I have a lot of friends who live in other countries besides my own country which is the United States. This is due to the fact that I do some traveling in a professional capacity but also because I make a habit of associating with folks who "ain't from 'round these parts." 

Homogeneity was the flavor of my upbringing and it wasn't something I was interested in continuing into adulthood. My home state had the distinction of being the whitest in the nation for many years until it was eclipsed by its next-door neighbor, and by eclipsed I mean the opposite of an eclipse because, well, everything went white. 

Where I am from is not a bad place, in fact it is a very good place. But one where everyone looks more or less the same. China is that way too and so are many other parts of the world. So it's not like my home state did anything wrong by being so white. It just isn't a place people with eumelanin find much interest in. Perhaps as a place to visit. But not one where to live.

The homogeneity is not limited to skin tone. Religion, culture, music, food preferences, and sports team allegiances have a fairly slim range of variation and this hasn’t changed much from year to year. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," they say.

But I found the whole world interesting, and I mean all of it. I wanted to go to all the places I could go and meet all the people I could meet. So, as much as was within my means, I did. I mean... I'm no Tony Bourdain. But I've seen some things. 

But one thing that seemed pretty consistent wherever I went was this idea of American Exceptionalism. Now some have misinterpreted this phrase as meaning that America was not just unique but uniquely BETTER than any other country. That is not what it means. Nor does it mean it's inherently worse. When Toqueville invoked this concept, he meant it neither as an insult nor a compliment. It was just an observation. That America was "the exception," not the rule. 

American Exceptionalism has been invoked many times since, sometimes in praise, other times as criticism, but rarely with accuracy. Sure, in Toqueville's time, we had a novel form of governance. But since then many democracies have popped up, many quite similar to our own, and our culture — our once-uniquely American culture -- has spread across international borders to the point that it is not just ubiquitous, but generically so. There are few cities on our Earth planet without a Starbucks or a McDonalds within spitting distance and they are all, more-or-less, exactly like the ones we have here. A Nigerian Big Mac is an Australian Big Mac is a Salt Lake City Big Mac.

But still, American Exceptionalism persists, like an old tube of toothpaste that always seems to have one squeeze left. Lately I've seen one particular form summoned in arenas of online discourse (which, while always the worst form of discourse, is often the best window into the zeitgeist). 

The particular form, this exceptional form, is the one what is referenced in the title of this essay, and is the reason I kicked it off with the paragraph that I did. I have a lot of friends who live in other countries besides my own country which is the United States. And lately, many of them have been asking: 

"Why Won't You People Do Something?"

Meaning, about Donald Trump. About authoritarianism. About fascism. About our once exceptional democracy being systemically and systematically demolished and in less time than it takes the New England Patriots to rebuild their football franchise into something Super Bowl worthy.   

But we are not the first country to face such challenges. Far from it. Spin the globe then put your finger down anywhere not blue and it's just as likely to land on an authoritarian dictatorship as not. 

Would you say to Hungary: “Why won't you do something about Orbán?” Or to Russia: “When are you going to get around to fixing all this Putin business?” Were the people of Iran letting an oppressive theocracy rule over them for fifty years simply due to procrastination? Even England, jolly old England, had its Whitman’s Sampler of mad kings. Why are we Americans held to a standard that no other nation under the sway of an authoritarian tyrant has ever been? Is it because you think we are.... EXCEPTIONAL? 

Getting rid of tyrants is hard. Especially when those tyrants enjoy a populist cult-of-personality and the support of our largest corporations.

"But you voted for this!"

Did we? I mean... maybe. In the same way that Russia voted for Putin the first, second, and 300th time. But while we perhaps, maybe, arguably voted for Trump -- and by "we" I mean a majority so thin you could slip it between Karoline Leavitt's pursed lips without her noticing -- we certainly did not vote for (waves hands at everything) THIS. 

We did not vote for THIS. 

And in this way we are also unexceptional. Plenty of tyrants grabbed power by way of democratic processes only to remove all checks and balances, purge all dissenters and seize, as the Doll-Fucker would say, "Plenary Authority."

But don't worry. We WILL take care of this. We understand the urgency and are doing the best we can. It's only been one year. The longest year of my memory but still... just one year.  And what we are up against, while horrible, is still just a man. A fragile, elderly, not-particularly-healthy man at that. He'll be gone before you know it. What happens after that is still unknown. But hopefully it will be something "exceptional."