We are Americans.

So much has been said about how Mitt Romney can overcome the incumbent Barack Obama, and what he must say in the first debate tonight. He must appeal to hispanics, to the poor, women, blacks, the elderly, the middle class, and above all, to appear likable.

I would remind Governor Romney that we are all Americans, and this president has sought to break us apart and use the presidency as the ultimate authority on how we are to behave.

Women are supposed to be ultimately concerned about whether the most intimate parts of their lives will be controlled by the government. Blacks are supposed to get in line with a black president, period. Hispanics are supposed to care only about whether they can vote without ID and become citizens of the nation by a stroke of a pen. The elderly are supposed to be afraid that they won’t receive checks that were promised to them, the middle class are the ultimate put-upons, and the poor are assumed to be illiterate takers who believe that they are poor because the rich are wealthy.

If you agree with the left, that is, white affluent liberals, this coalition of the underprivileged will ultimately walk with the Democrat party into a great and bright future. This will be realized when the nation is ruled once again by a man who has no interest in the free market, because it is unfair, no interest in the rule of law, because it does not conform to his wishes, and no definition of human nature, because it cannot be controlled.

The American Dream, a notion by some to mean a house on a hill with a white picket fence and plenty of resources to be comfortable, is now a class of people, suburban selfists, ignorant of and afraid of the class beneath them. At the same time that this “middle class” lifestyle is said to be put-upon by the Republican lead tax-breaks-for-the-rich campaign to hurt them.

Is the middle-class definable? Are you middle class if you have air-conditioned housing? Two televisions? Two cars? Are you then middle class if you have these material goods through your own ability to acquire them, or are you poor with no job but with help from the policies of a politician who wants your vote?

If you are a female black with little resources, are you sure you will stay poor? Or do you have a vision, a thought, entirely your own, of how you will someday become part of the American Dream?

We are Americans. The only thing we share in entirety, collectively, are the supposed limits to our own destiny, our own ability to get where we want to be.

The left would have us believe that we are not in charge of our own destiny. Individual will is hampered by the rich, the affluent, the invisible strings that these other individuals place upon us. But the fact is, the only way anyone can place shackles upon our will is by a collection of politicians who believe they are able to make our will irrelevant, by putting us in a group of others who do not put expectations upon themselves.

Mitt Romney has an opportunity to remind Americans that they are Americans. They, we, are able, intelligent, worthy, beautiful people, who aspire, create, take pride in our accomplishments without direction or force.

America is a state of mind, and the only collective way to describe us, is that we are a nation of individual might.

To every obstacle thrown in front of us, let a quote Ronald Reagan be our guide, “It can be done.”

Mr. Romney, you have the task of selling the American spirit to a nation that has been coerced, tread-upon, stifled, and warned. Let the bells ring out and the banners fly, this is America, and we are Americans.