Peggy Noonan should cheer up

I'm a big fan of Peggy Noonan. Her stark realism and unique perspective make for fascinating reading. However, for all that I claim to be a pessimist, I think she goes a bit too far. (in case the link dies before you read this, she tells of a gloomy New York now that the financial economy has effectively been nationalized, and goes on to compare the attitude of Capt. Sully who landed his disabled passenger jet on the Hudson to that of Ms. Sulley who felt it was okay to have eight kids in addition to her first 6 and raise them all on food stamps.)

I think we will call the 1990s and first decade of this century a "not my problem" period of American history. Our schools push actual education up the pipeline, to the point college professors have to teach basic grammar to sophomores at teir-one universities. Many engineering programs now do as much as possible as "group projects" that shield underperforming students from their day of reckoning. Now immigration barriers seem to be going up to sheild us from "job stealers" who might exploit a free market to lower costs. Securitization separated the originators of loans from their performance. We invaded two countries and cut taxes so that only our volunteer military force felt the pinch. The great trend in almost all "progress" of the GE/Disney type has been to isolate us from people with safer cars, larger houses and gismos that do work which used to fall to human hands (and still does where domestic service is cheap).

There are two things that give me a lot of hope going forward, however. The first is that prosperity is increasingly being redefined by ability to interact, rather than isolate. The most popular video game system in the world is at its best in parties. Social networking is a major growth field, allowing people to connect and stay connected in ways that provide impressive new capabilities for those willing to exploit them. Cell phones, already the most popular piece of technology around the world, move capabilities that used to tie people to their desks into social spaces. Netbooks are accelerating this trend by putting enough computing power to do any office task in a low-cost, highly portable laptop that can, and does, help plan events on the fly. The era of the Fourth Screen promises more time in social spaces.

Internationally, our hope is the rise of the middle class around the world. As countries need examples of how to lift themselves out of poverty, their examples right now are Europe, which is in a deepening hole; China, who's in more trouble than us; and the US. China and Russia may well end up in another border war, probably near some pipelines or gas fields, since China needs to burn off extra male population and Russia needs higher gas and oil prices. Europe is set for a real mess as populists on the right and left attack centrist governments that brought them greater economic integration without the political will to spread the pain around (Germany may end up simply buying Greece and Spain, and deploying troops as necessary). The only example of a large, diversified, domestic-and-export economy with capacity for business creation in both services and manufacturing is the United States. We overstretched, and intentionally let ourselves believe blatant falsehoods (like: always appreciates!) while being incredibly innovative in finding ways to channel the buckets of money the world was pouring on us. In other words, we did what we do best here too well, and the rest of the world responded to us acting like drunken sailors by chanting "chug! chug!".

More importantly, the future of the country lies not in the hands of the sheltered, but the aggressive. Despite their best efforts, the "insiders" of the major parties could not secure their party's nomination in the face of aggressive campaigns by "insurgents" (in how many other countries could that happen? hint, it's a nice round number). Most credit unions are running full-court-press marketing to grab the best consumer and commercial loans that the big banks can't make today because they're model of lend-and-sell has failed. Ivy league engineering students are going into engineering, where they will be forced to make something of intrinsic (new products, applications, etc) instead of notional value (like CDOs, CDS's, etc*). There is one place in the world right now with the strategic depth, capacity for innovation and appetite for risk to take the lead on issues like moving towards a post-oil world, climate change and global migration. Things are bad, and will continue to be bad for another couple of years, but our tolerance for Octomoms, whether they stay at home or run money-center banks, is slim.

Even the latest stimulus package is a good example of this. Yes, it utterly reeks of Democrat triumphalism, and further proves that the GOP's best friend is Nancy Pelosi, but give it points for chutzpa. Given the opportunity to undo the vaguely Republican-friendly things that have dominated Federal spending since 1996ish, they seized the bull by the horns and did their best to undo it all within three weeks of the arrival of a friendlier White House. For their overstep, they can expect to be thrown out of office by the first intelligent and aggressive Republican to put together a real alternative vision for the country (no, "um . . . Cut taxes again!" doesn't count, but Manzi's on the right track). This country survives and thrives because of the indomitable dynamism that has made our shores the destination for the tired, poor, talented, and ambitious masses yearning to breath free.

We'll be fine.