This is the year of Lincoln — so many books and movies, so little time. But to understand Lincoln and his America, it might be worth turning to the first words publicly put forth by his most effective public agent, William Lloyd Garrison: “Our country is the world. Our countrymen are mankind.” Without question, this speaks for Hollywood today and Bill Clinton and Amy Poehler and Tina Fey as well, who hosted the (world) Golden Globe awards, which The Washington Post said “our culture” (the world) deserves. The awards this year come with a touch of lament — possibly why Daniel Day-Lewis’s Lincoln appears to look so plaintively to the past, like that portrait of Whistler’s Mother. Because there is trouble here this year and this year, 2013, could be the year of big trouble. It is not just because Hollywood has managed to lose China. Jackie Chan says we Americans are the worst people on earth. But Ang Lee has long cast America in cryptic and neurotic shadows. Hollywood is the dream that reflects our anxieties and dangers, and two issues could open this year that might haunt us for years, maybe decades. This year we might see executive orders on guns and the debt ceiling. President Obama will bring a challenge to America. America will accept the challenge.

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