Hawthorne's current political relevance?

[chicken]

For Hawthorne, America's darkness could be expressed in social as well as spiritual realms. This was not only a reasoned rebuke to the optimism of Emerson and the Transcendentalists but also a counter to the blinkered chauvinism, automatic patriotism, and arrogant power-mongering of his time (and ours). [bold is mine]

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wbur/arts.artsmain?action=viewArticle&id=656335&pid=30&sid=13#hawthorne

Hmmmm.