In the 1920s the spectre of millions of deaths loomed behind them and the shadow of fascist and communist totalitarianism darkened the European's horizon. In the midst of this oppressive onslaught against the human spirit, one thinker looked westward for hope.
The British philosopher Herbert Read said that the strength of Americans lay in our unwillingness to become polarized into two warring factions, left and right. At that time he felt that the practicality, humor and good will of Americans prevented them succumbing to the mortal pettiness and rancor of the Europeans, with whom he included the Russians under Stalin. Read despaired of the one dimensional political hatred that was taking over all classes of global society, and he looked to the U.S. to provide a clear headed leadership grounded in humane values and practical intelligence.
This was remarkable for many reasons. Read was not a champion of the common man. He was a connoisseur of the arts, a philosopher, and a member of the elite of his nation and generation. So he wasn't just expressing the stereotyped support of a liberal or progressive intellectual mired in the crumbling aristocratic traditions of Europe.
He had what you might call a technical insight into the systemic problem which was driving Europe toward the devastation of World War II. He knew that simple two valued conflict between "left" and "right" drove both parties to extreme positions which were ultimately inhuman: totalitarian, whether fascist or communist. The circle was closed at the point of unsupportable violence against citizens within the nation's boundaries as well as mechanized warfare on an insane scale mounted against the "enemy." America represented at least three values in any conflict: the liberal, the conservative, and the skeptical. And in any given mileu the skeptic armed with humor was more likely to win an audience if not a constituency. For every Father Coughlin spewing simple minded hatred into the airwaves, there was the counter force of Will Rogers "calling it as he saw it", putting the pretentious in their place and elevating the common sensical and clearly observed to head of the table.
When Bush attacked Iraq, and a millenial chill settled into the bones of arguement in this country, I thought that the last vestige of Read's hope for the U.S. had been done in. Everywhere I looked and listened, the polarization proceeded at light speed. No one could present a balanced appraisal of anything important. There was the Patriot position and there was the Terrorist position, and every utterance in public was a litmus test of where the speaker stood between these two monoliths.
It was as though the national media had become a Boa Constrictor of the intellect, and each time the body politic exhaled, the censorius grip of intolerant polarization tightened, until there was little breath of wisdom or skepticism left.
But there is something in the gut of the average American, no matter how long they have been here, that has to say "wait a minute" when things get out of hand. It is at work at every lunch counter and office break room, every bar and family gathering in this country. It is laced with humor, braced with just enough logic, and motivated by a hugely uncontainable sentiment that believes, first and last, in the human spirit. And that humor, logic, and spirit will not be crushed by group think at the media level or immature jingoism at the level of national governance.
A nation that looks its leaders in the eye periodically and challenges the bill when it comes due is going to be resiliant. It will take in damaging blows to its self confidence and stagger for a while, but it will come back and speak up and look askance, and laugh. What should other nation's trust and honor in the spectacle presented by America at the present time? We are skeptical of our own excesses, not impressed easily by our own extremes, quick to laugh at our own foibles even as we persist in them.
There is hope for us yet. And in that hope for us, there is a certain untameable, unsuppressable hope for the spirit of every man and woman in the world.
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