The troubling rise of American pessimism

Donald Trump's success at winning the Republican nomination is a powerful sign that the pessimism of the late 1970s has returned, albeit in darker, angrier form

It's been a rough couple of decades.
(Image credit: REUTERS/Carlo Allegri)

America is supposed to be a nation of optimists.

Founded and then continually joined by people who made great efforts and took enormous risks to come here from other places, the country's economic and geopolitical rise has been fueled from the start by great individual and collective hopes and ambitions. We are a nation of strivers and believers.

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Damon Linker

Damon Linker is a senior correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also a former contributing editor at The New Republic and the author of The Theocons and The Religious Test.