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| America. One sexy bitch. |
Book Review: "America, You Sexy Bitch: A Love Letter to Freedom" by Meghan McCain and Micheal Ian Black
Leftist alt-comic Michael Ian Black and Republic party loyalist Meghan McCain went on a road trip across America one sweltering July, and the end result is “America, You Sexy Bitch”, a highly entertaining if somewhat schizophrenic account of their misadventures. This “experiment in bipartisan mixology” as Meghan describes it, flips back and forth between Meghan and Michael’s viewpoints as they traverse the country in a smelly RV in an attempt to discover common ground in an increasingly partisan and polarized country. But anyone looking to read the book for a tidy “we both learned from each other and changed our outlooks” ending are going to be disappointed. The book doesn’t draw any neat conclusions, nor does it present any solutions for what ails America. In fact, the state of American politics seem just as muddy and chaotic by the end of the book as they are in the beginning. But sandwiched in between are plenty of entertaining tales of gun-shooting, fighting, pot-smoking, boozy nights in strips clubs, boozy nights in New Orleans, and boozy nights in sleazy truck stop diners.
Although the “hook” is supposed to be that two political opposites are stuck in an RV together for a month, Meghan and Michael as people turn out, of course, to be much more interesting and complicated than that. Meghan is fiercely loyal to her family, energetic, emotional, and wild. She parties like a maniac. What she loves, she loves deeply, with every cell of her being. She imbues every experience with intense enthusiasm. She is tireless and stubborn and loud. She loves the Republican party with a visceral, bone-deep passion, and believes in America with her whole soul. She is also a strong-willed young women with a free but unsettled life, conflicted about the idea of family and children, and convinced despite all evidence to the contrary that she can reform the party she loves.
Michael is older, world-weary, sensitive, and fundamentally pessimistic about the future of America. Raised by lesbian parents, he vaguely identifies as a liberal agnostic Democrat, but has no clear definition of what that means. (“As much as I want to be a committed Democrat, I just can’t justify it to myself”, he admits.) Although he doesn’t shy away from making savage fun of liberals, he still detests the Republican party and what they stand for culturally and politically. Yet in spite of his more leftist leanings, his settled life as a rock-solid family man in suburban Connecticut more closely mirrors the cultural stereotype of a Republican than Meghan’s free-wheeling, unattached life in the city.
Throughout their time on the road, the two are intensively competitive, at times derisive of each other. They fight. They get on each other’s last nerve. They hurt each other’s feelings. They both refuse to admit when the other is right. Michael accuses Meghan of being a spoiled brat who spouts platitudes, and Meghan thinks Michael is a liberal pansy. Meghan is disgusted by Michael’s Crocs, and Michael makes relentless fun of Meghan’s enormous suitcases. In the end, neither one shifts viewpoints. Michael is still pessimistic and disheartened about the future of America, and Meghan is still passionately in love with the Republican party and believes in whole-heartedly in American exceptionalism.
Yet if there is any hope for America’s future to be found in the book, it is in the respect that both of them develop not only for each other, but for all of the people they meet along the way. Politics turn out to be secondary, nothing much more than an incidental plot point. Michael and Meghan’s growth does not come from changing each other politically, but from the relationships they develop with all of the people they meet on the road; through hospitality offered and reciprocated, through hours spent talking over home-cooked meals with their political opposites, through dancing and drinking and music and laughter shared with the most unlikely guests. In the end, common ground was found--because Americans are still willing to truly connect to one another as fellow human beings, not as political parties or ideals. In fact, I think we’re starving for this sort of connection with one another. I was heartened by how open people were, how much they seemed, like me, to feel that something is wrong in our political climate, that the nation as a whole is not as savagely polarized as we’re portrayed to be in the media. That we are all tired, and desperate to stop fighting and to hammer out some real solutions so there’s still something left for the kids.
The book has it's flaws. The original intent of the trip sometimes gets lost in rambling and unfocused narrative, and it's often fuzzy on details and specifics that would help flesh out the various stories. But it is a highly entertaining read, and a step in the right direction towards encouraging dialogue about American identity, purpose and unity.
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