It was inauguration night; I was in New York City, prepared to fly to London for my first Europe experience.

Weeks earlier I had suddenly awoken consumed by the idea that I needed to go to Europe; I felt a bit lost in the developments across 'Western' politics and felt it was time to see for myself what was going on, to deepen my understanding of where we are and how we got here.

I watched the inauguration ceremony, a rain-soaked and gloomy-looking affair brightened only by the antics of dear old George Dubya (seriously, the man has innate comic genius).

These were the days, my friends. These were the days.

It was all still a bit surreal to take in. Had this all really happened?

I used the rest of my day in NYC to check in on my favorite sights in the city (mainly Washington Square Park), my favorite coffee shop in the city (the bean!), and one of my favorite activities- free Friday night at the Museum of Modern Art (with a featured exhibit on Russian Revolutionaries...).

Afterwards I wandered amidst midtown skyscrapers on a cloudy night: this is my happy place, underneath massive structures that make me feel small yet deeply connected to everyone and everything around these behemoths. I was in a sort of contemplative reverie, unsure of where I was headed physically or mentally.

And then I stopped.

One of the monuments, a sleek, jet-black monolith, had attracted a small crowd...along with a light police presence.

Trump Tower.

Look, no matter who you are, you have to admit...whoever designed this tower had to have been at least somewhat inspired by a lego version of an evil business tower. Impersonal, starkly angular, with the leader's name prominently displayed and now surrounded by barricades to keep us lowly citizens away. I mean...it seems almost like an architectural wink.

I stood across the street and thought, for about the millionth time since election night, about how everything had seemed to change. It was just a Presidential Election, sure. It happens every 4 years and none of them could really be said to have destroyed the nation themselves- though a few can certainly be described as 'epochal moments' in our history, and this particular election felt that way. Someone with as many publicly known misdeeds or such confused, violent rhetoric wrapped up in what was once considered an 'unpresidential' persona had never actually become President before...we have had our share of colorful characters in the oval office, but none whose full arsenal of immorality and shortcomings had been so publicly known beforehand. The change in decorum from one President to another has rarely been as pronounced in our history.

-I should take a moment here to also note that I was not a supporter of Ms. Clinton in the election, either (or in the past 20 years, for that matter). I believe I was one of many who have found some of her actions, appearances and addiction to secrecy a little unnerving over many years in the public spotlight...both major party options were a disappointment to me, as I'm afraid they were to most of the country.

With memories of the ugly election cycle still splayed across my mind, I noticed a small group of Chinese tourists near me. Their voices bubbled with excitement as they gestured and waved selfie sticks, thrilled to capture this moment in front of such an important American landmark. I watched them for a minute before full realization finally dawned on me: Donald J. Trump was now THE symbol of America to the rest of the world. This picture contained the outside perspective: that Mr. Trump isn't just a representative of American wealth and celebrity, but our government, our society, our institutions. Us.

The man who lived in a gold-plated penthouse, who made his fortune through a shady and checkered history of business dealings and public notoriety, who speaks in vulgarities and vanities now also speaks for us. I saw these foreign visitors snap picture after picture, and I couldn't help but tear up.

I know, I know. Melodramatic.

Weepy, bleeding heart liberal.

No matter where we come from or who we supported, I think we can still all agree that the last year has revealed a lot of ugly moments and scandals, real or implied, that seem to come at us non-stop. It has been easy for many of us to attack, to see Mr. Trump (or, apparently still, Ms. Clinton) as an alien boogeyman. To see the Presidency as 'stolen', our government swindled. "Not my President!" "Russian puppet!" As we embarked on this ride together, I quickly grew uncomfortable with how...easy it all seemed. Jump on social media and write a post that makes it clear we are morally superior to that repugnant man-child, to that monster, and then put #Resist and sign off back to our real lives, convinced we had just done great good in the world. It was all too easy, too clean-cut and in the end, illusory. There are some actual powerful moments and movements to come out of this past year, which has maybe made it even more seductive to feel that we are separate from the whole business, the 'real' America. Throughout it all, though, there was one fundamental truth I could not shake. One uncomfortable acknowledgement that undercut every hashtag movement and public condemnation. Something most of us want to ignore in our indignation:

We are Trump.

Deep breath.

Let's talk a little about America, first. With eyes wide open. And let us start with an important admission: none of us really have a clue what daily life was like for our 'forefathers'. None of us fought for our independence, struggled to form a constitution that bound individual states together, waged war against each other to uphold what we thought that constitution really said, built great wealth through industrial revolutions or lived carefree through a golden age before causing the near-complete collapse of our economy in 1929. None of you who read this are likely to have served during the Great Wars on the side of 'freedom' across the world, or proved yourself instrumental to the great triumph of industry during those wars. What we know of the past is preserved in snippets of writing and personal histories up to the point at which recording devices became prevalent. When we talk about our 'forefathers' or the generations afterwards, we will never truly understand the context of a country that could stand for both 'freedom' and 'slavery' at the same time, a society that could promote individual expression as well as oppression based on gender or skin color.

