Last week we finally had a more or less pro-Boomer article titled “Boomers and upper-middle class to America: We didn’t start the fire” . I say “finally” because if you click on the TBP search button and enter “Boomer” you will find that the majority of articles blame Boomers for everything-that-is-wrong-with-the-world. Well, as a Boomer myself, I had a serious question. I even made sure folks knew it was a serious question because I wrote – “I have a serious question”. Here’s my serious question in full;
To those who think Boomers fucked it all up I have a serious question —- WHEN did we start this? I want specifics.
Was it while we were in high school … I mean, is that where we started to take classes in “Let’s fuck up America?” Was it while we were in college? Or, was it while some of us were sent to Vietnam to get our asses blown off? Was it when we were in our mid to late 20s trying to start a family? Was it in our 30s when we were trying to establish our careers? Was it when we were in our 40s and getting divorced, or when we were in our 50s and buying a shiny new red sports car?
Look, if I am in the mix as one of the cocksuckers who is responsible for all this shit … at least give me a fucken idea when I started it. That way I can reflect on that time, and make reparations, or at least send an Apology Card from Hallmark. “Dear 1968, I’m truly sorry I fucked up whatever it is that I fucked up that year. I think I started the ’68 riots in Newark. Yeah, that’s it. So solly!”
No one answered the question. However, a few days later in the Millennial Socialism article someone, — perhaps even a single-celled amoeba with extraordinary powers — by the name of Aodh Mor MacRaynall gave his opinion of Boomers. While it is not the majority view of readers here, such Boomer Derangement Syndrome isn’t unusual either. He said:
“I am old enough to remember the lie the Baby-Boomers accepted; free love, free hugs, free beer, free drugs, everything free, free, free. After they accepted the degenerate lies they were fed and another foot-hold was achieved in our society, they were let go to enjoy ‘the fruits of capitalism.’ A more pathetic bunch of old cucks, to my knowledge, has never been in the HISTORY OF THE WORLD.”
The history of the world, eh? I wonder if Mr. Amoeba realizes that the Mongol Empire killed upwards of 70 million, the Soviets at least 40,000,000, and the European colonialists (primarily British, Spanish, French, and Dutch – see above map) at one point controlled virtually the entire world and caused many millions of deaths and untold suffering. And though their numbers don’t reflect millions of deaths the following empires were also exceedingly brutal and bloodthirsty; Maori, Comanche, Vikings, Assyrians, Jews (in the Old Testament), Romans, Aztecs, and pretty much any country in the Middle East today. But, sure … this cretin thinks Boomers are worse than all of that!
I was thinking on these things this past Lord’s Day and while meditating, or perhaps sleeping, a bright flash of light appeared and I think I heard a voice from above say; — “There is none so blind as he who will not see!“. I began to tremble and quake and I thought to myself; “Good Lord! What if The Amoeba is correct?? Have I, the great Stucky, and all my cohorts of similar age actually caused the fall of Mighty Babylon? Woe is me, woe is me!” Really.
And so, as such, I have decided to ponder and then write about my findings regarding this Great Mystery. Since a picture is worth a thousand words I’ll be using the “Pictorial Essay” format. Obviously, I simply can not include every event from 1968 for it was truly a momentous year, and detailing all of it would require a small book. So, I’ll choose Nine Events. I do so in hopes that the items I selected will reveal some kind of pattern which will unlock some previously unknown “secrets” concerning Boomers. Are we Boomers mostly Saints, or Sinners, both, or neither? I must know!
I chose 1968 mostly because it was 50 years ago, and I love round numbers. Also, the passing of half a century ought to be a sufficient amount of time to come to certain conclusions.
The earliest Boomers (1946) were already out of college or in the workforce, and the earliest Boomers (1964) were just entering kindergarten. This works out just fine. Considering that boomers are pure evil (worse than the Borg!) then the making of such little demons surely started while they were still in grade school, perhaps even in the womb. For reference, in 1968, I was a sophomore in high school — where the only thing of value I learned came from Wood Shop; that you’ll never accomplish dick without good wood.
