Musings on the "day after" (ok, several days after, but you get the idea): America faces three over-arching interlocking large-scale challenges that, in any reasonable world, should be the objective for the next four years:
1) At the narrowest, tactical level - we need to /1
1) At the narrowest, tactical level - we need to /1
fix the election system. Whatever you think of the result, the fact that this nation can be so miserably contorted in the process of elections -- long lines, mail-in disputes, different rules and rulings creating confusion, etc. -- is simply unacceptable for a mature democracy./2
2) More broadly, we must repair the rule of law. Over the last four years, confidence in the legal system has been deeply eroded by the ability of the President to game the system and to break rules and norms without consequence. No country can survive where the people /3
have no confidence in the government. The disruption of law is the hallmark of authoritarianism. Hence, the vital project of repair. Perhaps Biden's single most important Cabinet choice will be Attorney General. We need another Edward Levi.
3) At the highest level we need /4
3) At the highest level we need /4
to confront the corrosion of America's soul. The divides are deep and they are both racial, economic, and geographic. We have lost a sense of shared purpose and shared commitment to values of equality of opportunity, freedom of expression and faith, and belief in /5
America's fundamental goodness. No longer a "shining city on the Hill" we are a nation where the "center does not hold." Instead of optimism, we are pessimists. We are a nation where simple questions of public health can become cultural weapons of division. /6
Sadly, while I can diagnose the problems, I cannot, yet discern any way forward in solving them. But I do know this -- I have not given up on America. In whatever I, personally, do going forward for the next 4 years, these three objectives will guide me -- and I hope others /7
will join in the effort. Good luck to us -- I fear we may need it. But with goodwill, we can achieve much. /fin
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