First-World Problems...

It's not really a problem...just a radical difference in perspective. We see America as a place of boundless opportunity and limitless horizons. Even now in the midst of our current malaise and possibly existential threats to our way of life, many of us expect to find a way out of this mess and predict a return to a sane society in which the now rare attributes of an "American" -- self-reliance, drive, individuality, and a healthy suspicion of obviously insane ideas -- return.

Imagine an America that is so staid and unchanging and sclerotic that an institution remains in the same place, essentially unchanged for 452 years!

I prefer an America that looks at an old building and says, "Let's tear it down and build something bigger and better!" That's not antithetical to "Chesterton's Fence," it is a recognition that we were and maybe still are a country that is not content with the way things are.

posted by CBD at 02:00 PM

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