HITH!

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“Can you believe this craziness!”

“What in the world… this is mind-numbing!”

“This is America?”

“How in the heck did we get here!”

The above comments—usually stated in hushed, anxious tones—have been overheard among family, friends, acquaintances, and strangers. Mostly limited to the last 8 years, they’ve come at grocery checkout lines, restaurant counters, retail stores, airport terminals, schools, church hallways, concerts and baseball games. A peripheral glance, a precursor to the whispered comment, gives the listener (me) the feeling we’re being watched... under surveillance by some anti-free-speech secret service. “I really don’t want to get into this,” they’ll offer, peeking over their shoulder, “But how in the heck…?” 

I’ve been wondering the same darn thing: “How is it possible that Highway 26, just south of Asheville, is still under construction?” It’s certainly a valid concern. I mean, have you driven on Highway 26 lately? 

Alas — lamentable for democracies everywhere — I’m pulling your leg. Americans aren’t fretting about North Carolina’s longstanding potholes or traffic barriers. They’re wringing their hands over the state of our Republic.

What’s this all about? Why the fear? The feelings of absurdity? The paranoia? The sensation of a democracy imploding?

It’s complicated. 

To attempt a response to these sentiments (the sneaking suspicion that bad things are on the national horizon), let us first clarify the sneaking suspicions. There are lots of things to worry about—health, children, debt, whether your phone battery will make it through the day—but we’re zeroing-in on apprehensions of national consequence. Let’s review.

Fears?

There is talk of violence, book banning, inflation, white nationalism, woke mandates, unabated debt consumption (to the tune of 33.5 trillion), a mushrooming gender identity crises, DIY abortions, DEI edicts, the erosion of cultural norms, cancel culture, the Project 25 agenda, pronoun indoctrination, mass shootings, shifting values, evil immigrants, civil unrest, moral decline, conspiracies, judicial corruption, the collapse of common decency, whisperings of another Rocky movie.

Some of these fears are legit.

Absurdities?

A spray-tanned, convicted felon—exhibiting a troubling affinity for violence—has gained a presidential nomination. Falsehoods, deceptions, exaggerations, alternative facts, disinformation, fake news, brazen lies—whatever you want to call them—spew forth from the political arena (and news outlets) like Old Faithful, geysering whoppers every 60 minutes. The rule of law, once the bastion of American democracy, has been loop-holed to death and abandoned; exchanged for political advantage and apologies (“Sorry we hindered your freedom to manipulate the system”). Attempting to out-inept each other, politicians vie for air-time with ill-informed pronouncements and half-baked legislation. Bullying, scapegoating and hate speech—once considered Hitleresque political tactics reserved for evil despots—are the new norm. Without reluctance, media outlets print stream-of-consciousness blather from our state-of-the-un-smart leaders, preferring scandalous chatter over meaningful content.

There’s more, but we don’t have the internet space to record it. Absurdities abound.

Paranoia?

Whispers of election fraud are already stirring. Threats of violence and retaliation hover over what-was-once common political discourse. Social media stokes fires of distrust and hatred. Blueprints for addressing complicated social and economic issues have gone MIA—leaving us to wonder, “Is anybody paying attention?” Polarizing beliefs, conveniently homogenized with an unwillingness to compromise, foster division. Incoherence and incompetence, regularly materializing in political speeches, signal the death of knowledgeable and accomplished statesman. Victimization, outrage and grievance fuel emotionally charged support bases—feeding irrational fears. A not-so-subtle rallying cry, “Autocracy for Democracy,” is offered as the final solution to pesky, disagreeable ideologies. According to some, AI has doctored photographs of political opponents, making them look nicer than they really are. 

The paranoia is palatable… and often, extremely bizarre.

A Democracy Imploding?

See above.

Now that we’ve cleared that up, democracy-lovers should be, quite frankly, freaking out. If you’re one of those rare beings who wears civic rose-colored glasses—“Same old, same old; just the election year crazies; this too shall pass”—the following Star Wars analogy is appearing on your computer screen to suggest otherwise: To the rosy Luke Skywalkers of the world, claiming “I’m not afraid” (of Vader, the Dark Side, or massive political shifts), Yoda’s response is instructive. “You will be… you will be.”

Which bring us back to our original conundrum. “How in the heck did we get here?”

For a unique moment in time, millions of Republicans and Democrats seem to be agreeing on the same perplexity. If history offers helpful insights—reasonable guesses at the origins of our fears, absurdities and paranoias, and where they might lead us—an attempt at solving this inquiry seems to be significant.

With that supposition in mind, let us abandoned this lengthy, but necessary, preface and proceed with a brief 5-point history lesson. Although our backward glance won’t calm your anxieties, it may provide context, encourage a small dose of critical thinking, and suggest an alternative, common-sense path forward. A path less frightful than the route we are currently traversing—teetering along a cliff edge where an accumulation of missteps may well end the American experiment.

To be continued… subscribe to follow.

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*Unfortunately, our first few Sticky Notes involve the discussion of politics. Given the current state of affairs, this should come as little surprise. There is that bothersome artifact called reality, which seems to be telling us all is not well. I share no affinity for either of our political parties (quite frankly, both seem to mastermind more problems than solutions). Consequently, our focus will not be to offer voting advice, but rather, to recommend discernment—horse sense that may help us understand and navigate these remarkably dim-witted times. If you are unswervingly committed to one party or another, I simply ask you to temporarily suspend your allegiance while reading the soon-to-follow posts. Although you may firmly believe your party is the answer to America's dysfunctions, in service of reason, I ask you to consider the possibility that both may have steered us terribly off course.

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