Built on Hope

I wanted to do something a little different for this and (hopefully) make a shorter, more digestible post. Because comprehension is on the decline and satire feels less and less like an absurd reality and more like our current one, I wanted to preface this by saying this is meant to be halfway tongue in cheek. It’s an impossible task to do an actual ranking without making some wildly insensitive assumptions, so let’s keep it light, have some fun, and dive into some half-baked analysis of our country. I’m sure no one will have strong opinions about this whatsoever.

5. 1876 – 1926

Notable Figures: Teddy Roosevelt, John Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Susan B. Anthony, Alexander Graham Bell

Rolling in at number 5, the period from 1876-1926 feels like there is nothing overwhelmingly good about it. Post-Civil War, the tail end of Reconstruction, it feels like a pretty dead half-century. It brought about the Jim Crow era and the idea that someone can be a fraction of a person. But hey Henry Ford invented a new way for men to mask their insecurities, so I feel like that balances out, right? America establishes itself as a serious global player through the Spanish-American war, gets credit for the group project they coasted through in WWI, and sprinkled in some voting rights for women with the spare time they had in brief prosperity in the Roaring 20s. It’s not a terrible era, but comparatively, there are just better ones. Not even electing Teddy Roosevelt president (a phenomenal man and still only the second best Roosevelt) can carry this time period.

4. 1976 – 2026

Notable Figures: Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates (Where are all the women?)

This will probably be my most controversial take. How can I list our current half-century so low? Truth be told I would’ve ranked it last if this era didn’t have a ripple effect for our future the size of our solar system.

We could talk about how every major financial gap and issue that currently exists can be attributed back to Reagan and his oft cited, never proven trickle down economic theory. Thanks Gipper.

We could talk about how unlike almost every other era in our country’s history, the impact was mostly shaped by people with money.

We could talk about the rise of the Internet and era of the Smartphone, an important detail because how else would I type this and pretend that people are reading and responding to it?

A lot of dumb wars for a lot of dumb reasons, the ensuing xenophobia, catering to the upper class, a rejection of intellectualism, an insurrection, a once in a century pandemic that people deny was real, artificial intelligence proving that said people have no idea what’s actually real, and a lot of shameless grifting that comes with every major technology boom.

Oh yeah, and podcasts. Everyone thinks they can make a podcast. The biggest sin of these 50 years is convincing people that everything they have to say is worth saying on a platform. I mean who would think that anyone would care about what you have to say just because you took the time to put something out there?

Delusional fools.

3. 1776 – 1826

Notable Figures: Lin-Manuel Miranda

It gave us the key historical figure that sparked a play that my wife became obsessed with almost 10 years after it was first created.

I guess the founding of the nation was good too.

2. 1826 – 1876

Notable Figures: Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt (not a president this time), Ulysses S. Grant, John Brown, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass

Truth be told, I don’t think I could put the era that abolished slavery any lower than number two. Not that I would’ve ranked it lower anyway!

I mean, think about it. In the research I did leading up to this (me disassociating to the sound of fireworks exploding and imagining how poorly this will be received and still deciding to do it anyway), as I made the list I realized how diverse this era really was.

The American Frontier with the Manifest Destiny mandate from God, the Gold Rush, the birth of the American Railroad to give every neurodivergent in the future a hyperfixation they can’t quit, the Industrial Revolution so we could finally put these children in the mines where they truly yearned for and belonged.

And not to mention the Underground Railroad and the fight for slavery from secessionists in the south.

The end of the Civil War was a tragic historical milestone in our country’s history, but thankfully the right side came out on top and we were able to begin to make right for African-Americans who had endured hardships beyond measure.

If only we had punished those dweebs in the Confederacy more for their crimes, then maybe we wouldn’t have all of these secret white hoods popping up all bold-like online and in our streets and staffing our government and…what’s that? Huh? The CIA is on the phone? Tell them I’ll be right there.

5. 1926 – 1976

The era that, as the kids say, did the most, we top this list with what I would consider the greatest 50 years of consequence in our nation’s history. Every decade was just banger after banger.

The Roaring 20s hurtling straight into the Great Depression and stock market crash.

Electing a socialist president and him being the most beloved and successful leader EVER.

Entering WWII and defeating fascism and emerging as one of two global superpowers.

Making up some of our own fascist villains and campaigns to keep running it back and the momentum going.

We gave rights to women. We gave rights to workers. We gave rights to black people in the Civil Rights Movement. We had so many rights to just dole out to everyone.

We landed on the freaking moon and bankrupted our only competition on a global scale in Russia.

We protested and fought for the dignity of just about every single type of person in this country and it actually worked.

And we did it all while developing arguably the greatest and most revolutionary period for art and music (using the most amount of drugs in the process), and by taxing the rich at 90%!

There truly wasn’t anything this era could not do. It should have been the precursor for another 50 years of success and prosperity, but we all know why that’s not the case (see “Reagan” above). And that’s why it stands atop the list as the best.

---

In conclusion, a nation that lasts for 250 years or more typically sees its fall from grace as an empire, and while that feels true more often than not most days, the remarkable truth is that we’re still fighting. Because one of the things that makes me truly proud to be American is the idea that there is no battle too large, too imposing, too painful that would ever cause us to give up. Similar to the century before this one, I think there is a real opportunity to create the success and growth people pine for when they say they want to make this nation great again. The answer doesn’t lie in the past though. It’s in our present and the actions we take everyday to pick each other up, fight for the common good, and reject the manipulation of the rich to pit us against each other.

Thank you all for reading.

You can follow my page on Facebook here or on Tumblr @built-on-hope-blog.

P.S. – Sorry I couldn’t follow through on making a short post. I’m just not built that way. See you all for the next one. And remember:

HOPE IS THE REBELLION