The Disunited States of America: Season 249

A lone television had been wheeled into the cafeteria at my high school so we could gather around to watch a triumphant moment. History was about to be made. The excitement was palpable. Seventy-three seconds later: stunned silence.

It was January 28, 1986.

Later that night, President Ronald Reagan addressed a country in shock. A country mourning the loss of the seven crew members of Space Shuttle Challenger, including Christa McAuliffe, the first teacher chosen to go into space. His words still echo when I remember that day: "We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and 'slipped the surly bonds of earth' to 'touch the face of God.'" Words intended to unite. To heal.

Tragedy Upon Tragedy

Thirty-nine years have passed, and in that time, America has endured tragedy after tragedy. Far too many to capture in one essay. From the rubble of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, to the rubble of the World Trade Center on September 11th. From classrooms, churches, synagogues, malls, movie theaters, nightclubs, and universities, all turned into crime scenes at Columbine, Las Vegas, Orlando, Parkland, Pittsburgh, Sandy Hook, and so many others. From hurricanes that drowned New Orleans, to wildfires that consumed Paradise, to tornadoes that flattened Joplin. The list could go on.

Voices rose during these tragedies. From President Bill Clinton, speaking of our nation "touched by evil" after Oklahoma City, to President George W. Bush standing amid the wreckage of the World Trade Center to declare that "the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon," to President Barack Obama singing "Amazing Grace" at the funeral of Reverend Clementa Pinckney in Charleston. Words intended to unite. To heal.

That contrast -- one television wheeled into a cafeteria, versus millions of screens in the palms of our hands feeding us tragedy in real time -- is the story of what has changed. The tragedies keep coming. The tools for processing them keep multiplying. The shared grief keeps shrinking.

In the aftermath, voices rose immediately, not to unite but to divide. Not to heal but to hurt. Calls have been made for vengeance, for retribution, for war. There is no collective mourning. No shared grief.

Vigils have been held, like the one in Boise, Idaho. As I've crisscrossed the United States these last three years, I've lived in Boise. I've walked along W Jefferson Street and through Cecil D. Andrus Park. I've sat on the steps of the Idaho State Capitol. On this journey of mine, I'm hard-pressed to name another city where the people have been as nice. To see the news coverage of the fight break out amidst the candlelight felt as if the darkness had come to my hometown.

While Boise reflects what it felt like to live there, even briefly, something else happens when you wander across America for three years. There's a pattern you see: courage, resilience, and generosity in daily life across our country, contrasted with immense cruelty, gaslighting, and hypocrisy on the national stage. Viewed from outside the power centers of Washington, Hollywood, and Wall Street, the latter resembles a reality television show — and not a good one. Every day, a new storyline emerges, but recurring themes persist. And never ever let facts get in the way of a good story, a clickbait headline, or a provocative tweet.

The national stage has become a content machine. Every tragedy gets a talking point before it gets a reckoning. Every crisis gets a frame before it gets a fix. And the people who've built careers on the friction -- the pundits, the hosts, the outrage architects -- have no incentive to let the moment breathe long enough to become something real.

And perspective doesn't just mean what is happening in the present. Rewriting or sanitizing the past is also happening right before our eyes. President Donald Trump's Executive Order "Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History" is focused on eradicating what he called a "corrosive ideology" around issues such as slavery or injustices that undermine the concept of American exceptionalism. Museums, national parks, and monuments are to be restored to remind "Americans of our extraordinary heritage, consistent progress toward becoming a more perfect Union, and unmatched record of advancing liberty, prosperity, and human flourishing."

As if the removal of "The Scourged Back" will somehow transform our nation's history and allow us to forget that more than 12 million Africans were trafficked across the Middle Passage, with millions dying along the way, and those who survived were subjected to brutal and dehumanizing conditions in slavery. Restore the names of Confederate generals who declared war on the United States to military bases, but omit Jim Crow, omit redlining, omit Greenwood, omit Selma, omit George Floyd. And let's not forget that we haven't even gotten to the genocide and cultural erasure of Indigenous peoples, to the more than one thousand tribes that once called this land home, to the Trail of Tears, to Wounded Knee, to Standing Rock.

Yet, addicted and exhausted, we tune in daily for each episode of "The Disunited States of America: Season 249," our hearts pounding and fingers ready to type, feeding off the outrage. Still, the uncomfortable conversations about our nation's past, present, and future are left out of the show. It's easier that way. Why let a thoughtful debate get in the way of a good spectacle?

America at 250 Years

So where does this leave us? We're marking our 250th birthday, a defining moment that forces the question: What kind of nation are we at 250? Are we the America of Emma Lazarus' promise, or the America of ICE raids? Are we the America of Irving Berlin's "God Bless America" or Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land?" Are we the America I've been fortunate to witness on the road, where neighbors show up for each other, or the America that devours itself each night on cable news?

The show will go on either way. The question is whether we're the audience or something more.