I have often been told that I am an old soul, and the study of history has no doubt weathered and aged this soul of mine further still. The foremost feature of this mode of existence, and one that I have observed in students of history at large, can be summarized as follows: the wisdom accrued to us from the past, and the good things it has led to, ought to be scrupulously preserved.
I consider this credo to be the distillation of all that is excellent in American political tradition. Dark chapters in human history were created by those with a reformatory or revolutionary zeal run amok; ideals and principles tend to take on a life of their own, disconnected from the facts on the ground, and the more extreme they are, the more necessary it becomes to achieve these ends. The French Revolution, the fascist movements and the various countries of the former Soviet sphere bear out this idea well enough, not to mention the “Red Scares” of our own past.
Our generation, growing up in the peace and prosperity of the late 20th century, has no real understanding of the political and economic extremes that any society can expect over a long enough timeline. But with the Arab world gaining political self-consciousness, the inevitable rise of China and India to superpower status and the continued economic turbulence in this country and in Europe, we can rightly expect a dramatic shift in the economic and political landscape within the next 10 to 20 years.
To be frank we ought to encounter a healthy dose of economic and political turmoil. For too long, our economy has been propped up by the tremendous debt load assumed on our behalf by the government, while our political dominance of the planet has been maintained with unsustainable military expenditures and morally corrupt covert tactics. There is simply no way we can even begin to approach liquidity as a nation without drastic cuts in government spending, which any economist will tell you will lead to a reduced standard of living. I realize that the previous suggestion could get me tarred and feathered in some quarters, and perhaps sneered at in classier locales. That is all well and good. If I’m doing my job correctly, feathers should be ruffled on either side of the political divide.
But let me assure the reading public: it’s not the end of the world. Living frugally, out of necessity or otherwise, leads individuals to reduce their sphere of action to things that truly matter and the simple essentials we’ve taken for granted become wonderful, representative of the hard work we have put into acquiring them. Lean times also prime the economic pump by fostering fierce competition, hard work and personal savings – virtues that made America prosperous and famous, but have since withered on the vine.
Flowery generalities aside, the issue ultimately boils down to facing the facts as they are and dealing with these latent problems before they become utterly unmanageable. This is easily comparable to being in a relationship with someone who is not right for you, but who you stay with for comfort. Surely it is better to bite the bullet now and spare the much bigger and messier breakup inevitably coming down the road.
This is not something that the public wants to hear, and politicians are only in office so long as they say the right things. Consequently, the political debate for a long time now has been facile and disingenuous, consisting of overtures to fixed ideals on either side of the aisle, while the pragmatic considerations that underlie policy remain absent from public discussion. These fixed ideals, sacred cows that cannot be slaughtered, are most prominently defense spending, Medicare/Medicaid and social security. Until we approach these and other expenditures with fresh minds, equally and objectively, we will never take leave of this miasma of debt, and the accompanying political liabilities it engenders. This is where the media can play such a crucial role – it has the ability to broaden the scope of the acceptable talking points in a way that politicians wouldn’t dare.
None of these challenges scare me, because I believe the liberal economic philosophy and its concomitant republican liberties to be the best vessel we could wish for to weather such a storm. By injecting a healthy dose of realism into the national debate, we will be better prepared to face the uncertain future without losing our heads or our values, transmitting these precious gifts to the next generation. It is not necessary to agree with each other; that has never been the idea. But we need to be realistic about the scope of the problem, so that the conversation, and more importantly the negotiation, can begin in earnest.
Gavin Beeker is a Collegian columnist and can be reached at [email protected].
