Keep Hope Alive
Hope and optimism are what sustains us and right now, they are more important than ever.
I’m Michael A. Cohen, and this is Truth and Consequences: A no-holds-barred look at the absurdities, hypocrisies, and surreality of American politics. If you received this email - or you are a free subscriber - and you’d like to subscribe: you can sign up here.
One year ago, taking the great leap into the Substack world was not easy, but the support I’ve received from you, the Truth and Consequences community, has sustained me. Thanks for your support, your readership, your comments, and, above all, thanks for making the experience of writing this newsletter so incredibly rewarding. Here’s to a great first year and an even better 2022!
Hope Is The Thing With Feathers
I’ve been thinking for several hours about what to write on this, the final day of 2021. How does one capture the emotions of a year that brought with it such extraordinary highs and lows? After the annus horribilis that was 2020 and the COVID pandemic, a miracle emerged: vaccines that saved millions of lives and allowed so many of us to return to a life of normalcy. Yet, at the same time, hundreds of Americans continued to needlessly die because of the toxic pull of political polarization. And as the year comes to a close, we are again trapped in the maw of COVID’s grasp.
After a four-year nightmare, we again have a decent, empathetic, and compassionate president who governed with the best interests of his fellow citizens in mind. Yet, at the same time, the Republican Party continued its further descent into authoritarianism, malevolence, and bat-shit insanity — and the potential for a return of the Trump nightmare in 2024 remains a real possibility?
Is the glass half-full or half-empty?
Well, here’s one perspective from the New Yorker’s Susan Glasser in her end-of-the-year roundup.
The national mood is sour, and understandably so. Sanity, competence, and civility have not exactly returned to Washington; normalcy is not just around the corner. Biden, it is now clear, promised what he couldn’t deliver in a nation divided against itself. He trafficked in hope that was arguably as misleading in its own way as Trump’s lies. More than four hundred thousand Americans have died of covid since Trump left office—many of them because they refused to get a free, lifesaving vaccine. More than two-thirds of Republicans to this day refuse to accept that Biden is the legitimately elected President, preferring Trump’s Big Lie to the uncomfortable truth of his defeat. There is no restoration possible in such a country.
When I read this earlier today, it genuinely annoyed me. How can hope be misleading, and how can it be equated with Trump’s monstrous indifference to the truth?
About a decade ago, I wrote a book called “Live From The Campaign Trail” that looked at the most important campaign speeches of the 20th century. One of the book’s conclusions was that the most potent and influential campaign rhetoric relies on an aspirational element. “The best political speeches invoke not simply the past,” I wrote then, “but also the hopefulness of the future … like voters everywhere, Americans want something to cast their ballot for, as opposed to simply finding something to vote against.”
What I didn’t truly appreciate when I wrote those words so many years ago is that hopefulness is more than simply a political necessity … it’s essential to the human experience. Where would we be without hope? If we don’t have optimism that tomorrow will be better than today, how would any of us even be able to get out of bed in the morning? Even if our grandest aspirations for the future are not realized — and usually they’re not — who wants to live in a world in which we don’t traffic in hope? Who wants to vote for a politician who doesn’t make us believe that we can overcome adversity and tragedy — and that our best days lay ahead?
I get all the reasons to be downcast on this last day of 2021, but I keep coming back to the fact that in the past year, 3.77 billion people around the globe have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Literally, millions of lives have been saved. If that doesn't make you hopeful about the ingenuity and resourcefulness of human beings — and if it doesn't sustain your faith in our ability to overcome even the most dire situations — I honestly don't know what to tell you. Recency bias is a real thing, and, understandably, humans often focus on the negative rather than the positive. And believe me, I’m not thrilled that another New Year’s Eve is going to be spent isolating because of COVID fears. But then I remember that three days ago, I celebrated my daughter’s ten birthday with a celebratory milkshake, in what was arguably the best hour I spent in all of 2021.
If there’s one lesson I’ve learned in this wildly strange year it is that it is the small moments of happiness and pleasure are what sustains us. The first jazz show I saw at Small’s Jazz Club in April 2021 after 14 months without live music … Bob Dylan performing “Key West” at the Capitol Theater in December … Dead and Company with 50,000 of my closest friends at Citi Field … standing in the end zone of Michigan Stadium watching the Wolverines score a touchdown 10 feet in front of me … taking my youngest to the Grand Canyon, Universal Studios, and the Vegas strip … swimming with her for hours in the pool at the Mandalay Bay hotel .. hanging out with my good friend Ian Zimmerman, after having not seen him for nearly a year … giving my vaccinated mother and brother a hug for the first time in far too long … seeing, in flesh and blood, so many dear friends, who for the previous year had been images on a Zoom call … and yeah, that delicious Oreo milkshake with my, how the hell is that kid ten years old, daughter. I could go on, but you get the idea.
There are many reasons to be pessimistic about 2022 — particularly for those of us who spend our time obsessing over politics. Maybe the Build Back Better agenda won’t pass; maybe Republicans will win back the House and Senate in November; maybe some worse COVID variant will emerge; maybe the schools will shut down again; maybe, maybe, maybe.
Or maybe, 2022 will be a year chockful of laughter and ecstasy, happiness and joy, pleasure and comfort that will outweigh all the reasons for pessimism, despair, and fear. I don’t know which one it will be, but I remain stubbornly hopeful it will be the former! After all, if we don’t have hope, then truly we are lost.
Emily Dickinson Says It Better Than I Could
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -
I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.
Musical Interlude
This video seems quite fitting today. I can’t tell you how much I love watching the pure joy on Jerry Garcia’s face from the 2 to 4-minute mark of this song … also the closing sentiment is pretty great!
Happy New Year!
Yes, without hope there isn't any reason to fight for a cause. I just get so frustrated that the Biden administration seems to have put voter rights (democracy) on the back burner in favor of his Build Back Better plan. What I don't get is, what good is infrastructure without a democracy inhabiting and using it?
I've given up reading Susan Glasser. She and her husband both. I saw that piece yesterday and skipped right over it. The oreo milkshake sounds good. With our NYE plans cancelled tonight, maybe we'll celebrate with milkshakes. Great idea. Thanks.