Stand Up For It!

In a recent print conversation between NYT columnists, conservative Bret Stephens, who calls himself “a law and order guy,” and liberal Frank Bruni, discussed the cruelty on display in Minneapolis and the shooting of Renee Good.

Stephens did not dismiss the horror, but stressed that America has endured worse moments. Bruni’s response to this caught my attention: “‘We’ve survived a lot worse’ sounds increasingly to me like a psychic binky—more pacifier than reality check.” He described himself as saddened and disturbed by how easily Americans comfort themselves with historical reassurances. Even Stephens conceded that, left unchecked, the ICE cruelty on display “ends in a police state.”

Much of their exchange centered on where to pin responsibility for the shooting and for ICE’s abuses. Trump was fingered, of course, as was JD Vance and Kristi Noem, but both columnists also blamed Democrats: If they weren’t so feckless, Trump might never have been elected in the first place.

This is a familiar argument, but misses something essential. Yes, national Democratic leaders are inept and the Republican Congress is cowardly, but in the end We the People bear the ultimate responsibility. As the saying goes, every nation has the government it deserves.

In my book, When We The People Lead, I argue that America’s principal problem is not polarization or even cruel and ineffective political parties. Those are real enough, but the deeper crisis is the disengagement and exhaustion of millions of Americans in the face of a system that does not work. If We the People do not cause a course correction, no one else will.

The majority of Americans are tired and are not rising to the moment or setting things right.

Exhaustion is not laziness; it is an entirely predictable political condition in a country marked by extreme inequality, radicalized politics, and a pervasive spiritual malaise. That exhaustion is exploitable—and it is being exploited.

One form of exhaustion shows up in our low rate of voting. Even in high‑turnout years, only about two‑thirds of eligible Americans cast ballots in national elections, and participation falls sharply in off‑year and local contests. Among younger voters, turnout often drops well below half. Many people who do vote otherwise live as spectators—outraged and informed, but disconnected from meaningful action. In the book and in talks about it, I emphasize that voting is not enough to preserve democracy. It is necessary, but our times call for far more.

In my book, I draw on Jon Alexander’s Subject–Consumer–Citizen model, from his book Citizens. In talks, I ask audiences which role our culture most encourages us to play: Obedient Subjects, self-focused Consumers, or involved Citizens? People answer instantly: Some say Trump wants us to be Subjects, others that consumerism seduces us into the role of Consumers. Almost no one says our culture calls us to be Citizens, and most have only a hazy idea of what that would mean in practice.

In my book, I write that when democracy is healthy, we must be shepherds and gardeners, but when it’s wounded, citizens must become fighters and healers. Clearly this is a time to fight. The people peacefully protesting ICE activities in Minneapolis illustrate what this looks like.

Recently, the Episcopal bishop of New Hampshire, Rt. Rev. Rob Hirschfeld, spoke at a vigil for Renee Good in language that a year ago would once have seemed unthinkable. He urged his clergy to prepare for sacrifice: to put their affairs in order, even to write their wills, because the moment demands more than rhetoric. “The time for statements is over,” he said. “We must be willing, with our bodies, to stand between the powers of this world and the most vulnerable.” His appeal was not to violence, but to conscience—yet it shows how much the ground beneath American democracy has shifted.

Democracy, I have come to believe, erodes from the bottom up as much as from the top down. The most dangerous pattern is not what autocrats and parties do, but what ordinary citizens fail to do—our refusal to engage in the everyday work of local civic life. That must change. Get your affairs in order. If you cannot yet bring yourself to stand up for the Renee Goods of the world, then at least stand up for yourself. Do you value freedom? Then stand up for it.