BOOK REVIEW: One on One with Bill Bradley

The Story We’re Told vs. The True American Story

You’d swear Bill Bradley was running for office or dashing down court for a breakaway three-pointer. This one-time presidential contender and New York Knicks superstar writes with the energy and urgency of a man on a mission.

Read his book, The New American Story, released today by Random House, and you’ll be tempted to join him. Bradley has issued a powerful call to action—one that promises to rescue our nation from political infighting and restore America’s leadership role in the world.

His is not a story of military might and moral superiority; it is the story of our nation’s founding principles, written by the men and women whose active engagement at pivotal points in history assured the country lived up to its highest ideals.

We have a choice before us that could transcend our current state of affairs, says Bradley. A choice that puts country over political party, the common good over the distracting issues that divide us.

One of our nation’s most admired leaders—Abraham Lincoln—knew a thing or two about bringing a divided nation together. When he was president, Lincoln would often sneak out of the White House on Wednesday nights to hear sermons of a well-known preacher at the New York Presbyterian Church. One night, an aide asked Lincoln what he had thought of the sermon. “The content was excellent. The minister had a strong voice and a good delivery,” said Lincoln, pausing. “But he forgot the most important part. He didn’t ask us to do something great.”

Bill Bradley is asking us to do something great.

“The answers to our problems rest in our hearts as well as in our heads,” Bradley says in the introduction to his book, “and until we understand that, we’ll make marginal improvements, but we won’t make the quantum leaps that our Founders made and hoped we would continue.”

I am drawn to stories of ordinary Americans who overcame obstacles to achieve great things. Freedom fighters on the Underground Railroad. Journalists who exposed unethical business practices at the turn of the 20th century. The immigrants who built our transcontinental railroad. A country lawyer who became a United States Supreme Court Justice, America’s chief prosecutor of Nazi War criminals, and the founder of international law.  These are the stories I want people around the world to know about when they think of America and its unique contributions to the world. That’s why my husband and I make historical documentaries for a living.

Bill Bradley’s book had me from hello, or at least from the moment I read the book jacket blurbs written by David McCullough, David Halberstam, Doris Kearns Goodwin and Robert A. Caro, all Pulitzer Prize winners. Because I love history, and because I believe in the strength of our nation’s collective character, I kept on reading.
   
There is no question the bold policies outlined in Bill Bradley’s book will be hotly debated in the coming weeks. He takes both political parties to task, taking aim at the current administration’s policies with the finesse of a seasoned athlete and senator. And while I don’t agree with every single one of Bradley’s strategies on health care, education, environment, tax reform, and national defense, if this American story is to have a happy ending, I, like all other Americans, will have to look for common ground, and make sacrifices for the greater good.

Bill Bradley has faith that, given the right information--the true American story--we will do the right thing.

Are you up to the challenge?

Lisa Gensheimer is a writer and documentary producer whose work has appeared on public television stations nationwide.