Bob Schwartz

There are various estimates of how long it will take to rebuild American life—its economy, its culture, its society—following the ongoing attempts to tear it down and throw it back to 1913, or the Gilded Age, or whatever era is thought by some to be better (meaning: better for them). The rebuilding estimates range from a few years to a generation or more.

Those of us who believe that America is not perfect—what nation is?—but that America has generally been on the right track toward a better future, based on its core principles, shouldn’t wait.

We shouldn’t wait and don’t have to. For example, if books are banned and removed from public libraries and schools, we start our own non-public libraries and start giving away books that contain a broad view. And speaking of schools, if universities are being told by the government what to teach and what not to teach, we start our own schools, not dependent on federal funding, not to promote any particular ideology except the philosophy of openness. And so on.

Where will the resource for these initiatives come from? It might come from ordinary citizens. But it is an open secret that there are Americans with progressive leanings and vast fortunes. Let them help with the rebuilding, not later when it will be that much harder, but now when a rebuilding effort will inspire and encourage, reminding us not that there will be light at the end of a tunnel but that we are only in the tunnel if we allow ourselves to believe it.