On that point: A weekly column examining media

For the last installation of “On That Point” for 2008, a discussion of hope is in order. Based on a symposium at the New York Public Library, entitled “What Happens Now: The 2008 Election,” prolific writer Joan Didion believes that because of the Obama election, irony is now out of style, and “Naivete, translated into “hope,” [is] now in.”

What is wrong with thinking a man (and the people he appoints) can be the answer to a country’s problems?

Religious people tend to do it all the time, usually with more fanaticism. Didion continues by proclaiming, “The expectations got fueled. The spirit of a cargo cult [is] loose in the land. I heard it said breathlessly on one channel that the United States, on the basis of having carried off this presidential election, now had “the congratulations of all the nations.”

“They want to be with us,” another commentator said. “Imagining in 2008 that all the world’s people wanted to be with us did not seem entirely different in kind from imagining in 2003 that we would be greeted with flowers when we invaded Iraq, but in the irony-free zone that the nation had chosen to become, this was not the preferred way of looking at it.”

A lot of citizens who voted for Obama and some who didn’t, want to believe, leaving decades of cynicism and disappointments behind, that yes, things will improve.

Perhaps it will have to get worse before it does, but within the next eight years, this country is going to be transformed to a place where immigration is not seen as threat, but an opportunity, where real discussions will take place about environmentally sound practices, both at the corporate and consumer level, where the media will be regulated, and a mandate for equal voice will be enforced, where corporate greed isn’t encouraged and where “faith-based initiatives” don’t ruin millions of lives.

Perhaps irony has gotten old, Ms. Didion, because we have no use for it anymore. We are too busy making master plans for fixing the mistakes your generation has dumped on us: a floundering Social Security, a dwindling middle class, a huge budget gap, a world where single-person homes have tripled and a world where social trust is at an all-time low.

If hope were not the feeling in which our expectations should reside, what would be a better one? Putting hope aside for a second, we are, for the most part, Generation Screwed.

David Brooks writes in a New York Times article, “recessions are about more than material deprivation. They’re also about fear and diminished expectations. The cultural consequences of recessions are rarely uplifting.”

Perhaps its time to prove the economists wrong and not only believe in change, but take steps within our own lives, liking getting off the credit cards, reducing individual commutes by car and generally being aware of what is going on in the world, to achieve it.

To be clear, Obama is no Messiah. No Allah. One would dare to say, he is not even an Al Gore or a Roosevelt. We can put our expectations on a high shelf, because we believe Obama has the stature to reach it. And not just on blind faith.

After Obama’s appointments, we can argue now that he not only is an electable candidate, but a thoughtful one too, proving his intelligence with sound judgment of the harsh realities to come.

His policies are clear, and with the backing of Congress, they can be easily implemented. The factors that would hinder his lofty goals, much like what happened to Bill Clinton, would be taking steps to get the country out of the economic crisis, and bolstering the U.S. image overseas.

These things were on his agenda in one way or another to begin with, but may take more time. Dealing with the last eight years of nonsense and lack of accountability has put Americans in a position ready for the long haul.

Winston Churchill is generally attributed to saying, “If you’re not a liberal by the time you’re 25, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative by the time you’re 35, you have no brain.” Idealism and liberalism have gone hand in hand for centuries. Why stop now?

For all the detractors out there, and there are many, hope is what is going to make this country better.