The Precarious Path to Unity

From 9/11 to 1/6 and beyond, creating a more unified America will be a rocky road, but a necessary one to fulfill the nation's promise

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Reflecting on Sept. 11, 2001 yesterday, I was reminded of that brief, shining moment—amid the horror—when it was possible to visualize a unified America. (Ironically, it may be a headline in the French daily, Le Monde, which best captured the mindset: “We Are All Americans.”) The subsequent weeks and months would reveal the inevitable fractures, particularly as some Americans began scapegoating Muslims and President George Bush decided to exploit the tragic attack to wage war against Saddam Hussein and Iraq.

But these days the notion of a unified America appears increasingly beyond our grasp. This is no better demonstrated than by our failure to unify following the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol—an event that should have led an overwhelming majority, including Republicans, to reject extremism, oppose political violence and loudly assert their belief in the sacred transfer of power by peaceful means.

When Joe Biden energetically advocated for unity while running for president and continued this call in his inaugural address, it sounded almost anachronistic, as if he were addressing some long-lost era, a time in which the American Dream was a real promise and the very idea of a “United” States of America did not demand to be dissected or promoted. "With unity we can do great things, important things," Biden said in his inaugural. “Without unity, there is no peace. Only bitterness and fury. No progress, only exhausting outrage. No nation, only a state of chaos…unity is the path forward."

I won’t detail here the aggressive, compulsive, violent effort to sow division and hatred by the previous occupant of the White House. Clearly, by the time Biden strolled up Pennsylvania Avenue after Donald Trump jetted off to south Florida and Mar-a-Lago, the country’s divisions were looking increasingly irreparable. Indeed, I have been struck by the vicious response to the president’s efforts to define the “soul of the nation,” address the dangers to democracy and brand the angry minority that is wedded to Trump as anti-democratic MAGA Republicans and even semi-fascists.

I know, I know. I shouldn’t be surprised, given the cult-like mentality in which they hail their leader no matter what he does. They have been convinced that political violence is justified to get and keep power, and insist that disagreeing Democrats are nothing less than “libtards” or “socialists” or “commies”—whatever these mean beyond empty insult—who possess low IQ and suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome.

As we have learned in the refusal of many to acknowledge the deadly danger of COVID-19 and get vaccinated, the narrative that drives them and unites them in opposition is worth dying for (except for the occasional sad, too-late deathbed conversion). The FBI search at Mar-a-Lago a month ago and even the news that agents were retrieving carelessly stored, highly classified compartmented documents seems to have only intensified their commitment to stand by their man and condemn federal authority.

But this riled-up MAGA group was not who Biden was talking to in Philadelphia on Sept. 1 in front of Independence Hall. He was focused on the Republicans still capable of seeing the theft of classified documents as a national security breach dangerous for America and bad for the world. He was speaking to those Republicans who, as the crimes become clearer and (let’s hope) indictments begin to accelerate, will recognize that they need to jump off the Trump train careening toward disaster. In his speech, Biden was envisioning a path toward unity by cleaving off this group from the extremists in their neighborhood, their churches, their school board meetings and all over social media.

Linger on Biden’s words here—an olive branch to those still capable of reason:

Too much of what’s happening in our country today is not normal. Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic. Now, I want to be very clear, very clear up front. Not every Republican, not even the majority of Republicans, are MAGA Republicans. Not every Republican embraces their extreme ideology. I know, because I’ve been able to work with these mainstream Republicans. But there’s no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans. And that is a threat to this country.

I believe Biden is right. All is not lost and most Americans—even most Republicans—do not prefer to live in a world of violence, chaos and extremism, a world in which the fundamental act of voting is dangerous and riddled with doubt. The off-ramp he was proposing heads back toward greater unity.

But I’m not naive. MAGA leaders like Trump, Steve Bannon and their fellow grifters don’t want unity. They want clear villains to con their followers into handing over their money. Even as the vise tightens and indictments and prosecutions come, their followers don’t want to be told that they were wrong all along. That’s why the coming months and years will be combustible. But come hell or high water, it’s clear that the only real way forward—which requires holding the top criminals accountable—is through the fire.

It’s intolerable to think there’s no path to a more unified country. This would mean that the MAGA grifters have succeeded in accelerating the divisions for their own advantage and the idea of a unified America has become too broken to repair—too impossible to pursue, let alone achieve. Neither is there wisdom in imagining that American unity has ever been fully realized; the democratic experiment has always only included some Americans and left others outside the fence looking in.

Too often, I hear Democrats insist that they’re done with all Republicans, that they have abandoned American democracy and they are not about to welcome them back. What I hear them saying is they’ve given up on the possibility of unity. But I believe, beyond the heat of this most fractious, poisonous period, most Democrats will welcome wayward Republicans back into the American family. But that future will demand traveling on a precarious path, not for the faint-hearted, the intransigent or those who never fully embraced what “We the People” really means.

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