“We don’t need to worry about greatness. We do need to concentrate on goodness, now more than ever.”
By Mark L. Taylor
The Commoner Call (7/27/20)
After reading a firsthand account of a university professor shot in the head and a Vietnam veteran sprayed in the face with some kind of debilitating spray by government storm troopers in Portland in the past day or two, it is a bit of a task to find something positive; something hopeful. Fortunately, Mike McCabe’s latest book “Unscrewing America: Hints And Hopes From The Heartland” is filled with examples of practical hope.
McCabe, who ran in the 2018 democratic primary for governor and is now the executive director of Our Wisconsin Revolution, has a long history of being on the frontlines of Wisconsin politics. For 15 years he led the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign exposing bipartisan corruption in state government. Along the way he has picked up numerous public service and journalism awards. But of all the things he has done Unscrewing America may be his most important contribution.
Finding pathways of hope through crisis
There are plenty of books that have come out in the past few years exposing the corruption and malfeasance of corrupted government and dirty corporate influence, and McCabe certainly doesn’t shy away from putting some of that up on the page, but what I find most significant is his laying out some much-needed hope and pathways to reform.
McCabe’s first book “Blue Jeans In High Places: The Coming Makeover Of American Politics” came out in 2014 and sold four editions. “Unscrewing America” hasn’t been so lucky. The book came out just as the cornavirus pandemic broke across the country. After only a couple speaking gigs to promote the book a full schedule of events had to be canceled and McCabe — along with the rest of us — has been sidelined from much of normal activities.
We have far more in common with our neighbors than not — no matter their politics. Imagine what could happen if more of us saw that reality. Trust me, Wall Street fraudsters, political party hacks and most of our congressional (mis)representatives would be the ones losing sleep over the future. That is real power.
At a time of epic failure by both parties — as McCabe likes to note, “One scary and the other scared” — hope and pathways are important resources to have.
The hourly news is plump with evidence that the country is really screwed. So what does ‘unscrewing’ America look like?
“It means dealing constructively with the reality that so many believe America’s future has never been cloudier and national decline seems more or less inevitable,” McCabe says. “It means recognizing that American politics has taken a turn toward madness and large numbers of Americans have come to believe the nation’s best days are in the rear-view mirror.
“It looks like a revolution because that’s what is required. America’s revolutionary spirit needs to be reawakened. Democracy needs to be rescued. As political democracy is saved, economic democracy needs to be established. We need to rethink our relationship with the earth. A new social contract needs to be written. When these things are made to happen, civic life will be revived, a sense of community purpose will reemerge, and our national identity will be redefined. America will be unscrewed.”
It’s Top vs Bottom, folks
An essential pathway to hope comes in unscrewing the way we see each other. As in all regimes, those in power depend upon dividing we commoners; so we have Republicans going after Democrats; right squabbling with left; rural and urban making snide jokes about each other. It’s a sucker’s game we all fall into. McCabe sees it differently, noting that is is not a right/left divide we face, it is a vertical Top/Bottom threat.
“We’ve been taught to think horizontally about politics—left to right—and that divides people who could and should be united,” McCabe notes. “Thinking vertically instead makes it possible to see that people who we think are enemies actually have much in common. Who has the most money, and who has the least? Who has power and who doesn’t? Whose voices are heard and whose aren’t? A person on the right and another on the left can be in the same spot on a vertical political spectrum and have more in common than either they or we have been trained to see.”
From this factual Top/Bottom perspective, the majority of Americans are in the same spot — on the bottom. And in the midst of the pandemic, that bottom is dropping by the hour. Looked at correctly, we have far more in common with our neighbors than not — no matter their politics. Imagine what could happen if more of us saw that reality. Trust me, Wall Street fraudsters, political party hacks and most of our congressional (mis)representatives would be the ones losing sleep over the future. That is real power.
From farm to suburb
In his scrappy 2018 campaign McCabe traveled 100,000 miles and never left the state. In Unscrewing America he shares stories of the people he met and the stressed communities he visited. McCabe grew up on a small, hardscrabble family dairy farm in northern Wisconsin’s Clark County and now lives in the Madison area. He is sensitive to the rural/urban divide which cynical politicians and consulting groups have twisted and poisoned. In the midst of such manufactured division, where is a pathway to hope?
“Hope and inspiration are found in countless of acts of compassion and human decency done by ordinary people who help out a neighbor or come to the aid of a complete stranger. Everyone who does this is not only leading by example, they are manufacturing hope,” McCabe says. “History also can be an endless source of hope. Our country has faced impossibly difficult-to-solve problems and mammoth crises many times before, and past generations of Americans consistently rose to the occasion and came up with solutions and brought about a better day.
“They were less educated than we are, had less money than we do, and had far fewer means of communication. Yet they proved smart enough, showed themselves to be plenty enterprising, and found ways to make their voices heard. Time after time, through the sheer force of will, they made America a better country. We can take comfort and draw inspiration from that history.”
Making friends with discomfort
McCabe’s optimistic message is not naive. He suffers no illusions of the challenges we face on the pathway to national redemption.
“We don’t need to worry about greatness. We do need to concentrate on goodness, now more than ever.”
