Jason posted an excerpt from an interview in Mother Jones with Tony Kushner. This got my dander up a bit, and it has been a point that has been made by many in the media recently. Here is the excerpt:

There are a lot of politically active young people, but I feel that we've misled them. I have great admiration for the essayists and writers on the left, but the left decided at some point that government couldn't get it what it wanted. As a result, it's a movement of endless complaint and of a one-sided reading of American history, which misses the important point: Constitutional democracy has created astonishing and apparently irreversible social progress. All we're interested in is talking about when government doesn't work.

I think it is a valid argument to claim that things have gotten better over the past two centuries. Progress has been made. This fact cannot, and should not be avoided. However, this simple fact does not discount that there are injustices in the world or that there are people in power who corrupt and are corrupted. The fact that things are better does not negate the problems that still exist. Because black people can vote does not nullify racism in this country, and the fact that woman can serve in the army does not nullify sexism. To turn away from the injustices in our society and state that "All we're interested in is talking about when government doesn't work" is a simplistic and dismissive attitude. Is the idea of a successful society based on the principle that things are good enough? Do we turn a blind eye because things are better then they were fifty years ago? Is this not analogous to the idea that medical care has improved over the past hundred years, but all people want to talk about is incurable cancer.

We should be proud of the accomplishments of our past. However, democracy and freedom are not a product of complacency or ambivalence. It is the people who stood up against public opinion to fight for what they believe is right, who pushed against the inertia of the status quo that allows us to live in one of the greatest democracies in the world. Progress is not achieved by mulling over the accomplishments of the past and ignoring the problems of the present and the future. We must be mindful of the issues of our times, and to imply that there are none, or that discussing them is "a movement of endless complaint" is foolishness at best.