Thoughts on "The Age of American Unreason"

I recently finished reading Susan Jacoby's "The Age of American Unreason." Her book is superb from start to finish, but one of her talking points struck me as particularly relevant in view of recent events.

In her chapter titled "Public Life: Defining Dumbness Downward," Jacoby laments the current rise of anti-intellectualism in America. She begins by describing a speech given by Robert F. Kennedy after he learned that Martin Luther King had been assassinated. In the speech, Kennedy quoted a line from Aeschylus's Agamemnon, in which the interrelationship of pain and wisdom is examined. Kennedy concluded with the hope that Americans would dedicate themselves "to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world." It is important to note that Kennedy's speech was given in Indianapolis, where he had originally intended to give a campaign speech to a predominantly black crowd.

One can only imagine what kind of a reception Hillary or Obama would have received in West Virginia this week if they had quoted any classic work of literature, much less Aeschylus. I can hear the hoots and hollers reverberating from Wheeling to the Big Sandy River Basin. The media would have erupted in an orgy of class-baiting; accusations of "elitism" would have flown through the air like sizzlin' pork rinds.

This is only to be expected in a campaign season in which candidates are scrambling all over themselves to hide any evidence of (gasp! the horror!) higher learning. We have now reached the point at which politicians are more willing to reveal prior drug use than the fact that they took Professor Hillyard's course in comparative literature during their freshman year of college. It is discouraging to watch the future leaders of our country compete with each other in the fine arts of beer swilling, bowling, and gun totin'. Can hog-calling and clogging be far behind? Jacoby points out that John F. Kennedy was notoriously opposed to donning cowboy hats, baseball caps, or any other headgear designed to show that he was just folks. Contrast that with John Kerry, an Ivy-Leaguer who felt compelled to borrow camouflage clothes and a blunderbuss to engage in a faux goose hunt. It's embarrassing.

I don't know about you, but I hope that whoever ends up running this country has more smarts than I do. I hope he or she has traveled to more places and spent more time learning about how other people in the world view us. I hope that he or she has had the advantage of conversing with and learning from the very best minds on matters of the economy, international relations, and social justice. The last eight years have taught us that the "brewski test" isn't just silly -- it's dangerous.