As often noted, every now and then I run across an editorial that strikes me as profoundly insightful, uniquely creative, or just a better way to say what I’m thinking. Perhaps each of these is true in the recent words of author Peggy Noonan.
Let me first say, as that semi-humble current events observer, I have the utmost respect for Noonan. She is an American author who has written several books on politics, religion, and culture. She has served previously as both a commentary writer for Dan Rather at CBS News and a speech writer for Ronald Reagan in the White House. Her words, in fact, after the space shuttle Challenger’s explosion — drawing upon the poet John Magee’s famous words about aviators who “slipped the surly bonds of earth… and touched the face of God” — is considered one of the best American political speeches of the 20th century. Noonan excels at articulating the heart of the matter.
Last week in her weekly column for the Wall Street Journal, Noonan reflected on the lack of strong leadership in the world today. She called it a “world in crisis” with “no genius in sight.”
Isn’t that part of the challenge these days? We crave authentic, wise, shepherding leadership; and yet it’s rare. Strong personalities, extensive resumes, and extraordinary talent are not enough; we crave something better and more.
For Noonan, this observation was most recently spurred on by what happened in Great Britain and the European Union — with Britain exiting the EU. She writes:
“The leaders of the world aren’t a very impressive group right now. There’s a sense with some of them of playing out a historical or cultural string, that they’re placeholders in some way. Many are young, yet so much around them feels tired.
Which has me thinking, again, of the concept of the genius cluster. They happen in history and no one knows why. It was a genius cluster that invented America. Somehow Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Adams, Madison, Hamilton, Jay and Monroe came together in the same place at the same time and invented something new in the history of man. I asked a great historian about it once. How did that happen? He’d thought about it too. ‘Providence,’ he guessed.
There was a small genius cluster in World War II — FDR, Churchill, de Gaulle. I should note I’m speaking of different kinds of political genius. There was a genius cluster in the 1980s — John Paul II, Reagan, Thatcher, Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa, Lee Kuan Yew in his last decade of leadership in Singapore.
The military genius cluster of World War II — Marshall, Eisenhower, Bradley, Montgomery, Patton, MacArthur, Nimitz, Bull Halsey, Stilwell — almost rivaled that of the Civil War — Grant, Lee, Stonewall, Sherman, Sheridan, Longstreet.
Obviously genius clusters require deep crises, otherwise their gifts are not revealed. Historic figures need historic circumstances. Also members of genius clusters tend to pursue shared goals.
We have those conditions now — the crises, and what should be shared goals.
Everything feels upended, the old order that has governed things for 70 years since World War II being swept away. Borders have disappeared before our eyes. Terrorism, waves of immigration transforming whole nations, Islam at war with itself and parts of it at war with the world. In the West, the epochal end of public faith in institutions, and a dreadful new tension between the leaders and the led. In both background and foreground is a technological revolution that has actually changed how people experience life.
It is a world crying out for bigness, wisdom, steady hands and steady eyes.
We could use a genius cluster.
I’m not quite seeing its members coming, are you? Maybe they’re off somewhere gaining strength. But the point we’re in feels more like what a Hollywood director said was the central tension at the heart of all great westerns: ‘the villain has arrived while the hero is evolving.’
Let’s hope some evolve soon.”
Yes, let’s hope.
Respectfully… and a Happy 4th…
AR