“It’s tough to write a Thanksgiving column when the nation’s economy is going so badly and so many of my fellow citizens are hurting. The problem for me is that I don’t have the outlook of the politicians, they make their bones by being overly optimistic. I like to believe that I’m a realist, which also makes me a pessimist.” That was the opening of my Thanksgiving message for 2010, and nothing much has changed since. If anything, they have gotten worse.
Political optimism has its place, but overusing it encourages a disconnection from reality and we have overused optimism by the truckload. Our society sees every little advance as a savior moment, the inevitable turning point; at the same time, serious failures are downplayed or even ignored; these are signs of desperation.
I am pessimistic about America’s future as never before because I do not believe in predestination – I believe in free will. This decline is not some sort of divine punishment; it’s because we have decided in a million little ways that we do not want to be a nation anymore. Every day we become more like the former Austro-Hungarian Empire with its 11 languages and overwhelming concern for ethnicity. The empire’s collapse in 1918 was as much due to internal tensions as the defeat in World War I.
Trying to explain Europe’s recent economic problems David Brooks wrote, “The European Union is an attempt to build an economic and legal superstructure without a linguistic, cultural, historic and civic base.” I would argue that to whatever extent the United States had a common linguistic, cultural, historic and civic base – it is rapidly disappearing. Commonality of experience is constantly being suppressed under the flag of individuality – my experience, my aspirations, my family, my school, my region and my town. Rarely is it our town.
We cannot seem to fit the pieces together; we tend to treat each problem as if it had answers of its own when almost every serious issue is part of complex conditions. If we fail to address the root causes, we will never make effective progress. More people than ever want things the easy way, their mantra is, “Just give me a job, all the tools, materials and trained personnel I need and I’ll produce.” Although that may be the economic definition of paradise, it has little value to society. Real value lies in overcoming problems and getting superior results.
We have become a nation dominated by government programs, but I have a hard time finding large-scale superior results in any government program except national defense and even then, the human and economic costs appear to be way out of line with the results considering our size and the investment of so much of our GDP.
The United States is the giant among nations, but the old saying holds true: “The bigger they are, the harder they fall.” If you are not concerned, you should be. Therefore, I wish you a pleasant, but not a happy thanksgiving.
If you care for your country some worry is in order.
Marty Richman is a Hollister resident.