What we do have, for the most part, we were given. Our great wealth, our status in the world, our beautiful land. As a country we grew up in a penthouse of our own; most of us have lived our entire lives with the idea of America as the 'only Superpower', or at least the only 'Democratic Superpower'. We didn't have to fight to rise out of ignominy, or come together to form a new idea of government- we (collectively) were given the keys to the kingdom. If bankruptcy came calling, America always had a bail out. And once we realized we could borrow based on our name alone, that we could capatilize on the present by pushing off consequencies to the future (generations...), well, it was a sprint towards the cognitive dissonance of both a 20 Trillion dollar debt and status as the wealthiest country in the world.

But surely every dollar of that wealth was gained in a virtuous, honest manner, right?

Ok. So we have some history of maybe...bending rules and taking advantage of others. But we're capatalists, right? More than our government or ideals or any of that, we are the symbol of unfettered Capatalism to the world. Capatalism has no morals or compassion- it is all about winning, baby. Winning at all costs. Which in turn forms a reliance on an 'other', a sucker, a loser in the race for wealth. We built ourselves largely on the backs of an impoverished labor force in factories and fields across the country- and then, when the opportunity arose, across the world. Third world countries have made mountains of money for the American economy, in return for incremental improvement in the lives of their people (and often massive improvements for their officials). No matter what happens, we always seem to make sure that we benefit the most.

To be sure, we have done great good in the world. We give a great big dollar amount to foreign aid and charity- though as a percentage of GDP it is much, much smaller than the rest of the developed world. And when it comes down to it, our aid to the world is always tipped towards areas deemed more important to our self-interest. We'll push for democracy and an adherence to human rights...but we'll also quickly turn a blind eye to abuse if that country has the resources or political value we want. We have supported as many military coups as we have free elections, whichever happened to serve our national interest at the time. The only truly consistent American foreign policy doctrine has been 'America First'.

Our double-dealing, our ability to flip between extreme positions in our stance to the world is legendary. Look at Iran and Iraq:

We essentially took over the British Empire's influence in the region when they were kicked out of Iran and Iraq in the 1950's, mainly because we wanted to preserve access to their massive oil reserves in the face of expansionist Soviet Union.

In 1953 we covertly orchestrate a coup in Iran to oust the Prime Minister and put in place our preferred King. For the next quarter century in both countries American support was not for individual liberty or free society, but for the money we could make with their oil and the ways we could beat the Soviet Union and be the best.

In 1967 we start to give Iran all the materials they need to start their nuclear program: multiple nuclear reactors and plenty of weapons-grade, enriched uranium fuel.

In the late 70's Saddam Hussein and Ayatollah Khomeini take over Iraq and Iran respectively and almost immediately are engaged in war with each other. We choose the brutal strong-man Hussein for support and mostly ignore all human rights violations and obvious use of chemical weapons so that we can send them aid in their war effort.

By 1986 we had to admit that we were covertly selling arms to Iran, too, with the proceeds going to guerrilas across the world in Nicaragua. Thus we were giving aid to both sides of a war with an estimated one million casualities and untold atrocities. America first.

We stayed friendly with Hussein literally all the way up to the point he invaded Kuwait, then spent the next decade insuring that Iraq couldn't build up it's nuclear arsenal or attack surrounding countries. And then 9/11 happened and within weeks plans were being drawn up in the white house to invade Iraq... and also to find a reason we could use to justify an invasion of Iraq.

So we invaded Iraq, as you know, and quickly discovered there were not any weapons of mass destruction (of course) or a coherent plan for reconstruction; the country descended into complete chaos, we lost thousands of American soldiers and the Iraqis lost millions of citizens. And we gifted the perfect conditions for terrorist organizations to gain more of a footing across the area in the next dozen years.

Oh and we've spent the last decade obsessing over the Iranian nuclear program that we ourselves helped subsidize for years.

Every step along the way we acted in our own self-interest first, with little regard to the conditions on the ground for innocent men, women and children across the entire area. Because, you know, America First. And we wonder why so many there hate us...

Uploaded by mike jonez on 2016-03-11.

