Maureen Dowd, one of the best Op-Ed writers to ever grace the pages of the New York Times, often strikes at the heart of the American dilemma capturing our current confusion with the precision of a surgeon. On this Fourth of July, in her column, “Who Do We Think We Are?” Dowd tapped into the dilemma of our psyche.
“From Katrina to Fallujah, we’re less the Shining City Upon a Hill than the House of Broken Toys. For the first time perhaps, hope is not as much a characteristic of American feelings.
Are we winners who have been through a rough patch? Or losers who have soured our sturdy and spiritual DNA with too much food, too much greed, too much narcissism, too many lies, too many spies, too many fat-cat bonuses, too many cat videos on the evening news, too many Buzzfeed listicles like “33 Photos Of Corgi Butts,” and too much mindless and malevolent online chatter?
Are we still the biggest and baddest? Or are we forever smaller, stingier, dumber, less ambitious and more cynical? Have we lost control of our not-so-manifest destiny?”
This makes me ask the question, are we still the greatest?