America's Struggle Within, by Richard C. Harwood

America's Struggle Within

Citizens Talk about the State of the Union

IV. Nothing Will Be Easy or Quick

As people in the conversations looked out across America, they said that they did not like what they could see. They deeply lament where the nation stands not just in terms of America s economy or families or values, but even more fundamentally about the nation s sense of itself. We ve lost our sense of humanity, is how a San Francisco man put it. People believed that the nation has gotten seriously off track. What is more, their belief struck directly at the nature of America. A Laconia man summed up the feelings of many people in these discussion groups when he said, We ve lost our soul. People around the room in Laconia nodded in agreement. Many Americans are now questioning their ability to dream. Recall the Mason City man who said, I m starting to wonder if the American Dream still exists. He was not alone. Americans want to recapture, or reinvigorate, the American soul. As one Laconia man observed, We don t live on farms anymore. We live in a community where there s stress... Conditions have changed. How do we regain the pride and the love and the respect and the caring you once had? Don t Expect Miracles People do not believe that a brighter future will come easily or quickly or that it should. Rather, people s sense of what the future holds drew on their previous experience with difficult problems. The Laconia man said about past attempts to address people s concerns, Easy answers were not achieved because there are none. A Tampa man noted that the nation was experiencing tremendous shifts that people would need to sort through. Society is moving fast...It s just coming right at you and people are more reactive to it. He said about Americans, They are trying to cope and deal with the absorption of it, and rationalize it, and say... What s the right and the wrong thing. Group participants were clear in their belief that the country must apply itself differently in order to tackle its challenges. The county has gotten out of shape, a Laconia woman observed. What we ve got to do is all keep working and get it back. But people believed that merely setting out to create change was the wrong approach. Recall the Modesto man who said, It s the dynamics of change, and they re not responding correctly to it. He continued, They re trying the old system of trying to fix things, instead of trying to find some new ways. Nor did people think that money was the answer. A Davenport man said, Just throwing money away doesn t solve the problem. And an Orlando man echoed the views of many people in the discussions when he said, Money s not the solution. Rather, he said, It s changing the way they do things is the solution. And a Tampa man made this observation: We can sit here and vent all day long...[but] if you don t take an interest in what s going on and try to do something about it, you can throw all the money in the world at it and you re not gonna see any results. As the country struggles within, people said that meaningful action will come slowly. It s not an overnight thing, a Tampa woman said. And a Tampa man added, It takes a long time with a big ship. A Miami woman captured people s sentiments when she recalled the saying, It takes a long time to grow a tree from a seed. The discussions suggested that progress would not come without some pain, either. We re all going to have to make sacrifices, a Mason City man said. And a Claremont woman suggested that Americans should take the long view. She referred to what people would say when getting a measles shot: I don t like this shot, but I know it s going to keep me from getting the measles. Throughout the group discussions people cautioned that despite the desire for progress, it would be difficult to put things into motion. When asked point blank if people would take steps to get more involved, a mixed response was heard. A Tallahassee man said, We re lazy. We re not willing to do it. Indeed, people said that Americans would need time in order to step forward that they no longer believe that they could really make a difference. Said a Mason City woman, A lot of people say... I m just one person. What difference am I going to make? An Orlando man captured the essence of many of the group discussions by saying that even when progress does occur, we re not going to have a utopia but an efficient government, maybe the majority of people caring for each other, and people...actually doing things instead of relying on the government.