The point is not that the United States is a monster. We have had many failings over the years, for sure. But we've also managed to do wonderful things for the world, as well as for ourselves; we have helped promote personal liberty, we've encouraged democratic institutions and have contributed enormous material and economic resources to countries recovering from the aftermath of war and oppression. Individuals from this country have gone on to create world-changing technologies and innovative techniques to better the lives of ordinary human beings in every corner of the earth. We still have world-class universities and laboratories and art centers. We have, despite tragic cases of "Do as we say, not as we do" syndrome, managed to export many ideals across the world. I believe we have consistently had good intentions, at least on some level.

The point is- we are flawed, despite the best of intentions. We have committed catastrophic mistakes, which have always been compounded by a recurring trait: we have a hard time admitting mistakes. Admitting that we were wrong, or that we failed. Every invasion since WWII has arguably been exacerbated by an incapacity for self-honesty. We have a pathological dependency on being 'right', on being the biggest. The best. On winning. Everything else is fake news- and we will create our own reality to support this intrinsic belief...then try to force that reality upon the world. We still want to think of ourselves as the only superpower in the world, as we declared the moment the Soviet Union fell. But we never stopped to think...does the world even need a superpower?

Numbers time. Consistently in studies, we are found to rank around 24th in literacy, 25th in science and 35th in math education. We have the 31st ranked life expectancy in the world, and the 41st ranked infant mortality rate. We rate 23rd in human freedom, 48th in press freedom, 34th in health; 56th in government transparency, 76th in government waste. Our economy ranks 3rd in labor efficiency, and 9th in economic competition; we still have the top ranked nominal GDP in the world, but China has now surpassed us in purchasing power parity (we have more money, but their money buys more if that makes sense).

And, of course, we still lead the world in military spending, in rate of incarceration, and gun ownership.

Does all of that add up to 'best'? Does it need to? Am I un-American for pointing this out?

We have exported much to the world- our sense of branding, our commercialization, our entertainment industry. Much of the world wants to look American, lead the American life and buy what Americans buy. They imagine we all have great wealth and comfort, and we sure can sell the sh** out of an image. We don't make people pay hundreds of dollars for a tennis shoe because we have the finest craftsmen in the world- we charge all that money because we make it look cool and necessary. Most major cities across the world have a McDonald's now...not because it's the finest cuisine in the world, but because it's a famous brand. Like a certain well-coiffed man, we have made a fortune on our name alone. This is what the world wants- our celebrity.

The ideals we claimed to be spreading across the world, though? Sure, there have been gains made in personal freedom and human rights...though I would argue that technology has more to do with this than our own personal example. When you look across the world, how many governments do you see exactly like ours? Elements are there for sure, even in communist China...but they, along with many other nations, have found that they could take just a few elements from our model and then 'improve' upon the rest. Elections take place across the world, and in many places are run far more efficiently and smartly than our convoluted, marathon-like process. Very few countries feature only two major political parties engaged in constant battle with each other, on the brink in essentially every news cycle. There are few lobbying industries as large and complex and unregulated as ours. The amount of money poured into our politics is basically unfathomable to most countries...and the distance between citizen and those in power is nearly as expansive.

There are few if any countries that govern like we do...and when you think about it, would you actually want them to? To lurch from shutdown threat to shutdown threat simply to fund our government, to turn every single issue into a partisan divide and fight over things like whether a fact is a fact? To have 11 school shootings in four weeks and not even blink an eye because we shouldn't 'politicize' such a tragedy? Do any of us actually wish this upon the world?

So maybe we aren't a perfect paragon of freedom and justice for all. Maybe we don't exactly have the most honest and efficient form of government any more, if we ever did. I have spent time talking of how we as a country were born in a penthouse- but of course that's not true for many, many Americans. I said that we didn't have to fight to rise out of ignominy- but for many citizens, that is exactly what they have had to do. And many have been held back, obstructed by the very institutions we proclaim to be the 'best'. The battles fought in the past decades have not been physical battles against tyranny but struggles for justice against what can be a tyrannical system. As we've seen, the civil rights movement was not a short-term hike to the mountaintop but a generations-long struggle to identify the racism and bigotry that can exist even within our own minds. The enemy now, in many ways, is the system- because the system is us.

The tragedy of last year's election was not the crowning of Donald J. Trump. No.

The tragedy was that we all looked around and said "this system is broken- it no longer works for us the way it should." We agreed on this fundamental problem....yet we were so wrapped up in our own worlds of pity and anger, so eager to blame the other side and label them as 'monsters' rather than actually stop to- god forbid- listen to each other, so full of vitriol that we managed to put up the most-despised candidates in the history of elections. Of course we did. It's the most Trumpian thing- to turn the whole thing into a mud-slinging contest. We got to spend an election cycle doing what we do best- calling each other names in hyperbolic, epic fashion. Russia didn't steal an election, or rig an election. They didn't change vote totals or invent fake voters- all they did was recognize the slef-inflicted, gaping divisions already apparent and exploit them to full effect. They didn't steal our election- we lost it. Collectively.

