We can extrapolate from this Tweet for hours, but I think it brings up a very relevant discussion that we are not having enough of.
Many modern commentators of American life discuss or at least mention political polarization and how it's harmful for us, democracy, and the country in general. However, what most of these discussions is missing, is how and why polarization persists and what it does to preserve power.
In the US, we mobilize around everything. We create sides and choose on every single issue you can think of and our political media sources discuss it and further politicize it. The Right and Left (made-up) binary is used to categorize all opinions about anything, and subversion is hardly tolerated if you self-proclaim your identity and membership to one or the other.
The US also self-promotes among its citizens as being the most advanced and modern nation on the planet, but this fallacy has enabled meaningless political dispute under the sense of entitlement that "we are so ahead, we can afford to create arguments for fun." Here, we have some of the richest individuals in the world, who are in fact embarking on the most advanced and modern endeavors in the world--for themselves and capital accumulation. This should be very clear and distinct from being a "modern" nation, because unlike a suspension monorail train, Richard Branson going to space doesn't help very many people live better, more convenient lives currently (even though some may make the argument that such innovations eventually will).
Presenting moral issues as political charges the discussion, and takes away from democracy. We have mastered this in the US, as most of the political disputes that occur are rooted in moral discrepancies and gaps in people's awareness when it comes to experiences different from their own. We know that the US is a much more diverse country than almost any country in the world, which is inevitably accompanied with diverse opinions. The main dilemma in the US is that we have very homogenous leadership and power distribution, despite an extremely varied distribution of cultures, ethnicities, religions, etc. While it is easier to govern a more homogenous society with a more homogenous government, with power comes responsibility, and in the US, we have the responsibility to reflect the citizens in our government if we are the democracy we claim to be.
Now without diving deep into the dark and evil, violent, exclusive, white-supremacist history of the US, it's important to address and adjust to what history has taught us if we actually want to transcend the freedoms of prior decades for everyone. This includes innovation, agreeing on launching infrastructure projects, and executing them. Unfortunately, this process is incredibly difficult to achieve because we are always stuck in the early stages of deciding if this hypothetical bullet train is aligned with the political agendas of left and right and the interests of large corporations.
Meanwhile, while the hypothetical train discussion is boring the rest of us, we are caught up arguing over more pressing, life or death issues like police and racial violence and murder--as we should. An infrastructure project seems insignificant compared to what's impacting people's right to safety. It's incredibly difficult for people to have the time and energy to focus on such collective innovations when they are still advocating and fighting for the bottom tiers on the hierarchy of need. Plus, issues like police violence must become politicized for people to gain wide recognition and for progress to be achieved, and this is where the true argumentation only begins.
When people feel safe, healthy, and heard, this is where innovation for the common good will actually begin to thrive. There will be failures and successes, but if everyone is contributing to these innovations, systems and infrastructure will be proliferated for collective well-being, not just that one group or 1 billionaire.
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