I don't know if civility will ever return because it also runs within families. We have a few cult followers in mine and some conversations are avoided like the plague. I am 80 years old and growing up in the 50's was a decent time to live. But now??? So sad.
I don't know if civility will ever return because it also runs within families. We have a few cult followers in mine and some conversations are avoided like the plague. I am 80 years old and growing up in the 50's was a decent time to live. But now??? So sad.
Jan, Like you, I am a child of the 50s, slightly younger but not by much. Then as now, there were a lot of issues but they were hidden underneath the pleasant surface of our lives and I don't think civility was one of them. We expected our leaders to set good examples and be worthy of our trust. We didn't get stellar leaders but Eisenhower was good enough and generally beyond reproach. My family was exclusively Democrat but, since my parents had gone through the war, they were loyal to Eisenhower. There may have been cults but we didn't know about them. And there were also serious problems with Civil Rights and the coming military-industrial complex which Eisenhower warned us about. We also had the threat of polio until Salk and Sabin saved a lot of lives with their vaccines. (I do not recall much conflict about the vaccines, only relief and gratitude that Salk and Sabin had saved us all.) I don't know how things are now or will be but I do know that civility probably died a while back and we seniors are left to remember it fondly. I try to understand why people would support a person like the former president as, to my knowledge, he's looking out for no. 1 full-time and just doesn't care about anyone or anything else. Sad, indeed.
Yes, the culture of the USA was pleasant if you were white and a middle-of-the-road person politically. My dad fought in Spain in 1938 and was тАЬinvestigatedтАЭ by the secret police during the McCarthy era. Luckily, he had started his own business and could not be fired тАФ unlike many of his comrades who went back to work for an employer.
Stan, I did mention some of the hidden issues beneath the surface of all those pleasant appearances. Perhaps life then and now were/are essentially the same thing with the exception that a lot of people living in the 50s swept a lot of things under the rug. In the 50s the Gilded Age people enjoyed essentially The Best of Everything and turned a blind eye to the plight of millions of other people. (That is: life for the Gilded Agers was one delight after another; life for a good many was hardscrabble and made even harder by racism, fear, and an economy that did not serve the working class.) Perhaps life in the 50s was not as different as I thought....people put on a facade of pleasant everything but beneath the surface then was what is more obvious now: social conflict, racism, hatred, competition, and a lot of greed and corruption from top to bottom.
Many men and women (of European origin) who served in the military during WW2 were satisfied and happy to have Eisenhower as president. Just think, the тАЬguy who won WW2тАЭ is now in charge тАФ even more fully. To have an elderly white male war hero leading the country gave my parentsтАЩ generation to a feeling of safety as they participated in a seemingly ever-growing economy.
Stan, You are spot-on. My parents were loyal Democrats , lower middle-class working people from generally rural/small city communities. They were the kind of people who supported labor unions and worked in the armaments plants during the war. Limited income and few connections to wealthy and powerful people. So who did they routinely vote for when it came to president of the US? Eisenhower and for the very reasons you suggest. But Eisenhower turned out to be somewhat more nuanced as a public servant, signing the law prohibiting segregation in the public schools (Brown vs the Board of Education in Supreme Court decision) and warning against the lethal link of the military/industrial complex to political and economic concerns. He proved to be a competent leader and he generally answered the public demands for peaceful and undisturbed growth. Of course, that growth served to hide many issues and problems that went unresolved during his term and into the 60s, issues that we are still tangling with now...and who knows when (if ever) they will be resolved?!
IтАЩm not a scholar of the times, but I suspect that Ike was familiar with the major players of the time тАФ Stalin, Mao, Adenauer, DeGaulle, et al тАФ and knew how far he could go in consolidating USA power worldwide. Having the best-possible poker player in charge allowed our parentsтАЩ generation to give rise to the Woodstock generation of which IтАЩm a member. To quote an old campaign button, тАЬI Like Ike.тАЭ However, he didnтАЩt do enough to reign in McCarthy тАФ and we still have a McCarthy problem today.
Thank You...You and I share generations--we are contemporaries. Which means that I was a little kid when Eisenhower was president. I knew that he was An Important Person and I came to reflect the high regard my parents had for him. He apparently tried to move us in the direction of a public healthcare system, as did FDR and Truman before him but it took LBJ to carry through to Medicare. What I thought of Eisenhower at the time was that he was very old and may have been around forever but wanted us all to be happy and safe. (This was a little kid's view of the man.) Later, I came to appreciate him more and this seems to have been a commonly held view of him as I believe he is now considered one of our better presidents. He was the right man for the time which is a darn sight better than what we had before the current president. (Trump, The Man for no Season). Yes we do have McCarthy people and they may be attempting another coup, that is, taking over the entire Republican Party....this may lead to the death of that Party and the emergence of something else. I do think the only way we can get out of this hole or death spiral or whatever it is we are in is by focusing on programs, policies, and problems of a national importance...that means we need to resolve the case of Trump, remove him from public life (one way or another), insist that he be held responsible for his actions, and move on....
In 1969 at Woodstock, my group sat toward the top of the hill: no mud when it rained. Encountered a tent over the crest of the hill that had a banner: We Are All One. This has stuck in my mind ever since and informs my politics.
I am an old Bernie-supporter...which may suggest an approach close to your own. I was a bit concerned because I feared Biden might try to compromise with the right-wing members of Congress (read: the GOPers) and to date my fears have proven justified. However, I did vote for Biden without any hesitancy and I would do it again. I also think that Biden is playing the hand he was dealt, amid staunch opposition from those who would take us farther astray. At least he is competent which, seeing where we've come from, is a lot.
