The Right cannot give credence to its claims of American Exceptionalism while it laments our decline. By reaching for an imaginary unspoiled past, the Right reveals that it never valued the march of progress that defines American history. If the Right cannot honor the progress that the country has made, it cannot claim to believe in and seek progress for the future. But what is American Exceptionalism if not an unfailing belief in our ability to achieve progress, and even greatness, through ingenuity, hard work, and the wealth of natural resources and beauty that we have been graced with? Conservatism is laid bare as a pessimistic ideology that refuses to believe that our society has evolved for the better and will continue to do so.

There is a revolution taking place in running. A man heal-struck his way to New Balance headquarters. Alarmed, the executives who were gathered around the drawing board of their latest market driven innovation turned and demanded of the new arrival, "A revolt?"

"No gentlemen", the messenger panted, "A revolution".

There is no time to incrementally drop the heal, and haltingly talk back 30 years of claims of shock absorption and pronation control. Instead the only option is a non-shoe. Take away the heal and let the people forefoot strike. Let them naturally land with leg under the center of mass. Let the bent knee cushion the impact. And let the foot do as it was designed to do.

History has a beauty to it. The investigation and theorizing that falls under the category of "punditry" when relating to the present, is allowed to put on the robes of truth and art when relating to the past. This is a matter of proximity and sensitivity, rather than some innate ability for the past to show itself in true light once a healthy period has elapsed. In fact, history written as it happens, journalism, is often the closest to proper analysis that there will ever be of a given event or personage. This is due to the importance of taking account of the zeitgeist of a time or event, something that comes naturally to a contemporary observer. A later historian has to apply himself not only to getting his facts straight regarding an event, but also needs to study the cultural and social history of the time and place to get at the problem of properly seeing an event holistically. As often as not, this leads the historian to the often absurd observation that a man was a "man of his time" whereas a contemporary observer could not hope to conclude with such a banality.