There is much to be commended about the American character: an entrepreneurial spirit, a can-do sense of possibility that has often moved mountains, a rugged individualism that has led to much success. But there has always been a mean streak among us as well, a collective shadow side that has produced horrors of injustice. Individually, too often our rugged individualism has become rugged narcissism, we acquiesce within ourselves to some of the lowest human traits, and we’re willing to normalize in government and society what should be considered intolerable behavior. MLK Jr. said “we need quantitative changes in our circumstances and qualitative shifts in our souls.” Never more so than now. The first place we need to clean up is our own hearts. We need personal transformation as much as transactional political change. Without the former, the latter will not occur on any fundamental basis. And the time to work on both is now.