Jay Sexton

This is a very unique take on American history in that it shows that the nation was created not on values and progress alone but forged in the fire of crisis. From the very beginning the author states that the US is now in a time of crisis and that 9/11, the wars in the Middle East, the 2008 financial crisis, and the dramatic swings of electoral politics from Obama to Trump are leading to a tipping point were the US will succeed or fail. It is not mistake that I decided to listen to this audiobook during the COVID-19 pandemic. America and the world is sacrificing a lot in an effort to save lives. Over 100,000 are dead around the world and the US has no leadership at home let alone abroad. The author mentions that in such a time of crisis it is tempting to reflect on progress and prosperity, when it is in fact the crisis of the past that we should reflect on. His first focus is on the American Revolution of the 1780s or what he calls the Anglo-American Civil War, which is a better name and describes the nature of it far better. It, like almost every civil war in history, had a third party intervene, France. Patriot forces would have not succeeded had it not been for the French. The second crisis was the slavery question and the civil war of the 1860s. A unique perspective on that crisis is that no other foreign power attempted to influence one side or the other. After the civil war the Anglo-American 'special relationship' was cemented through the power elite in the Gilded Age. In the third crisis, that of the "second thirty years war" for 1914-1945, the US would come to the aid of Britain and France. As a result of our intervention we became the global superpower. In this new age of crisis the author says "the more we look outward the more prepared we will be."… (meer)