The nightly news brings up thoughts of Wilder and his firm optimism in the human capacity for avoiding species disaster "by the skin of our teeth." Each year this optimism strikes me as harder to defend. I like Wilder, in my book his work still stands despite the optimism, which is out of fashion, but the case for the cynics does appear to get stronger. We are forever creating new problems from well-meaning solutions. We decide to make fuel from corn -- and contribute to a food shortage. 25 years ago a report documents the failure of American education -- and now a new report says, despite all the money to inaugurate improvement, we're even worse than before. Corporations wave American flags and claim patriotism while moving jobs overseas, even critical airline maintenance jobs. Your computer breaks down and you deal with someone in India whose English accent you may or may not be able to understand. We, who led the fight to save the world from Hitler, are "world leaders" in almost nothing, although political leaders like to posture, and alas even act, as if we were.
World history is driven by the rise and fall of global powers. Maybe it's just our turn to fall. I wonder what Wilder would say today.
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