I Have Loved America Since I Was a Boy. That Makes This Harder to Write.

The country I have admired since my childhood in Europe is rewriting its own story. Here is what I see.

Today, the United States turns 250 years old.

I have been thinking about this country since I was thirteen years old. That was when Dutch television aired Centennial, the NBC miniseries based on James Michener’s 1974 novel of the same name. When it first aired in the US in 1978, it was reported as the most expensive television production in history: a 26…