C. S. Lewis said it best:
We all want progress. But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be. And if you have taken a wrong turning, then to go forward does not get you any nearer. If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man.
There is nothing progressive about being pig-headed and refusing to admit a mistake. And I think if you look at the present state of the world, it is pretty plain that humanity has been making some big mistake. We are on the wrong road. And if that is so, we must go back. Going back is the quickest way on.
Given the title, I’m assuming you are referring to the USA in particular. In your view, how far should the USA go back?
I'm thinking about life in general, but the title is a direct quote from Kamala Harris. I'm pretty sure it was from the recent debate, although it might have been from her Democratic National Convention speech—or maybe both, as I've heard the same quote from her with very minor variations, and all those political speeches tend to run together in my mind. What I can assure you is that I heard it in context, not as some isolated sound bite, which I always find suspect.
My mind connects things; I can't help it. And when I heard her say "We're not going back," I immediately thought of what C.S. Lewis said on the subject. It took some brief research to find the source (Mere Christianity); I'm also suspicious of unattributed quotes, and like to know where they come from.
"How far back"? That's above my pay grade, if for no other reason than that it's not a chronological problem. There's no when to go back to, but more what or where or even how. In what areas are we worse off than we were at some time in the past? Where did we start going off the track? (The answer will obviously be different for different issues.) What is the best path, and how can we get ourselves back on it? Maybe there's a shortcut to the right road that doesn't involve going all the way back to the point of divergence, but then again, shortcuts can be risky.
In any case, as with so many political sound bites, it's at best meaningless, and at worst outright harmful. I'm reminded again of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, in which the prevailing sentiment was "Change! We want change!" without much thought for what that change might be like when it came.
"We're not going back" has become something of a slogan for Vice President Harris and Tim Walz, so you've certainly heard it several times. It feels like a riposte to "Make America Great Again," which implies that America is now not great, but was once great, and thus we must go back.
I agree with you that it's not a purely chronological problem. Even people who disagree with the Dobbs decision might want to go back 18 months on that issue, but not on others.
The trouble is probably that slogans are of necessity brief and lack nuance. "We're not going back" is essentially a conservative call: We want to uphold the good progress we have made. And thus the slogan is filled with whatever good progress the hearer believes the USA has made. "Make America Great Again" is essentially a reactionary call: We are (or are turning into) a "shithole country" and need to reverse course. And thus the slogan is filled with whatever bad the hearer believes has happened to the USA that needs to be rolled back. Maybe you're right that these slogans are meaningless, but I propose that they are filled with meaning by the hearer. You once mentioned a "MAGA Democrat" T-shirt. Obviously, "Make America Great Again" takes on positive meaning for you, even though I would argue that in terms of raw clarity and meaning it rates no different than "We're not going back": at best meaningless, at worst harmful.
Of course, folks of the opposite party fill the slogans with (in the former case) all the "bad progress" that has been made and (in the latter case) all the aspects of life that were manifestly worse in the past.
So while Lewis's point is well made and pithy, it too simplifies and seems to work with the model of two diverging paths, one of which is right and the other of which is wrong. I think your more nuanced answer to "how far back" is more helpful.
Me, I like RJF Jr.'s variation: Make America Healthy Again. It's one of his major themes and one I'm 100% behind. I've said before that the Republican Party ought to reinvent itself as the party of human scale: small businesses, small farms, food freedom, medical freedom, educational freedom, conservation...all to my mind critical causes that have been sorely neglected by all political parties. Kennedy is the only politician I know who has spoken up for these things, and Trump is listening to him. I found Kennedy's endorsement speech to be remarkable, and encouraging.
