And yet, I hear you, and your passion is so great, and I’m moved by it, frankly. But here we are. Yeah. So, I don’t know. You shouldn’t think I’ve never asked myself that question. One way to put it is this: Twenty-five years ago, I essentially predicted everything that was going to happen. That’s a little exaggerated, but not much. And yet they happened. I’ve been a little bit of an Isaiah, preaching how awful things are. One person once said I was like an Old Testament prophet with charts. I’ve been working for most of my adult life to try to build a better, more productive, more equal, more connected community in America, and now I’m 83 and looking back, and it’s been a total failure. Should I be optimistic or pessimistic about the future? I don’t know that I’m optimistic or pessimistic. Honestly, looking at the polls today, I could be pretty pessimistic. But I am hopeful, because I can see how we could change it, and I’m doing my damnedest, including right this moment, to try to change the course of history. I’m sorry, that’s very self-important and I apologize for that, but I’m telling you honestly how I feel. I don’t mean to sound cynical, it’s just, What can I do? I tried my damnedest to sketch a way forward, but I’ve not been persuasive enough.
Well, maybe it’s just that one man can’t do it alone. We need community. [Laughs] You’re right!
What is your question? You started your journalism career at the end of the 20th century, just about the time that “Bowling Alone” was released. Suppose you didn’t know me at all and didn’t know the book, but you were trying to describe how you think American society has changed. What’s changed?
I came here in 2017 from having lived overseas, and the things that I had seen in other places that I had not seen here before, I started to see here. Families turning against each other, friendships broken, politics invading every part of people’s lives. And I think, as you say, to turn that around is a hard and herculean task. It’s interesting that we have very different careers and origins and so on, but — I have actually seen an America that was better. So I know it doesn’t have to be this way. It doesn’t mean I know how to get out of here. But America as a whole has been in good times. We have trusted one another. That’s what my books show. We’ve trusted one another, we’ve loved one another, we’ve been equal to one another. We even began to reach across racial lines — I mean, it’s not an accident that the civil rights movement comes at the peak of this upswing. So I know that we can do better, and I know that we’ve turned corners in the past.
We’ve come back from worse. There’s no question that you can turn a corner. But you asked me in my lifetime what I had seen, and I’m afraid the trajectory hasn’t been on an upswing. And I think that’s what your data shows too. Sure does.
