LEADER ARTICLE
Mall isn’t Beautiful

forget all that home video chortling about calculated casualties that has incensed talking heads on television. osama bin laden has hit america where it hurts most — in its wallet, which americans like to call their pocketbook. as column inches are expended on how the ''equal opportunity recession'' has left christmas shelves heaving with unsold goods, despite aggressive discounts and special promotions, the us government has begun to look like the good guy, with democrats and republicans in congress doing the unthinkable; negotiating on an economic recovery plan to boost declining consumer confidence.anyone remember a certain former president, whose hair was suspiciously black and whose mind was strangely blank, and who so famously said ''government is not the solution to our problems, government is the problem''? well, america's suffering from ronald reagan's favourite disease — selective recall. but there's no dearth of people urging americans to do what they know best: buy. in fact, the diktat to do so has come from no less than george w bush. after all, consumer spending accounts for two-thirds of all economic activity in the us and holiday sales make for half the retailers' annual revenue. being loyal to their flag, it has to be said americans tried. the sale of apocalypse gear such as executive chutes went up, so, in an outburst of patriotism, did the sale of the star and stripes in a $200 million flag market. wal-mart, the chain store synonymous with cheap bargains in the us, announced 400 more stores next year. and even high fashion gurus donna karan and ralph lauren did their bit, turning up in special t-shirts designed to support the cause. but nothing has helped. consumer confidence has tumbled to a seven-year low. the us national retail federation, which represents 1.4 million retailers, projected that its sales would be down to half in the last quarter of the year. and with the holiday season on them, department stores had to hire retailing experts to convince americans that buying, especially for others, would lessen the guilt of self-indulgence. but even as the market is losing its lustre, public services have gained respectability. whether it's the 800,000 postal service workers who've to handle mail or the staff in the nation's 5,000 public hospitals, americans have been willing to give their government and its offshoots a chance. in fact, opinion polls showed a greater appreciation of big government and even of agencies such as the fbi and cia, about whose inabilities to check stray people roaming around with box-cutters there has not been a single complaint. and then, of course, there's the latest fad among manhattan singletons of dating firemen, the ultimate symbol of state service, apparently because they're highly principled and full of heroic machismo. add to that the us government behaving in an almost keynesian fashion. having, for years, treated the gdp as the responsibility of new york's fifth avenue, it is now taking an interest in every sector. congress agreed to a $15 billion package to help the airline business recover. the federal reserve released $81 billion to bolster the financial markets. and in november, mr bush pledged $175 million to the postal service as crisis aid. yet, are these not knee-jerk reactions against two decades of untrammelled privatisation and unchecked individual consumerism? after all, americans have been living beyond their means for years. net saving by the private sector fell from 5.5 per cent of gdp in 1992 to minus six per cent at the end of last year. the excess spending was possible only because of increased borrowing. and it's precisely this conspicuous consumption that attracted the envy of those who have nothing but hunger as their companion in cold desert nights. of course, as benjamin barber points out in jihad vs mcworld, these are two sides of the same coin: if mcworld treats its citizens as consumers, jihad treats them as ''blood brothers and sisters defined by identities they also are not permitted to choose for themselves''. the kinder, gentler america that mr bush talks about is one where public utilities will have to come centre-stage. already there are signs. that 19 passengers could take over four planes underlines the complete failure of the airport security system. much of it is because it has been contracted out. now, not surprisingly, congress has put the federal government in charge of baggage and passenger screening. insulated over the clinton years by rising prosperity from the world outside as well as its neighbours, public participation in the us also seems to be on the rise. one example is the fact that thanks to an outpouring of donors, new york city was able to solve its chronic blood shortage within a day of september 11. another is that recruitment to the peace corps and government service is rising. in a weekly standard essay, david brooks, the author of bobos in paradise, says the nineties zeitgeist of ''local affairs, community, intimate relations and construction of private paradises'' has finally given way to an age of conflict. in this new age, americans will realise mall isn't beautiful. others have echoed him, saying the just me decade of narcissistic pleasure had to end. with a bang, not a whimper. it may be too early to pronounce the death of globalisation (read americanisation) as naomi klein has done. that process is irreversible. but what daniel harris describes as the aesthetic of consumerism will have to change. as he writes in cute, quaint, hungry and romantic, the culture of buying has created the perfect disguise for conformity: rebelliousness. ''our individuality is actually contingent on our obedience, on buying the same products that millions of other people are buying at exactly the same time in exactly the same stores, all the while labouring under the extraordinary misconception that shopping is a profoundly self-creative act that distinguishes us from the mindless herd''. surely unalloyed materialism cannot be a strong foundation for a political philosophy or even a nation. it's something our own blindly privatising bjp-led government has to realise. perhaps as america discards its old totems, it can learn from the creator of its latest myth, resurrected from the 1930s, john ronald reuel tolkein. the author of the lord of the rings hated the conveniences of modern living so much that he gave up his car and his television. on the other hand, maybe not. hollywood has just spent $300 million making and marketing a trilogy based on his 1,200-page epic.