Summary

The article advocates for embracing the concept of "The Restoration" as a unifying theme for the post-Trump era in America, focusing on collective healing and progress.

Abstract

The author of the article suggests that the period following the Biden presidency's commencement should be termed "The Restoration," reflecting a collective desire to recover and rebuild after a tumultuous period in American history. This era of restoration encompasses the revival of decency, truth, justice, the economy, and leadership. Despite the significant challenges faced, including a divided nation, systemic issues, and the aftermath of the Trump presidency, the author posits that a shared commitment to restoration can serve as a powerful narrative to unite citizens and guide the nation through recovery. The article emphasizes the importance of this concept in countering the spread of misinformation and fostering a sense of collective responsibility and optimism for the future.

Opinions

The author believes that naming the current era "The Restoration" can help shape a positive national narrative and guide the nation's recovery efforts.
President Joe Biden's consistent message of restoration throughout his campaign resonated with voters, leading to his historic electoral victory.
The deep political and cultural divisions in the U.S. present significant obstacles to the envisioned restoration, exacerbated by the widespread belief in the "Big Lie" of a stolen election.
The author, identifying as an "ad guy," acknowledges the power of marketing in promoting big ideas and suggests that "The Restoration" can be a marketable concept to rally the public.
The article contrasts the current need for gradual recovery with the immediate celebratory moments of past historical events, such as the end of World War II.
The author views the restoration as not just a return to past values but also an opportunity to replace outdated systems with better ones.
The narrative of "The Restoration" is seen as a positive force to combat the growing threat of right-wing extremism and institutionalized racism, drawing parallels with historical events like the Southern Lost Cause mythology.
Recent positive developments, such as the distribution of Covid vaccines, bipartisan support for Biden's economic rescue plan, and speculation about an economic boom, are cited as signs of a thaw in the nation's "pandemic winter of discontent."
The author encourages readers to actively use the term "The Restoration" in their communications, hoping that widespread adoption could turn the idea into a self-fulfilling prophecy for national renewal.

The Restoration

Here’s an idea that just might make our hope for better days ahead a self-fulfilling prophecy.

There’s something in us that likes to name historical eras, at least the big ones.

The Kennedy administration became Camelot in our collective memory. The American Civil War was followed by Reconstruction. Hear the word “Victorian” and it’s easy to conjure up images of laced-up corsets and drafty houses with colorful paint, even if you don’t know much about the monarch who presided over the high water mark of the British Empire.

Assigning a name to an era is probably something best left to historians. But I’m going to go out on a limb here as a lowly ad guy. We should get a jump on history and call the period that lies just ahead of us The Restoration. We should start doing this now.

Think of it as Babe Ruth pointing to the left field fence before knocking a ball into the bleacher seats. Better yet, think of it as a bit of perceptive marketing.

Restoration is the new U.S. President’s word, not mine. From the early days of his run for the Oval Office Joe Biden talked about restoring what we’ve lost as a nation. Restoring decency. Restoring truth. Restoring justice. Restoring the economy. Restoring leadership.

To the astonishment of many a prognosticator the formerly gaff-prone candidate stuck like Super Glue to his message through a wild election season populated by two dozen primary challengers and one power-crazed sitting president. Biden won with the most votes ever cast in a presidential election.

So we have clarity here. Restoration is what the people want.

But it won’t be that easy. On his way to getting beat Donald Trump also piled up an impressive vote total. The second-highest in presidential history. There’s a massive cultural and political flywheel spinning in the opposite direction of anything we might come to see as an era of restoration. It doesn’t help that many of these Republican voters have hook-line-and-sinker swallowed the toxic fiction that Trump won, and by a landslide.

We’ve spent years digging the nation into an abyss. No one could have predicted the crisis mash-up of the year just past, but something on that order of magnitude has been a long time coming. Most sane people knew if a real crisis arrived during the Trump presidency his chaotic, self-absorbed management style would send it spinning wildly out of control.

And so it did, exponentially.

None of the calamities we face, the pandemic, the wrecked economy, the systemic racism, the Trumpism that continues to gnaw at the bones of our democracy, none of this lends itself to any clear-cut sense of resolution. We are unlikely to see a bright moment like when World War II ended and we got the iconic photo of a sailor kissing his girl in the middle of Times Square. This time around we may not even know exactly when it’s safe to enter Times Square without wearing a cloth mask.

A Biden victory was supposed to bring a period of national healing, and I hope it will. But it’s going to take time. The sort of time that doesn’t fit neatly into our obsession with the next news cycle. In a lot of ways the promised healing is going to feel more like a recovery from stage-three cancer. Fragile and exhausted from the treatment regimen. Left with a deep, nagging fear it might come back.

All of this is why we need the promise of The Restoration. Not as an end to be described by some far-off future historian, but as a shared task for right now. An organizing idea for the hard work ahead.

Like I said, I’m an ad guy not a historian, and I’m certainly no policy expert. I can’t tell you what mix of programs might work best to solve the nation’s problems. Or how we ought to pay for them. Or what exactly we should restore, and what needs to be replaced with something better. But I do know how to find markets for good ideas, and create momentum for them in the mass culture. That’s the power of a big emotional theme like The Restoration.

It’s a message that we’re all a part of something bigger. Of the many things that need restoring right now, the most important may be a renewed sense of “us” and our collective responsibility to one another.

It’s a useful counter to The Big Lie of a stolen election. If we don’t pay attention, that dangerous bit of nonsense threatens to metastasize into something far worse — an enduring mythology that could fuel the growing darkness and violence on the far right in the same way the fiction of a Southern Lost Cause once served those working to institutionalize racism.

The Restoration even comes to us from the mists of history with a positive vibe. Originally it was the name given to the return of a relatively benign English monarchy following the ruthlessly puritanical regime of Oliver Cromwell.

In other words, it’s a narrative that can help advance the things we need to accomplish as a nation right now. And while there may be some hubris in describing an era that’s only just begun, there’s also advantage in riding the positive momentum that we see beginning to build.

The government is governing. Covid vaccines are slowly making their way into the arms of the general public. More than three-quarters of independents and four in 10 Republicans join nearly every Democrat in supporting Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion economic rescue plan. That feels like a critical mass of us all putting our shoulders to the same wheel. Economists are beginning to speculate that instead of the halting recovery we got after the last economic train wreck, the coming years may feel more like a high-octane boom. As I write this, Covid case numbers have been falling. Thing are beginning to open up. Who knows, maybe before too much more time passes you and I might find ourselves in the same bar raising a celebratory glass.

All this good news might not add up to one shining moment of victory, but it does feel like a real thaw is coming to our long pandemic winter of discontent. There’s an energy in a moment like that — political, economic, cultural, emotional, spiritual. Calling it out as The Restoration puts a handle on that energy, and makes it a part of a larger narrative we can all engage with.

Give the words a try in your own writing. In conversations. In social media. The Restoration, however you want to describe it. Share this essay around if you think that might get some wheels turning. Let’s see how far we can push the idea out into the world. So many dark impulses have been weaponized by people of bad intent. Misinformation. Dishonesty. Grievance. It’s time to see what happens when we put that sort of firepower behind a little optimism.

We could all use a little restorative energy in our lives right now. In our economy. In our politics. In our hope for this particular moment of history. If enough of us say it out loud, it might just become a self-fulfilling prophecy.