Please play along. With each pictorial event you might want to ask yourself; — “Is this event in 1968 generally the beginning of a trend in the USA?“. If “yes”, then perhaps Boomers can be blamed! On the other hand, in 1968 Boomers were between 4 and 23 years old. How much damage can a four year old do to society? How much power did YOU have to actually influence things when you were just twenty-three? If “no”, then who actually started the damned fire?
Naturally, the other question to ask yourself is; — “How does this event in 1968 compare to America today?” Have things gotten better, or worse?
So, let’s get started.
========================================= =
1)- Andy Warhol’s “Blue Movie”.
Here is how the film is generally viewed today: It is basically a lot of talk. A documentary about life in the sixties. Even Andy Warhol said it’s mostly about Vietnam. Viva and Louis, the primary actors, tell each other many stories, cook food together, …. and screw in the shower. Yet, Variety said that it was actually the “deconstruction of pornography” … that it lovingly concentrated on the “affectionate relationship” between its stars. Well, the PC police can call it anything they want. Fact is, the movie was originally called “Fuck” (not, “Affectionate Relationships”). The other fact is that in 1968, that bastion of Conservative Values, the New York Times, even they called it “heterosexual pornography” As such, it was the FIRST adult erotic film depicting explicit sex to receive wide theatrical release in the United States.
Porn today is a hundred billion dollar industry worldwide. Porn sites put up billboards in Times Square and online news sources everywhere. You can hardly be on the internet for more than three minutes before being bombarded with porn. On The Burning Platform it’s 3 seconds. lol
Twitter has 10+ million porn accounts. Every month porn sites get more regular traffic than Netflix, Amazon, Twitter, and The Burning Platform …. combined. Pornhub (world’s largest porn site) gets 65 MILLION visitors per day. 35% of ALL internet downloads are porn-related. Porn has become so mainstream in our society that even the President of the United States can get an affectionate blowjob in the Oral Office from his mistress, and not suffer any consequences.
Just four years after “Blue Movie”, in 1972 hardcore porn became mainstream with the release of “Deep Throat” (a movie about blow jobs not involving Bill Clinton) which was shown on commercial theaters across America, and tabloids showing even Frank Sinatra and Barbara Walters in the audience, and the star of the show even appeared on William F. Buckley’s “Firing Line” to debate whether or not sucking down a cock (we’re not talking about chickens here) qualifies as obscenity. This is rather stunning when you consider that not even a decade earlier Dick Van Dyke and Mary were only shown sleeping in separate beds, and you couldn’t even say the word “pregnant” on the Lucy show …. even though Lucy was pregnant!
2)- ARPANET.
AlGore did not invent the Internet. The guys in the photo above did. (There might be a Boomer in the pic.) In July, 1968, ARPA requested a proposal for bids on a device called the Interface Message Processor. The technology would allow a network of “Host Computers” to communicate with one another. An American company named BBN (pic above) won the contract. By 1969, the first working Internet arrived in the USA which connected exactly FOUR universities (UCLA, Stanford Research Institute, the University of California-Santa Barbara, University of Utah.) You can read about the real history of the internet here. You’ll discover such fascinating details as what it was originally going to be called; The Intergalactic Computer Network (really, and then they got rid of the “galactic” part when they likely realized how difficult it would be to string copper wire all the way to Uranus). Clearly, in retrospect, this one development in 1968 changed the course of human history more than all other events combined.
3)- Tet Offensive and Walter Cronkite (a lying son of a bitch!).
Fact #1. The 1968 Tet Offensive did catch the USA by surprise and, as such, was a psychological defeat. Fact #2. In military terms, the Tet Offensive was a military disaster for the North Vietnamese. If you believe it was a military defeat for the United States then you are ignorant of the facts or, you know the facts and you’re just an idiotic sheep. I won’t argue with you but, would encourage you to read this piece in the Smithsonian. Fact #3. It was a political victory for the North Vietnamese primarily because Walter Cronkite, CBS, New York Times, and other MSM decided in 1968 to become lying sonsofbitches — i.e.; FAKE NEWS!!! — in order to affect the outcome of the war as they wanted. It was ….