Yes, I agree with you. Joe is the right person to be in charge although I would have preferred Bernie, who presumably wouldnтАЩt have wasted time appealing to Manchin & sinema.
I don't know if civility will ever return because it also runs within families. We have a few cult followers in mine and some conversations are avoided like the plague. I am 80 years old and growing up in the 50's was a decent time to live. But now??? So sad.
Jan, Like you, I am a child of the 50s, slightly younger but not by much. Then as now, there were a lot of issues but they were hidden underneath the pleasant surface of our lives and I don't think civility was one of them. We expected our leaders to set good examples and be worthy of our trust. We didn't get stellar leaders but Eisenhower was good enough and generally beyond reproach. My family was exclusively Democrat but, since my parents had gone through the war, they were loyal to Eisenhower. There may have been cults but we didn't know about them. And there were also serious problems with Civil Rights and the coming military-industrial complex which Eisenhower warned us about. We also had the threat of polio until Salk and Sabin saved a lot of lives with their vaccines. (I do not recall much conflict about the vaccines, only relief and gratitude that Salk and Sabin had saved us all.) I don't know how things are now or will be but I do know that civility probably died a while back and we seniors are left to remember it fondly. I try to understand why people would support a person like the former president as, to my knowledge, he's looking out for no. 1 full-time and just doesn't care about anyone or anything else. Sad, indeed.
Yes, the culture of the USA was pleasant if you were white and a middle-of-the-road person politically. My dad fought in Spain in 1938 and was тАЬinvestigatedтАЭ by the secret police during the McCarthy era. Luckily, he had started his own business and could not be fired тАФ unlike many of his comrades who went back to work for an employer.
Stan, I did mention some of the hidden issues beneath the surface of all those pleasant appearances. Perhaps life then and now were/are essentially the same thing with the exception that a lot of people living in the 50s swept a lot of things under the rug. In the 50s the Gilded Age people enjoyed essentially The Best of Everything and turned a blind eye to the plight of millions of other people. (That is: life for the Gilded Agers was one delight after another; life for a good many was hardscrabble and made even harder by racism, fear, and an economy that did not serve the working class.) Perhaps life in the 50s was not as different as I thought....people put on a facade of pleasant everything but beneath the surface then was what is more obvious now: social conflict, racism, hatred, competition, and a lot of greed and corruption from top to bottom.
Many men and women (of European origin) who served in the military during WW2 were satisfied and happy to have Eisenhower as president. Just think, the тАЬguy who won WW2тАЭ is now in charge тАФ even more fully. To have an elderly white male war hero leading the country gave my parentsтАЩ generation to a feeling of safety as they participated in a seemingly ever-growing economy.
Stan, You are spot-on. My parents were loyal Democrats , lower middle-class working people from generally rural/small city communities. They were the kind of people who supported labor unions and worked in the armaments plants during the war. Limited income and few connections to wealthy and powerful people. So who did they routinely vote for when it came to president of the US? Eisenhower and for the very reasons you suggest. But Eisenhower turned out to be somewhat more nuanced as a public servant, signing the law prohibiting segregation in the public schools (Brown vs the Board of Education in Supreme Court decision) and warning against the lethal link of the military/industrial complex to political and economic concerns. He proved to be a competent leader and he generally answered the public demands for peaceful and undisturbed growth. Of course, that growth served to hide many issues and problems that went unresolved during his term and into the 60s, issues that we are still tangling with now...and who knows when (if ever) they will be resolved?!
IтАЩm not a scholar of the times, but I suspect that Ike was familiar with the major players of the time тАФ Stalin, Mao, Adenauer, DeGaulle, et al тАФ and knew how far he could go in consolidating USA power worldwide. Having the best-possible poker player in charge allowed our parentsтАЩ generation to give rise to the Woodstock generation of which IтАЩm a member. To quote an old campaign button, тАЬI Like Ike.тАЭ However, he didnтАЩt do enough to reign in McCarthy тАФ and we still have a McCarthy problem today.
Thank You...You and I share generations--we are contemporaries. Which means that I was a little kid when Eisenhower was president. I knew that he was An Important Person and I came to reflect the high regard my parents had for him. He apparently tried to move us in the direction of a public healthcare system, as did FDR and Truman before him but it took LBJ to carry through to Medicare. What I thought of Eisenhower at the time was that he was very old and may have been around forever but wanted us all to be happy and safe. (This was a little kid's view of the man.) Later, I came to appreciate him more and this seems to have been a commonly held view of him as I believe he is now considered one of our better presidents. He was the right man for the time which is a darn sight better than what we had before the current president. (Trump, The Man for no Season). Yes we do have McCarthy people and they may be attempting another coup, that is, taking over the entire Republican Party....this may lead to the death of that Party and the emergence of something else. I do think the only way we can get out of this hole or death spiral or whatever it is we are in is by focusing on programs, policies, and problems of a national importance...that means we need to resolve the case of Trump, remove him from public life (one way or another), insist that he be held responsible for his actions, and move on....
In 1969 at Woodstock, my group sat toward the top of the hill: no mud when it rained. Encountered a tent over the crest of the hill that had a banner: We Are All One. This has stuck in my mind ever since and informs my politics.
I am an old Bernie-supporter...which may suggest an approach close to your own. I was a bit concerned because I feared Biden might try to compromise with the right-wing members of Congress (read: the GOPers) and to date my fears have proven justified. However, I did vote for Biden without any hesitancy and I would do it again. I also think that Biden is playing the hand he was dealt, amid staunch opposition from those who would take us farther astray. At least he is competent which, seeing where we've come from, is a lot.
Yes, I agree with you. Joe is the right person to be in charge although I would have preferred Bernie, who presumably wouldnтАЩt have wasted time appealing to Manchin & sinema.