THE LOST CORE OF AMERICAN POLITICS.

UNITED States politics & government; ETHNICITY; EMIGRATION & immigration; LEADERSHIP; POLITICAL science

The article discusses the lost core of American politics. It is the Holy Grail of American politics. The Archimedean, point at which North, South, East, and West; men and women; urban and suburban; left and right; and race and ethnicity are in harmonious political balance. It is the fulfillment of the modern alchemist's dream of transmutation--of views into votes, and political conflicts into public consensus. It is the political center, which is increasingly difficult to discern, much less to lead from, in contemporary American politics. The past decade has brought unprecedented levels of immigration and with it rising levels of public concern, coupled with some very profound questions about what it means to be, or become an American. Leadership in times of deep national divisions requires leaders of a particular kind: those who have both courage and convictions; who are not afraid to raise and honestly answer difficult political questions, and make these honest answers the basis of their leadership.