A deficit of dreams

If I were advising the President, I would tell him that the deficit he really should be addressing is the dream deficit. We have become a nation of grim plodders, looking behind us to see if our job is still around, checking our 401ks each day, grimly watching the value of our homes turn to dust. What has happened to the hope of the presidential campaign? What has happened to the man who delivered that hope? He is so focused on getting things done, and making our expectations realistic, that he is failing to deliver the one thing we elected him for: A sense of calm and confidence, a belief that the world can be better, that we can be better.
Where did the hope go? Why doesn't he tell us that no one can predict the future, that the astronomical value of our homes was not realistic, that the exuberant bubble of the stock market was bound to burst, and that we're now in reset mode? But reset can unleash creativity, and help us think about old problems in new ways. It can change what we value and how we live our lives.
It can make us better.
If I were advising the president, I'd have him declare a one-time-only national holiday, "Chill Out Day." This would be a day for everyone to take stock, to hug their kids, and appreciate something in their lives they have not had the time to appreciate.
Then, I'd declare a month to get our national mojo back. I'd declare that no one can predict the future. That somewhere, in some obscure suburban house, some teenager is thinking a thought that may very well create a new industry. That if people rebound from terrible natural disasters, and the destruction of war, that we can rebound, too.
And I'd bring all the creative geniuses I could find and lock them into a room and ask them to brainstorm. We need new solutions. Maybe communities with neighborhoods devastated by foreclosed homes could buy those homes up cheaply with stimulus money and rent them at low rates to firemen, policemen and teachers. Maybe in exchange for affordable housing, those civil servants would accept pay cuts and help retain city jobs and services. Maybe that idea is unworkable from a zillion perspectives, but at least it would get people thinking.
Maybe this is hopelessly naive. But I would choose goofy optimism over mindless gloom. It prevents binge eating. And maybe, just maybe, it can kickstart something good.
And it seems I am not alone in these thoughts. I recommend Richard Florida's article, "How the Crash Will Reshape America" in the March issue of The Atlantic. If I were clever, I would add a link, But not being clever, I will include Florida's thoughtful, and hopeful, conclusion.

The Stanford economist Paul Romer famously said, “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” The United States, whatever its flaws, has seldom wasted its crises in the past. On the contrary, it has used them, time and again, to reinvent itself, clearing away the old and making way for the new. Throughout U.S. history, adaptability has been perhaps the best and most quintessential of American attributes. Over the course of the 19th century’s Long Depression, the country remade itself from an agricultural power into an industrial one. After the Great Depression, it discovered a new way of living, working, and producing, which contributed to an unprecedented period of mass prosperity. At critical moments, Americans have always looked forward, not back, and surprised the world with our resilience. Can we do it again?