At the Close of a Decade
John-Clark Levin
Last Updated: 12/30/09 Section: Editorial
The war in Iraq was short and relatively bloodless, or so we thought for nearly a year after Baghdad fell. Only gradually did it set in that war was a far longer and costlier endeavor than we had once believed. But even war, with all the grim images sent home each day, could not shake America's faith in its new age. Maybe we didn't have flying cars and sleek jumpsuits, but YouTube and the iPod weren't half bad. Thanks to Google and Wikipedia, we were able to access and share information in ways even Arthur C. Clarke couldn't have imagined. This, we felt, was what the Aughts were all about.
There were some, of course, who would have liked to see this a decade of political ferment - who would have liked to see the discontent over the war, global warming, Darfur, or any one of a hundred other causes, boil over into a repeat of the 1960s. But Michael Moore's Slacker Uprising never came, and Greenday's "American Idiot" fell comically flat in its attempt to rouse America's youth to political action. Quite simply, that's not where our collective aspirations lay. Our culture resolutely made lemonade out of the bitterest lemons the Aughts could throw at us, as the subversive comedy of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert turned even the disaster of Hurricane Katrina into national catharsis.
In spite of everything, by 2007 our economy was back on top, in a sustained boom that promised to be the continuation of the late '90s. Facebook, Twitter and the iPhone were every day making our way of life more like the future we had imagined nearly a decade before, and every day drawing a divided world closer together. Even in Iraq, so long feared an unwinnable quagmire, the Surge was steadily salvaging victory out of almost-certain failure. For a moment it appeared as though the decade had been redeemed - we again had the luxury of reckless enthusiasm, and our way of life seemed secure.
And then everything just sort of unraveled. The DOW hemorrhaged most of the whole decade's gains in a matter of weeks, and America became aware that the Taliban were still around and threatening to plunge Afghanistan back into chaos. When the dust had settled, we were back in the same boat we had been in the Aughts' first years. The future seemed to hold only more disappointments. Undaunted, a hungry America elected Barack Obama on the faith that he could fulfill the all the promises that the past decade had so repeatedly dashed. And so now, we look toward the Teens with the same mixture of hope and fear that we shared ten years ago.
Yet I would hope that the experiences of the present decade are not profitless in the next one. We have learned that even as we try to compensate, as a culture, for the uncertainties of the wider world, we must remain aware and engaged in our political process. We have learned that America's strength is founded not on wild speculation, but the industry and ingenuity of its people. We have learned, moreover, that even as the world changes, we still struggle to preserve the same hopes and values. And we have learned, I hope, by now, to neither cling to the unrealistic ideals nor submit to the darkest fears of the decade to come.
There were some, of course, who would have liked to see this a decade of political ferment - who would have liked to see the discontent over the war, global warming, Darfur, or any one of a hundred other causes, boil over into a repeat of the 1960s. But Michael Moore's Slacker Uprising never came, and Greenday's "American Idiot" fell comically flat in its attempt to rouse America's youth to political action. Quite simply, that's not where our collective aspirations lay. Our culture resolutely made lemonade out of the bitterest lemons the Aughts could throw at us, as the subversive comedy of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert turned even the disaster of Hurricane Katrina into national catharsis.
In spite of everything, by 2007 our economy was back on top, in a sustained boom that promised to be the continuation of the late '90s. Facebook, Twitter and the iPhone were every day making our way of life more like the future we had imagined nearly a decade before, and every day drawing a divided world closer together. Even in Iraq, so long feared an unwinnable quagmire, the Surge was steadily salvaging victory out of almost-certain failure. For a moment it appeared as though the decade had been redeemed - we again had the luxury of reckless enthusiasm, and our way of life seemed secure.
And then everything just sort of unraveled. The DOW hemorrhaged most of the whole decade's gains in a matter of weeks, and America became aware that the Taliban were still around and threatening to plunge Afghanistan back into chaos. When the dust had settled, we were back in the same boat we had been in the Aughts' first years. The future seemed to hold only more disappointments. Undaunted, a hungry America elected Barack Obama on the faith that he could fulfill the all the promises that the past decade had so repeatedly dashed. And so now, we look toward the Teens with the same mixture of hope and fear that we shared ten years ago.
Yet I would hope that the experiences of the present decade are not profitless in the next one. We have learned that even as we try to compensate, as a culture, for the uncertainties of the wider world, we must remain aware and engaged in our political process. We have learned that America's strength is founded not on wild speculation, but the industry and ingenuity of its people. We have learned, moreover, that even as the world changes, we still struggle to preserve the same hopes and values. And we have learned, I hope, by now, to neither cling to the unrealistic ideals nor submit to the darkest fears of the decade to come.
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