The plain-ness of it all

There is a series of little articles that G.K. Chesterton wrote bundled in the book All Things Considered. In the article "Patriotism and Sport," Chesterton writes:

But the real historic strength of England, physical and moral, has never had anything to do with this athletic specialism; it has been rather hindered by it. Somebody said that the Battle of Waterloo was won on Eton playing-fields. It was a particularly unfortunate remark, for the English contribution to the victory of Waterloo depended very much more than is common in victories upon the steadiness of the rank and file in an almost desperate situation. The Battle of Waterloo was won by the stubbornness of the common soldier—that is to say, it was won by the man who had never been to Eton. It was absurd to say that Waterloo was won on Eton cricket-fields. But it might have been fairly said that Waterloo was won on the village green, where clumsy boys played a very clumsy cricket. In a word, it was the average of the nation that was strong, and athletic glories do not indicate much about the average of a nation. Waterloo was not won by good cricket-players. But Waterloo was won by bad cricket-players, by a mass of men who had some minimum of athletic instincts and habits.

Chesterton often turns conventional wisdom on its head, and since today's conventional wisdom is typically only the wisdom of his day stretched out and taken to its logical (and oft times illogical) extremes, many of his insights are as insightful today as they were in his own time. It is fashionable today to bemoan the state of America - her politics, her job market, her "lost" liberties, her social inequality, her international reputation, her antiquated institutions, her professionalization of many aspects of society... the list can go on and on. In some ways, we are right to worry about these things, as constant evaluation of where you are helps with the mid-course corrections needed to get to where you are going. I think that, however, we sometimes lose sight of the winding road's long course for fear of the numerous potholes we are swerving to avoid. The state of the United States now looks a lot like Rome in its decline, they say.

For all I know, we might look a lot like Rome in decline. I wouldn't know; I never lived in Rome. But I have studied this country and lived with her people for almost four decades, and that experience does give me the ability to say a few things about the U.S. Americans are a hard-working, innovative people who are very engaged in their families and communities. States and the nation as a whole produce bright, energetic leaders and thinkers who work to make things better for the country. We know how to compromise to avoid extremes, and we have a uniquely American way of doing things. We've been stumbling about for over two hundred years, but somehow we continue to find a way to stumble forward.

By all rights, the United States should not be a great power - we are loosely organized and governed, we are not good at managing complex systems, we have multiple-layers of power and thousands of points of responsibility. Yet we have constantly risen to meet challenges that threaten us. Time and again, we have shown that we can come together and beat the odds. We reinvent ourselves and, somehow, end up on top - or at least among the leaders.

I attribute this to the grit of the average American. We live passionately and love our families, communities, and country, yet we fight constantly - among ourselves with words and too easily against other peoples with weapons. We believe in who we are, yet we find ways to treat each other as humans to tolerate dissent and conversation. We hate government, yet we continue to find creative ways to channel it to solve societal ills even as we turn around again to constrain and shackle it. We are full of paradox, yet we are guided by an everyday plain-ness, and average-ness, that is really not all that plain or average.

The United States is not perfect as a country. But Americans as a people are not Romans, and history does not repeat itself. At least not in the way most of the Talking Heads mean.