Wrapped up in our own worlds, detached from reality; full of divisive rhetoric; an incapacity to admit failure or shortcomings; wealthy, over-leveraged and obsessed with image. With 'winning'. The United States of Trump.

But it doesn't have to be this way. You know this. I know this. Trump represents who I think we are as a country in this moment; but he does not have to represent who we are going to be in the next. The chasm that separates us was not created by him, or any other politician before him; we are the culprits. We have done this to ourselves. In the words of Edward R. Murrow, as he quoted Shakespeare: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves." As such, it is not any political party or personality who holds the key to our greatness; the key lies within each and every one of us.

If we are to be a great republic in this information age, we have to become something more: an informed and engaged electorate. Not one that is whipped up into activity for activity's sake, or in pursuit of someone else's agenda. We all enjoy access to the greatest library of information in the history of the world, and the ability to communicate with one another faster than ever before. Our potential power is immense- the MeToo movement has exposed and destroyed men in positions the old system never thought possible. But with this power comes....great...responsibility (sorry, couldn't avoid it). Responsibility to not just use it wisely but honestly.

Honesty. Stop and think about that for a moment, because it's far more difficult to comprehend than it is to read. Honesty is admitting that the loudest voice is not always the most important voice, in the world outside or in your own head. Honesty is reading an article and then assessing- Do I believe the argument because of the evidentiary truth revealed, or because I want it to be true to fit the narrative I've already formed? Honesty is confessing that you can have doubt in your belief, that the answer is not necessarily black and white. I swear to you- if we were able to let our doubt see the light of day as a society, we would instantaneously grow as close together as we've ever been. It is always weakness, and not strength, that binds people tightly.

There are four words in Mr. Trump's famous slogan: I posit that we all totally agree with the first three. Make America Great. We all want that- for ourselves, and our country. It's that fourth word that gets sticky...'Again'. Because we'll never agree on a certain point in our past when everyone in this country had equal opportunity for personal liberty and freedom. Not just a majority, or your own group; a time when every single person, regardless of color or gender or sexual orientation, had the same rights and protections. That moment is not in our past. If it exists, it doesn't exist there- it lies in our future. The shining city on the hill could indeed be something we make. But we will never make it while we chase ghosts from the past, or try to re-interpret what was said before as fuel for our own narratives; the only chance we have is to make this place together, person to person.

One week after inauguration I was in a damp Trafalgar Square. London.

I had spent hours in museum, quietly introspective and lost in my own thoughts (once again). Suddenly an old woman grabbed me and asked if I was there for the demonstration; I responded with an ".........?" Nonplussed, she pressed on into conversation. She was endearingly daffy, but also genuinely inquisitive as to just what the heck was happening in our country. Somewhat flustered, I didn't duck and dive but started answering her questions. And before I knew it I was expressing all the thoughts listed here and more; it just all poured out in what must have been jumbled fashion. I recounted history as I saw it, and the psychological ailments we've developed. I went full Old Testament Jeremaid on the sins and injustices of a nation, and the heartbreak in coming to understand this. She connected with it all, somehow.

And then she moved to say farewell, but not before she asked one more question:

"With all of this going on, do you still have hope for America?"

This should have been easy. I had just finished a diatribe on what we've become, on how insurmountable the divide felt now. My mind activated to respond with thick cynicism.

"...yeah. I do."

I almost felt like I watched myself speak, detached; it wasn't my mind, my knowledge or my reasoning that answered. For whatever reason, I opened into a pure honesty I didn't expect; the answer traveled straight from my heart to my throat and past my cracked lips. It was the truth, a truth I had seemingly buried deep within. We said farewell to each other and as soon as I turned away I broke into tears (once again).

I do believe in America. I believe in what we can stand for, what we can do together. But I'm also afraid, and daunted by the road ahead. I know we all agree that our government can and should be more efficient, more responsive, more transparent. But we are not witnessing the honest and even-handed work of consensus-building professionals in DC who have sacrificed for thorough civic duty- we are watching an indiscriminate forest fire. Families are torn apart, departments are run into the ground, world leadership is abdicated, corruption is unchecked, the legislative process is kabuki theater and twitter quotes dominate policy. I have no idea what depths each side will go to, or how real any of the nightmare scenarios truly are. None of us knows the full extent of what is happening in front of our faces.

But I know one thing for sure; no matter how long or how fearsomely a forest-fire burns, it always ends with the same result.

Something new grows.