Neil Young, "Campaigner"

I have spent several years engaging in a research project related to American history in the mid 1970s. I feel like that period is a secret fulcrum. Globalization, deindustrialization, neoliberalism, and mass incarceration really surfaced then, along with the social and political shocks of Watergate, the Fall of Saigon, and an economic crisis. What we are living through right now feels like an even bigger confluence, with the Trump presidency, a pandemic, economic crisis, and mass protests over racism happening all at once.

A key difference in these moments is that in the mid-70s the protest movement of the prior decade were flaming out, whereas now they seem to be getting stronger. One era was defined by resignation, ours is defined by engagement, mostly because the scale of death and political collapse is so horrific. In the mid-70s that resignation was maybe best expressed in Neil Young's famous "ditch trilogy" of challenging albums.

He recorded one album in that period, Hitchhiker, that only recently found an official release (although he re-recorded some of the songs for later albums.) One song put on a later album was "Campaigner," with the key line "Even Richard Nixon has got soul." It's a surprise considering that in the song "Ohio" Young called out Nixon by name for being responsible for the Kent State shooting. This song is a kind of radical act of empathy, an acknowledgement that Nixon was still a human being no matter how awfully he had behaved.

A sign that we are in a different turning point nowadays is that I cannot imagine hearing the lines "Even Donald Trump has got soul" and keeping a straight face. Nixon was a horrible person, but he was all too human. In his hatred for the Ivy League and his chip on his shoulder from having come from humble origins there's a little bit in Nixon I can empathize with. This is impossible with Trump, a moral black hole who seems to represent nothing but his own unfettered greed and ego.

The time we are in now is more radically catastrophic than the mid-70s. There won't be any time for wistful empathy for the oppressors. In the end, that might prove freeing.