The American Dream: Walking in the Shoes of Carnies, Arms Dealers, Immigrant Dreamers, Pot Farmers, and Christian Believers

300 Pages·2008·0.88 MB·English

by  Harmon Leon

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THE AMERICAN DREAM
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THE
AMERICAN DREAM
Walking in the Shoes of
CARNIES, ARMS DEALERS,
IMMIGRANT DREAMERS,
POT FARMERS, and
CHRISTIAN BELIEVERS
Harmon Leon
NEW YORK
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Copyright © 2008 by Harmon Leon
Published by
Nation Books, A Member of the Perseus Books Group
116 East 16th Street, 8th Floor
New York, NY 10003
Nation Books is a co-publishing venture of the Nation
Institute and the Perseus Books Group.
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of
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Designed by Timm Bryson
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Leon, Harmon.
The American Dream : walking in the shoes of carnies,
arms dealers, immigrant dreamers, pot farmers, and
Christian believers / Harmon Leon.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-56858-352-5 (alk. paper)
1. United States—Civilization—1970- 2. Popular
culture—United States. 3. United States—Social
conditions—1980- I. Title.
E169.12.L447 2008
306.0973’090511—dc22
2008023160
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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Not everybody knows how I killed old
Phillip Mathers, smashing his jaw in with
my spade; but first it is better to speak of
my friendship with John Divney because it
was he who first knocked old Mathers down
by giving him a great blow in the neck with
a special bicycle pump which he manufac-
tured himself out of a hollow iron bar.
—FLANN O’BRIEN
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CONTENTS
Introduction ix
I Immigrant American Dream 1
II Carny American Dream 35
III Cult of Celebrity American Dream 73
IV Military American Dream 99
V Bible-Thumping American Dream 127
VI Swinger American Dream 171
VII Hollywood American Dream 199
Reality Television Show
VIII 223
American Dream
IX Marijuana American Dream 249
Acknowledgments 285
About the Author 287
vii
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INTRODUCTION
When I was a child, my active imagination told me that the
American Dream was to become a doctor who drove a garbage
truck (I liked the way you could hang on to the sides of the ve-
hicle while it was in operation). Ask a room full of any other
seven-year-olds, and they’d each have a completely different
take on the question. Just imagine if all those children’s Amer-
ican Dreams had been fulfilled; we could have a world made
up entirely of ballerinas, superheroes, and rappers.
What is the American Dream? Every proud citizen has their
own unique, different idea on what it might entail. The defini-
tion is broader than Rosie O’Donnell’s hips. Does the American
Dream truly exist? Or is the whole myth a shame? Can the
American Dream be achieved, or is it a pimp-slapped whore?
We live in a country of immigrants—dreamers, pragmatists,
and everyone else in between—who have come to the United
States in search of a better life. This conceptual American
Dream ideal dates as far back as the sixteenth century, when
Englishmen were persuaded to move to the colonies, thinking
ix