actively seek refuge in Three Jewels does not require me to support or oppose the Beijing Olympics.

What we must realize, however — and these are difficult words for me to type — is that because of our interconnectedness, an attempt to make a political statement about China during the Games could very well lead to even greater suffering. If someone in Beijing tries to do something to embarrass the Communist government, what of the crackdowns that will certainly take place in the monasteries across the old Tibet, and in the back-alley shops in Lhasa?

I read enough from credible sources on the Internet to know of the horrors that are going on right now in prisons around China, and especially in the Tibetan areas. And I know it will get worse when His Holiness dies — the Communists will certainly do everything in their power to take over Tibetan Buddhism by naming his successor, just as they have already done with the Panchen Lama. The youth of Tibet, both inside and outside of the People’s Republic of China, will rise up, leading to even greater suffering, despite calls from their elders to practice pacifism.

Be it now or later, it is inevitable that we will fulfill our destiny as humans by creating more suffering in the name of stopping suffering. There is hope, but that hope exists solely inside the hearts, minds and souls of more than 6 billion individuals, all sharing this shrinking little planet.

For me, I will accept that I can do nothing to change the events that will unfold over the next three weeks. I am sure, in fact, that these Olympic games will bring joy to some people, and perhaps that joy will be enough to spur the innate seeds of compassion that we all harbor deep in our hearts.

I will keep vigil, however, being mindful of those who do not, will not or simply can not share in that Chinese Olympic joy. I will keep Tibet and Tibetans in my motivations and dedications. I will continue to pray for His Holiness’ long life. I will continue to seek refuge, and I will wish nothing but loving-kindness for the Chinese, including their leaders.

To do anything otherwise would defeat the entire purpose of my practice.