“America’s FIRST MAJOR ENCOUNTER with the Big Lie, with all its disastrous consequences, started 50 years ago today, when the American mainstream media — CBS and the other networks, plus the New York Times and the Washington Post — decided to turn the major Communist Tet offensive against U.S. forces and South Vietnam on January 30, 1968, into an American defeat, rather than what it actually was: a major American victory.” —– Hudson.org
4)- Black Power.
One of the most iconic images of the 1960’s is the above picture taken at the 1968 Summer Olympics; black athletes protesting police brutality at a sporting event. According to Wiki here;
“By 1968 Black Power was a recognized movement embraced by the majority of African-American youth. New organizations that supported Black Power philosophies ranging from socialism to black nationalism, including the Black Panther Party, grew to prominence.”
The Black Panthers developed the Ten Point Program (in 1966). The first section is titled “What We Want Now!” Point 8 states; — “We want freedom for ALL Black men held in federal, state, county and city prisons and jails.” Point 10 states; — “We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace.” (I’m not making this up.)
The second section is titled “What We Believe” and outlines their philosophical views (which basically condemns all whites as racists). Point 2 states; — “We believe that the federal government is responsible and obligated to give EVERY [black] man employment or a guaranteed income.” Black lives matter!! Nowhere is there any talk whatsoever about their own responsibilities. Apparently, they have none.
How is all this any different 50 years later?
5)- 2001: A Space Odyssey:
This was the #1 grossing movie in 1968. It’s a good movie and I enjoyed it in 1968, and even again just last year when I watched it on demand. But, let’s briefly compare the beginning and the end of 2001 to the original Star Trek (in it’s second season in 1968) to see how it changed the SciFi genre, and consequently (maybe) how we think.
Gene Roddenberry was an avowed humanist who at times said some rather uncomplimentary things about Christianity. Nevertheless, themes about God and Gods were rampant throughout the original Star Trek, and also all of the offshoots. The original had an episode that clearly resembled the Adam and Eve story. Another episode featured a Greek-like God who liked to play with humans as if they were toys. TNG (the next generation) had a very Godlike being named Q. In one episode of TNG the android Data contemplates his own death, what it means, and what his “life” has meant so far … and in another episode he’s most anxious to meet his “creator”. And one of the best God-lines ever appear in Deep Space 9; –“That’s what gods do. After all, why be a god if there’s no one to worship you?“.
God was everywhere. Check out this article titled Star Trek’s Religious Themes Or, this one “Star Trek: The God Thing”. Or, this very interesting article “What Star Trek Teaches Us About Faith 50 Years Later” which makes the remarkable claim that “Star Trek is one of the most pro-Christian shows ever to air.”.
In contrast, the opening sequence in 2001 (above pic) leaves no room for God: mankind arrives on the scene via the Ape, and a pissed off Ape at that (must of been the First Democrat) … who eventually evolves to the point of space travel a few frames later. Friedrich Nietzsche, of “God is dead” fame, would have also enjoyed this movie.
It is the closing act in 2001 where things get really bizarre and trippy. Whom among us actually understood it the first time around? Some are still debating what it “means” 50 years later! Strangely and oddly enough, unlike Roddenbury, Stanley Kubrik said that “the God concept is at the heart of the film“. I suppose he’s talking about that weird ending which is interpreted by some to be religiously oriented — the character being resurrected into some kind of heavenly being. People surely enjoyed the special effects which were nothing short of revolutionary for the time, and as a consequence, paid less attention to what was really going on. It is somewhat shocking to see a mystical ending to a film when everything preceding it was grounded in Entirely Natural (god less) reality. I’m not buying the spiritual line of reasoning.
