I'm no good at good-byes. It's not that I get particularly emotional. In fact, quite the opposite is true; when one thing ends, I shrug and move on to whatever is next. So instead of trying to write something sentimental, I'm going to use my last go-round on the soapbox to make a number of general points that have defined my work over the past two years as a columnist for The Sun.

Almost all of my columns have had a single theme, never stated explicitly, but always lurking in the subtext: the American system is in serious danger, and the illusion of permanent security and prosperity is just that. Growing up in the 1990s, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, we became used to the idea that our liberal, democratic world would go on forever. It won't. The height of the Roman Empire lasted 600 years; I think we'll be lucky if ours lasts half that long. The problem has more to do with the nature of American society than with any partisan battles, although the Republicans have done more than their fair share of mucking things up. Don't believe me? Consider the following:

1. The American public is staggeringly uncommitted to American civil society. Almost half the country does not vote, and most of the people who do don't take the time to educate themselves about important issues. Everyone can get their minds around George W. Bush's desertion from the National Guard or John Kerry's throwing away his ribbons (but not his medals!) in protest of the Vietnam War. Few people deal with substantive issues; it's easier to be intellectually lazy and vote solely on character.

2. Enlightenment principles are under attack in all sectors of our society. Nowhere is this more apparent than with IDEA, the Intelligent Design Education and Awareness club at Cornell. To put it bluntly, ID is a transparent attempt to dress up as science a creation myth as primitive as any held by any of the world's preliterate cultures. Even at Cornell, one of the great centers for scientific research, faith-based thinking has corrupted basic intellectual processes. In the current global environment, we cannot afford the luxury of abandoning reason for either faith or dogma. To see the terrible consequences of doing so, we need look no further than the Bush administration that proudly and notoriously dismissed its enemies as the "reality-based community." Among the many disastrous outcomes was an invasion of Iraq that seemed, from all the published descriptions, never to have been subjected by policymakers to the scrutiny of reason, but simply to have been embraced as an article of faith. To quote the great physicist Richard Feynman, "Reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled."

3. American "elites" feel little obligation to serve the country and are more concerned with making their own profits. Say what you will about the classist ideologies bound up with "noblesse oblige," that cultural tendency funneled some of the best prepared citizens into positions where they could do the most good and created a culture of civic duty. Now, the wealthy demand tax cuts that tie our hands in the war on terror despite their refusal to serve the country either in government or the military. Regardless of our personal backgrounds, we are all privileged in our opportunity to attend Cornell, and that confers on us an obligation to give back.

All of these themes can be summed up as follows: we spend too much time taking the easy way out and in the end it will be our downfall. Tax cuts are easier than belt-tightening; watching television is easier than reading; voting based on preconceived notions is easier than informing ourselves; faith is easier than science. In the end, societies like ours never fall from the outside, we rot from the inside and the seeds of our destruction are already apparent in our culture. George W. Bush is a symptom, but the root of the problem is buried in each one of us. It lies in our apathy, our laziness and our abandonment of what Theodore Roosevelt called "The Strenuous Life."

With all that in mind, I have tried to use this space to point out the flaws and suggest ways to fix them. Whenever possible, I tried to debunk "easier" conventional wisdom and expose a more complicated reality. I beg your indulgence for my myriad failures, both personal and intellectual. Lest you think I am original, I suppose now is as good a time as any to say that much of my thinking was influenced by others; although I have credited individuals or publications in many of my columns, it bears listing them here: Slate.com's Dahlia Lithwick, John Dickerson and Fred Kaplan; The New Republic's Peter Beinart; The Washington Monthly's Amy Sullivan; Atlantic Monthly's James Fallows; my advisor, Walter LaFeber and his (informal) advisor, William Appleman Williams, have all provided intellectual fodder for these columns.

There are a number of people to whom I owe more thanks than I can adequately express, but I'd like to take a minute and try anyway. To my editors: Erica Stein, thanks for insisting that I stop apologizing for myself, I'm sorry that I did it so much; Zach Jones, thank you for being the funniest man alive; Jefe (Carlos Maycotte), thank you for being willing to work with my crazy schedule. To the Class Notes: thanks for giving me a place to sing and chew over ideas. To the Cornell History Department, especially Prof. LaFeber: thanks for putting up with me, my incessant questioning and my … erm … flexible relationship with deadlines. To my Baby Sister '09, for insisting that I do schoolwork once in a while, and to Mom and Dad, thanks for your tireless editing and idea-sharpening. Penultimately, thanks to everyone who wasted their time by reading my column; I'm especially grateful for those who took time to write in and inform me that I'm an idiot.

My column moniker, The Half-Brit, was the same one that I used in high school. It comes from my being (surprise!) half-british. There is no brilliant joke behind it; we needed something and couldn't think of anything else. The irony is that half-Britishness has become an integral part of my personal identity, but that is fodder for a column I'll never write. The mention of high school brings me to one last thank you: Erica Temel, thanks for walking with me to Ms. Tygel's violin class in second grade, making interminable Record press nights so cra-a-azy and dragging me over to Erica Stein, thereby ensuring that I actually apply for a columnist job here. It's been an unbelievable amount of fun.

Well, I'm off. Cheers.

Will Evans is a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences. He can be contacted at wme2@cornell.edu. The Half-Brit appeared Thursdays.

Archived article by Will Evans