The Rise of American Exceptionalism

As the 2012 election cycle heats up, the myth of American Exceptionalism is with us again. Romney and Gingrich, the two bruised and battered candidates still standing, have both chosen American Exceptionalism as their clarion call, their only rationale for being candidates for president.

They accuse President Obama of diminishing America's so-called God-driven divine right to rule the planet, to spread democracy and liberty around the globe. We are hearing again Reagan's "shining city on the hill" rhetoric, the call to restore America's manifest destiny.

I was personally reminded of the shining city imagery on a recent weekend trip to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, for a family gathering. Stockbridge is home to the Norman Rockwell museum, filled with his famous Saturday Evening Post images of the American Dream. It's obvious now that America's artist of record is no longer Rockwell with his proud aproned grandmother delivering the Thanksgiving turkey to her happy family. Instead, we are closer today to this week's New Yorker Magazine cover of an unappetizing Thanksgiving meal for one in a lonely café.

If we want to put that image behind us, we must not return to Rockwellian sentimentality. We need public and private support and cooperation to help create the kind of world where we all have a chance to end violence and restore some degree of peace and economic justice, but without the condescension of behaving as if America had some special destiny. There's a difference between destiny and responsibility after all.

The attacks of 9/11 taught us hard lessons. We have use the wisdom we gained to be less susceptible to nostalgic myth-making. We have to study our history, accept responsibility for our failures and live up to our promise, but not as a nation destined to save the world but rather to be a nation among nations and a people among peoples who have the same dreams we have of living productive, meaningful lives.

If American voters go to the polls blinded by the myth of American Exceptionalism as no doubt will be spun into TV ads by whoever survives the Republican reality show, we will become a parody of our own myth-making. When the tough brilliant Benjamin Franklin emerged from the long arduous process of creating the Constitution, a woman asked him, "What have you given us?" Franklin replied, "A republic madam, if you can keep it." He didn't say "God has given us a shining city on a hill. Let us go forth and claim the world in His name." God forbid.

 

 

 

Follow Richard Geldard on Twitter: www.twitter.com/richgeldard

Comments

[ketchupandfries]

02:44 AM on 12/24/2011

Excellent blog!

[NewPolemic]

03:30 AM on 11/29/2011

Mass media has made it possible to poison the general population with sound bites that are easy to swallow because they feed the myth. Stick a fork in it. This country is finished. It is just a matter of time before things come apart at the seems. Hopefully, something better will arise from the ashes.

[TRex86]

03:39 PM on 11/22/2011

American "exceptionalism" is nothing more than old fashioned jingoism with a touch of Manifest Destiny thrown in. The Republican pander-bears are tools militaristic profiteers, who benefit from our imperialistic misadventures. They pose; they posture; they blather, but as the Mittster said, his sons serve the country best by helping his presidential campaign, not by enlisting in the military.

At this point we spend more on our military than the rest of the planet combined. It's not that we have no obligation to police the planet, this level of spending is insane. It accomplishes nothing, but make us look like quivering, helpless giant. The Cold War is over. Global terrorism poses no strategic threat. On the contrary, the genius of Bin Ladin was to realize that he could catalyze our self-destruction, like the Soviets, spending ourselves to death.

For those who care to read more I heartily recommend Chalmers Johnson's excellent books, including The Sorrows of Empire which is spot on regarding the cost of Pax Americana.

[addisonsteele]

02:54 PM on 11/22/2011

Proponents of American Exceptionalism seem to believe that the United States exists outside of history, which means that no other nation's history can provide us with any useful lessons because we are unique. Europeans, on the other hand, have learned hard lessons from history, which is why there was a consensus among all political parties at the end of World War II to create social democracies with extensive safety nets for the citizenry. Europeans had lived and died through the consequences of massive income inequality: thirty years of crisis and war from 1914 to 1945 that killed tens of millions of people. American Exceptionalists do not believe that we can learn anything from that.

[Countess]

02:12 PM on 11/22/2011

One of the surest indications of our bipartisan imbecility is this ridiculous concept of American Exceptionalism which is shared by a large majority of the population. There are many western countries that are just as exceptional by any objective standard and the domination of the white super rich and the obvious corruption of our economic and political system makes any claim to exceptionalism an absurd lie.

[RW22]

01:38 PM on 11/22/2011

An excellent article. Mr. Geldard's recent book "Emerson and the Dream of America" is excellent as well. The American Conservative world view has always been dominated by symbol over substance. The mythology of the Founding Fathers gave birth to the Tea Party, emphasizing the symbolic Madison, Jefferson, and Franklin and abandoning the reality of their ideas. For the Tea Party and millions of other Americans, those faces on Mount Rushmore and what they think they represent were the real presidents, not the men Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and T. Roosevelt. The hatred of government, taxation, and actual community involvement by those who imagine themselves to be the "real" Americans has reduced our nation to parody. The Bill Mahr joke about Joe the Plumber, fearing a tax hike on his plumbing company that existed only in his head, says a lot about modern America. The myth that we could all become millionaires drive people to vote against their real interests, while protecting their imaginary future wealth by voting against tax hikes on the 1%, strangling our economy, reducing those services we desparately need, and increasing the national debt.

[mtdem4ever]

12:54 PM on 11/22/2011

Excellent little article Mr. Geldard. I've long said one of the major differences between conservatives and progressives, Republicans and Democrats, is that one group believes the entire myth of American Exceptionalism while the other believes in the POSSIBILITY of an exceptional America. The group that believes in the possibility recognizes the difficulties and hard work that must be suffered to get to that future point.

[iridium53]

12:34 PM on 11/22/2011

The United States has lots of serious problems. Problems that have resulted from 30 years of ideological neglect - from Ray-gun forward.

We need serious people, serious leaders to help solve those problems.

Solve them for all of us, not just for the top 1%.
Solve them with the help of all of us, not just the bottom 99%.

Solve them with evidence-based logical solutions. Not faith-based ideological magical thinking.

The problems have been identified.
Joblessness, homelessness, poverty, healthcare, education.
Corporations offshoring jobs to shore up the profits of executives.
Congress purposely facilitating the destruction of the American economy so that they can make more money on insider trading and political "donations" that are akin to bribery.

We need serious people to solve serious problems.
Not crazy, corrupt, corporate kleptocrats with magical, ideological, fact-free, faith-based platitudes.

[muffler]

11:42 AM on 11/22/2011

American Exceptionalism is something that is not inherited or genetic, but earned day in and day out. If anything the GOP and it's candidates prove that being an American does not automatically make you exceptional.

[Bret Alan Cebulla]

02:05 PM on 11/22/2011

Quite right.