Focusing on the Future
From coast to coast, the explosion of fireworks that traditionally celebrates our day of independence never fails to evoke sentiments expressed in the song "God Bless America," namely America as "my home sweet home." Patriotism remains America's national religion.
The essence of our national faith lies in our dedication to individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion, the rule of law, and equality of opportunity. These ideals, imperfectly realized but always the goal, have sustained America for two centuries as the best hope for mankind on this Earth: No other nation has shared its wealth so generously whether by our foreign aid or unparalleled expressions of private philanthropy (Warren Buffett's billions are a happy-birthday present, but giving as much as they can afford is a distinguishing characteristic of millions of ordinary Americans).
But other fireworks marked our national day--and not in celebration but, rather, as a challenge to us, requiring yet again the qualities of leadership summoned up in the great crises of our 230 years. North Korea's dictator and nuclear fantasist, Kim Jong Il, timed his fireworks--seven ballistic missiles--as an insult and a provocation, another nasty reminder that the world today is a more complex and dangerous place than ever.
During our founding, when we were a nation of 3 million, transcendent leaders emerged. Think of Washington, Jefferson, and Madison. In the Civil War, perhaps our greatest president, Abraham Lincoln, and his cabinet held the United States together when it was close to coming apart, an extraordinary chapter of our history captured brilliantly in Doris Kearns Goodwin's gripping new book Team of Rivals. In the 1930s and 1940s, another generation of great American leaders confronted the despair of the Great Depression and rallied the nation to confront the threat of fascism. Franklin Roosevelt, George Marshall, Dwight Eisenhower, Harry Truman, Omar Bradley--all were leaders of wisdom, common sense, and modesty.
Where are their like today? With a population of some 300 million people, America seems unable to produce even one great leader. Our past three presidents have all shrunk in the estimation of their countrymen--and not without cause, given the nation's seeming inability to solve the critical problems of healthcare, education, immigration, energy dependency, and fiscal profligacy.
Why is this so? Is it because people of talent are seduced by the material rewards of the private sector? Is it because the media so distort the image of public officials that fewer gifted people are willing to risk the hazards of public life, not to speak of the demeaning process of fundraising? Is it because earlier crises inspired a life-and-death fear for the nation but a consequent resolution and commitment are absent today? Is it because the complexity of modern life demands such specialization of potential leaders that we can no longer expect to see integrated in one person the virtues of the soldier, the scholar, the writer, the lawmaker? Is it possible Ameri-ca can no longer grow its own statesmen?
Cutting edge. Perhaps, but if our political leadership is waning, aren't our business and academic leaders impressive? Yes, there are episodic scandals, but America dominates the high-end, high-margin creative industries with cutting-edge companies in information technology, biotech, the Internet, and entertainment. America is home to most of the world's great uni-versities and has no peer in applying new research to the market, turning nascent technologies into products that literally change people's lives. It's no accident that Google, Yahoo!, eBay, Amazon, Apple, Wal-Mart, and Intel were invented and financed in America.
As great as all that is, however, other countries today seem better able than we to act on the recognition that the future belongs to those educated in the hard sciences and technologies, those who understand that intellectual capital will make up the creative infrastructure of tomorrow just as highways, railroads, and canals did yesterday. We know that growth is tied to innovative talent, but America's scientific and technical leadership is waning just as India, China, Canada, and Australia are investing more in these areas. As if to spite ourselves, we are making matters worse by turning foreign talent away from our shores. Domestic political pressure has been allowed to keep out thousands of skilled professionals formerly allowed to work here under H-1B visas, the number of which has been cut by two thirds in recent years. Americans met and conquered enormous challenges in the past, and we can do so again in the future, but we must keep our doors--and minds--open to the contributions new arrivals here can make.
The United States was the leader of the 20th century. It could and should be the leader of the 21st century. But this will require a kind of farsighted leadership that reconfigures the balance between America's longer-term interest and short-term partisan politics.
This story appears in the July 17, 2006 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.