Fareed Zakariah: "Election brought back that sense of America

"Growing up in India in the 1960s and 1970s, I always thought of America as the future. It was the place where the newest technology, the best gadgets and the latest fads seemed to originate. Seemingly exotic political causes — women’s liberation, gay rights, the fight against ageism — always seemed to get their start on the streets or in the legislatures and courts of the United States. Indians couldn’t imagine embracing all American trends — in fact, some were rejected outright — because they were too edgy for a country like India. But we had a sneaking suspicion that today’s weird California fad would become tomorrow’s conventional practice.

For me, Tuesday’s elections brought back that sense of America as the land of the future. The presidential race is being discussed as one that was “about nothing,” with no message or mandate. But that’s simply not true. Put aside the reelection of Barack Obama and consider what else happened this week:"

(See link below on a very hopeful article on what the various indicators of this amazing election may portend for our future.)

"I hesitate to build a grand narrative out of all this, but the trend seems to be toward individual freedom, self-expression and dignity for all. This embrace of diversity — in every sense — is America’s great gift to the world, one at which, since the days of J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur and Alexis de Tocqueville, foreigners have marveled.

In 1990, the neoconservative writer Ben Wattenberg wrote a book titled“The First Universal Nation,” arguing that the United States was creating something unique in history, a nation composed of all colors, races, religions and creeds, all thriving in their individualism. That diversity, he wrote, was going to be America’s greatest strength in the years ahead.

While Wattenberg’s party, the GOP, has taken to looking at this new America with anxiety and fear, he was right. What the world saw this week was a picture of America at its best: edgy, experimental, open-minded — and brilliantly diverse."