Still more politics: Mitch Albom's column

[eisoj5]

http://www.freep.com/sports/albom/mitch7_20041107.htm

His ending is a bit glib. How do we bridge (and I mean BRIDGE, because I don't see any way clear to wholesale conversions or shifts) the gap between these (admittedly stereotyped) views? Are the people who believe things from both sides of the aisle the ones to make the difference? I don't know, and Mitch doesn't seem to either.

Comments

[rinnaldo.livejournal.com]

The whole thing was glib. It's not that he was offering a solution, he was offering a clearer view of ourselves. Which, on the whole, solves nothing. But what he says is true, and humorous, and sad.

- Ronnie

[wheloc.livejournal.com]

There was a time (or so I'm told) that patrotism would unite people despite these fundamental differences. This was hardly a coincidence; the leaders of our country recognized that their nation needed a unifying force, so worked very hard to sell people on the "dream" of America. It worked very well, for something like a century and a half.

Patrotism isn't going to work today, however. Too many of us (myself most espicially included) simply arn't going to buy it. We're too disillusioned and disenfranchised. It's not that I don't love my country, but I don't trust it enough to follow it blindly. So we need something else, some other unifying force. I'd like to believe that there's some less tarnished dream that people might be sold on. Something that will unite us on a fundamental level and make us put aside our "petty" differences. I can't think of one just now, however.

For better or for worse, our current leaders have their own notion of how to unify the nation. Recognizing that we're primarily motivated by fear, they're doing they're best to get us all afraid of the same thing.

Down with those darn terrorists.