|
RE: What is America? (The Message)
|
omark-@yahoo.com
|
Mar 07, 2004 19:45 PST
|
John McCreery wrote:
| |
It is clear to me that one defining difference between the Republican
and Democratic parties today is that the GOP has defined itself as the
party of the Sacred Mission, wrapping itself in the flag and insisting
that the true test of leadership is stubborn adherence to the mission,
the blind hedgehog's one big idea--no doubt, no evidence, no argument
can ever shake the leader's commitment.
The Democratic Party is now the party of the Grand Experiment, and here
we face our greatest test. We live in a world of uncertainty where the
anomie of being unable to define our goals, let alone the means to
achieve them, is our greatest nightmare. We could wish that more of us
were like Noble prize winning physicist Richard Feynman who said that he
wasn't bothered by not knowing something; he saw not knowing as a
challenge and enjoyed the search for solutions. But the fact is that too
many of us want the certainties that our uncertain times deny them.
Should we just give up, resigning ourselves to the thought that, however
disastrous their consequences, simplistic certainties will always have
greater popular appeal than subtle thinking and complex doubts?
Shouldn't we, instead, find simple ways to celebrate the Great
Experiment, the adventure in cooperative effort that often makes
mistakes but is, at the end of the day, the only engine of progress?
How would you sell the idea that America the Great Experiment is ever so
much more fair, more noble, more fun than America the Sacred Mission?
|
First, I am not sure what the idea of "the Great Experiment" means in
the present-day context. Where and how does "the Great Experiment" take
place ? Could the neoconservative adventurous project in the Middle East
also be characterized as a form of "Great Experiment" ?
Second, some are not so sure that, in terms of the practical
consequences, especially in the foreign policy, the differences between
"subtle thinking" and "simplistic certainties" are so great in the end
of the day. See, for example:
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/opinion/04_03_04_d.asp
Could it be that those who lack robust convictions of their own turn out
to follow the convictions of others when in positions of responsibility?
O.K.
|
|
 |
|