Much of what happened in 1968 can be seen as The Great Journey Inward. Star Trek was about “boldly going” out and exploring the “Final Frontier”. Kirk battled enemies like Klingons (Russians) and killed the bastards, good always triumphed over evil, and there was always a lesson or moral to be learned from each episode.
In contrast, 2001 has no real enemies except maybe HAL — after all, it was the Dawning of the Age Of Aquarius, and only Apes kill in the beginning of the movie. Groovy. The movie ends on a psychedelic trip of mind blowing sights and sounds, where climax is achieved when the adult protagonist is transformed backwards into a galactic fetus enveloped in the amniotic fluid of space, contemplating scenes of Earth of which it might or might not be aware …. Jeez!! So, what is the actual lesson of the movie? There’s no lesson. But, there is a message. If Star Trek’s catchphrase was “To boldly go where no man has gone before” then 2001’s tagline should be “The ultimate trip, man!” Speaking of trips …
(Note #1: HAL is not a “one-off” code for IBM. It is an acronym for “heuristic” and “algorithmic”)
(Note #2: 1968 was a great year for iconic movies; Planet of the Apes, Rosemary’s Baby, Bullitt, Night of the Living Dead, The Odd Couple, Yellow Submarine, Love Bug, Hang ’em High.)
6)- The MERRY PRANKSTERS and Trippin’ on LSD
In 1968, Tom Wolfe wrote “The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test“. The book became a bestseller and cemented Tom Wolfe as one of the founding fathers of New Journalism — an application of fictional techniques to nonfiction writing, which included such writers as; Hunter S. Thompson, Norman Mailer, and Joan Didion. More people than not consider it the definitive book of sixties counterculture.
In it he tells the true story of Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) the ultimate hippie, and his band of groupies, the Merry Pranksters, who zigged and zagged across the country in a far out converted school bus. Wolf traces the hippie phenomenon back to the early 60’s when Kesey and his Merry Pranksters organized the first West Coast LSD parties; aka “acid tests”. These experiments gave the psychedelic revolution its momentum and meaning. From them came the style of dress, music, and graphic arts that permeated the 60’s popular culture. An excerpt from the book;
“The Acid Test were one of those outrages, one of those scandals, that create a new style or a new world view. Everyone clucks, fumes, grinds their teeth over the bad taste, the bad morals, the insolence, the vulgarity, the childishness, the lunacy, the cruelty, the irresponsibility, the fraudulence, and, in fact gets worked up into such a state of excitement, such an epitasis, such a slaver, they can’t turn it loose. It becomes a perfect obsession.”
It turns out that the Grateful Dead were YUGE fans of the Acid Tests. Owsley “Bear” Stanley was the sound engineer for the band. Another excerpt from the book;
“In any case [Owsley] started buying the Dead equipment such as no rock ‘n’ roll band ever had before, the Beatles included, all manner of tuners, amplifiers, receivers, loudspeakers, microphones, cartridges, tapes, theater horns, booms, lights, turntables, instruments, mixers, servile mesochroics, whatever was on the market. The sound went down so many microphones and hooked through so many mixers and variable lags and blew up in so many amplifiers, and roiled around in so many speakers and fed back down so many microphones, it came on like a chemical refinery. There was something wholly new and deliriously weird in the Dead’s sound, …. it was pure ambrosial candy for the brain with creamy filling every time … and practically everything new in rock ‘n’ roll came out of it.“
In this fine interview given in 1999 Wolf had this to say; — “LSD lets you in on something. When you’re tripping, the idea of race disappears; the idea of sex disappears; you don’t even know what species you are sometimes. And I don’t know of anybody who hasn’t come back from that being more humane, more thoughtful, more understanding.”
Doesn’t that sound GRRREAT?? Not only should marijuana be legalized in America — it’s 2018 fer cryin’ out loud!!! — but I think they should replace the fluoride in out water supply with LSD!! At this point in American history trippin’ on Acid Tests is about the only thing that will save us. Really. LSD was one of the greatest things to come out of that era.
7)- HAIR.
