Belonging to Something Bigger Than Ourselves

America, the exceptional nation, is once again in search of an exceptional story to live by. Some of the most passionate amongst us are committing excesses in that discovery process.

That said, let’s go easy on the sinners, theirs and ours.

Something truly big is at stake. Follow along.

As Ecclesiastes teaches, there is nothing new under the sun. The excesses — both of the Woke Folk and of the Ultra MAGAs — were anticipated in Richard Hofstadter’s classic 1964 essay, The Paranoid Style in American Politics:

“In recent years we have seen angry minds at work … who have now demonstrated … how much political leverage can be got out of the animosities and passions of a small minority. But behind this I believe there is a style of mind that is far from new and that is not necessarily right-wing. … I call it the paranoid style simply because no other word adequately evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy that I have in mind.”

Going back further. Teddy Roosevelt (a Republican, before becoming a Bull Moose, the nickname for the original Progressive Party) in his 1912 essay History as Literature, wrote:

“Then, among the wise and high-minded people who in self-respecting and genuine fashion strive earnestly for peace, there are foolish fanatics always to be found in such a movement and always discrediting it — the men who form the lunatic fringe in all reform movements.”

Hey Teddy! Women, too!

So, Joe Biden? You said: “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”

This overlooks something great about MAGA, an acronym for Make America Great Again. People crave being part of something great.

Pushing back to 1851, consider the grandeur, verging on grandiosity, from the great American novel, Moby Dick:

“Unconsciously my chirography expands into placard capitals. Give me a condor’s quill! Give me Vesuvius’ crater for an inkstand! Friends, hold my arms! For in the mere act of penning my thoughts of this Leviathan, they weary me, and make me faint with their outreaching comprehensiveness of sweep, as if to include the whole circle of the sciences, and all the generations of whales, and men, and mastodons, past, present, and to come, with all the revolving panoramas of empire on earth, and throughout the whole universe, not excluding its suburbs. Such, and so magnifying, is the virtue of a large and liberal theme! We expand to its bulk. To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme.”

This sentiment has been part of American history since the time where the memory of man runneth not to the contrary. We have felt it from the American Revolution’s turning the world upside down, through Manifest Destiny, to the War Between the States … right through the 20th century.

It’s in our DNA. The Greatest Generation, followed by us Baby Boomers, had that something bigger. We inhabited an epic era.

Mid-20th century: America’s noble fight against, and victory over the Axis Powers. Late-20th century: the heroic era of the Cold War and the Free World’s victory.

Consider the healthy hunger for belonging to something bigger than ourselves. Per the NHS Foundation Trust:

“During a visit to the NASA Space Centre in 1962, President Kennedy noticed a janitor carrying a broom. He interrupted his tour, walked over to the man and said: “Hi, I’m Jack Kennedy, what are you doing?” The janitor responded: “I’m helping put a man on the moon, Mr President.” The janitor understand (sic) the importance of his contribution. He truly felt he was a valuable part of something bigger than himself. …”

Both WWII and the Cold War gave us a grand cause, something bigger than ourselves. America, Sweet Land of Liberty, against the totalitarians!

Go Team America! With the Free World’s Christmas Day 1991 victory in the Cold War, we lost that “something bigger.”

Various American presidents since then, sometimes catastrophically, attempted to write a new American narrative. And failed.

Some trivialized America’s high purpose. Some squandered billions, trillions, and wrought geopolitical havoc.

Our hunger to be part of something bigger went begging. And we’re still flailing.

Now, MAGAs, at base, yearn to belong to something bigger. Something great.

Crave true greatness? MAGAs, find your way to join us mugwumps.

We, too, share a revulsion to inflation. We mugwumps were all for crushing inflation by restoring the classical gold standard. Some of us still are.

And there are other possibilities. Mr. President?

Don’t denigrate MAGAs. You, too, believe in American greatness.

Challenge the MAGAs with your very own vision of greatness.

And may the best “something bigger” win.