Reply #31: Got me to thinking. Has our Boomer generation (and its representatives) accomplished [View All]

[pampango]

any significant societal change? Earlier generations won world wars and passed civil rights and anti-poverty legislation.

People fought wars, endured rationing, high taxes, and other wartime limitations not for personal comfort or a few extra bucks, but to achieve a larger societal goal. Later LBJ knew the Democratic Party was going to lose in the South but pushed through legislation anyway because it was the right thing to do. While African Americans and poor people provided tremendous amounts of effort and sacrifice, the legislators who passed the laws were largely white as was much of the support they received from the public.

The "what's in it for me" mentality didn't seem as all-pervasive as it is today. Now it's hard to get legislation, like HCR or climate change legislation, passed because it seems that no one wants to sacrifice for the "greater good"? The republican party is pretty good at protecting the rich from "sacrifice", while our party is, at least sporadically, able to protect the middle class from "sacrifice", so there is no sacrifice - other than by the poor and uninsured who do it all the time. Why should I sacrifice any part of my own good health care plan or pay more taxes or have to do anything I don't want to do in order to provide health care or coverage for those that don't have any? Let someone else sacrifice to achieve these wonderful goals.

Maybe the next generation will prove to not be as easy to manipulate by the PTB. Whether it's Harry and Louise or Osama the boogie man or Obama the socialist, it has proven to be quite easy to distract and control a populace that is dominated by the Boomer generation.

I don't really have any reason to believe that the next generation will be more resistant to the manipulation. Maybe they are growing up more media savvy and can see through the BS better. The optimist in me says that maybe the willingness to sacrifice to accomplish great things skips a generation and the young folks will do just fine. (Along the lines of the entrepreneur that makes a fortune turns it over to his kids who squander it, then perhaps their kids produce another successful entrepreneur.) The pessimist in me says why should they do any better than my generation has done?