Nude Hippies! Yeah! This article says it changed Broadway [and possibly us] forever. The onstage nudity was “a cry for freedom, and it reflected the reality of what was happening.” This is a funny story; a city ordinance had to be found that allowed onstage nudity “as long as the actors didn’t move“. Sounds like my ex-wife in bed. Diane Keaton was an original cast member … but she refused to take off her clothes. She was saving herself for Michael Corleone. This play did almost as much as Wolf’s “Acid Test” book in defining the beatnik subculture for mainstream America. One reviewer said immediately after seeing the play; — “Oh, that’s the reason my son is that way!”
Most people equate the play solely with it’s very strong anti-war themes … and there’s nothing wrong with that! One of the best images was the “4U slogan” — “We are the unwilling, led by the unqualified, to do the unnecessary for the ungrateful“. Sums up the Vietnam War fairly nicely, I think. The anti-war slogan gained public currency when a photograph appeared of it painted on a US airforce base in Vietnam. To bad NO ONE in America today — young or old, Red, Blue, black or white — gives enough shits to protest our endless wars. So, why include this seemingly benign play in this list?
Because I believe it was, if not the beginning of two trends, it surely was the beginning of giving them great legitimacy. First, you have the African-American cries of racism, blaming all their problems on others, and playing the Eternal Victim. Second, it reinforced the decade’s ongoing cries for Social Justice, persuading millions more white American than Rev. King and his band of Merry Demanders ever did. It was the beginning of Identity Politics.
One-third of the cast was African-American. Ebony magazine called it “the biggest outlet for black actors in the history of the American theater.” The song “Colored Spade” featured a number of terms that would cause liberals today to have an anal cavity aneurysm; “pickaninny, jungle bunny, jigaboo, nigger, and White Boys“. One of the jungle bunny cast members said; “African-Americans in Hair were saying what was wrong with our society”. How refreshing. Of course, once again, nothing was wrong with their society.
The show’s co-creators, Rado and Ragni, make it clear that the war is not only racist (!!!!), but is merely the next chapter in a long history of “imperialism” which has seen the “white man” being pitted against the “red man” and the “black man“, and in Vietnam, both were pitted against the “yellow man“. The song “Ain’t Got No” addresses the poverty of black Americans dispossessed and alienated by “capitalism“.
The play also addressed a whole host of other social issues; drug use, racism (natch), inter-racial relationships, sexuality, youth alienation, unwed mothers, lesbian and homosexual relationships (nothing wrong with it), and, as mentioned capitalism (bad!), colonialism (bad!) and imperialism (bad!).
As such, not everyone was pleased. . Leonard Bernstein walked out of the production. So did two of the three Apollo 13 astronauts. As they toured the heartland the actors were at times detained, harassed or arrested by the police. Also, two separate United States Supreme Court cases dealt with attempts to shut down productions.
Further reading … not an endorsement as I have not read it, but it does look interesting and accurate based on reviews I’ve read; “Hair: The Story Of A Show That Defined A Generation”
8)- U.S.S. Pueblo.
(North Korean photo of captured American sailors. Please note that they are surreptitiously giving Da Norks da finger!)
I am including this 1968 event because it was So Damned Successful — a beautiful blueprint for ALL future American Wars for freedom! OK, I’m not very good at sarcasm. The fact of the matter is that this event was a complete failure of American foreign policy! Instead of learning from this clusterfuk of epic proportions it seems that all American Military Policy in subsequent years has used it as a blueprint.
I wonder if Americans truly understand the Hell that the USAF rained down on the North Koreans; over 600,000 tons of bombs (more than were dropped in the Pacific Theater during WWII), every village bombed, 85% of North Korean buildings destroyed, and 20% (!!!) of its population killed. And even that wasn’t enough. General MacArthur requested 34 atomic bombs to create “a belt of radioactive cobalt across the neck of Manchuria so that there could be no land invasion of Korea from the north for at least 60 years”.
Despite all this, America did not win the war.
America rained down death and destruction in Vietnam but, did not win against a bunch of Gooks with rusted rifles, sandals, and a bowl of rice.
In Afghanistan for 16 years, our trillion dollar military can’t beat a bunch of mud dwellers with rusted Kalashnikov rifles, towels on their heads, and a falafel sandwich.
What we should have learned; it’s damned near impossible to defeat a people on their home soil especially if they are willing to fight to the death of the last man standing.
Fortunately, thanks to Trump, we are now near-Allies with North Korea. But, we are humming war songs about bomb, bomb, Iran. Should it happen it’ll be over in a month, they say! But, wait, there’s more! There has been open talk among both politicians and military planners in the past year that America could win a First-Strike nuke war with Russia. The Hit Parade of 1968ish Clusterfuks keep on coming even in 2018, and seemingly will be with us forever, … until the first mushroom clouds appear over Washington D.C.
9)- Second Latin American Bishops’ Conference, Medellin, Columbia
(Many of the world’s problems could be eliminated if people would simply refuse to trust people wearing goofy hats.)
It eventually changed the face, and mission, of the Catholic Church. I say “eventually” because Rome initially rejected most of the proclamations issued by the Bishops. The movement’s leaders were replaced, exiled to far off placed, ordered to keep silent, some were outright condemned by Pope John Paul II — and there were secular reprisals including torturous imprisonments and death squad assassinations, such as happened to El Salvador’s archbishop Oscar Romero which, in effect, turn them into martyrs for the movement.
The bishops denounced the systematic oppression of the poor. They criticized the exploitation of the Third World by industrialized nations. They stated that the Latin Church was different than the Church in Europe because they had a different mission. They claimed to have a practical application of faith … which became known as Liberation Theology. They published “A Theology of Liberation”, which caused activists to establish a grass roots organization known as The Church Of The Poor, which was light on religious dogma, but heavy on social activism. The movement eventually produced books such as “Jesus Christ Liberator” and “Church, Charism, and Power” … all of which were thinly disguised versions of Marxism. Sadly, what The Church initially rejected in 1968 … today, in 2018, it embraces and cherishes with open arms. While sin was crouching at the door (Gen. 4:6-7) the Church just opened it wider than ever.
10)- The Rest Of 1968.
The Boys in the Band debuts on Broadway … the first major contemporary play to deal with homosexuality. In the first major women’s march since the Suffragette Era, 5,000 women march in Washington D.C to protest the war in Vietnam and the social crisis at home. Star Trek airs America’s first interracial TV kiss on a major show (Capt. Kirk and Lt. Uhura). O.J. wins the Heisman Trophy. MLK and RFK are assassinated. All making their debut; Boeing 747, Waterbeds, Hot Wheels, Laugh-In, Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood, Virginia Slims, and In-a-gadda-da-vida. Jackie marries Aristotle. Mrs. Robinson becomes America’s first and hottest celebrity Cougar. It was a HELLUVA year!!!
CLOSING COMMENTS
So, was 1968 the beginning of the end for America? Of course, not! Not any more than the year prior, the year after, or any other year — although some folks make a case for certain years, such as; 1913 when the Federal Reserve was created or, 1962 when prayer was taken out of schools or, 1971 when Nixon abandoned the gold standard.
Speaking of Nixon, after all the chaos and craziness that took place in 1968 — isn’t it odd that Nixon won in a landslide in Nov. 1968? Amidst all the Crazy Shit, Americans elected a (relative) conservative who last held office as Dwight Eisenhower’s vice president! One of his big campaign themes was a promise to return to a Warren Harding-ish “return to normalcy“. Actually, that sounds almost Trump-ian!
What is the meaning of life? God!! It seems to be a human condition to take a very complex question and boil it down to a simple answer that all can understand. Sometimes it works. Other times the “simple answer” is just proof of a “simple mind”. Such is the case of those who blame all, or most, of America’s current problems on just one group of people of a certain age — a level of simplicity that even a caveman would reject. I listed just nine issues, from just one year, which may (some will say, not) have contributed to where America is today. But, there are many thousands of historical issues to consider, along with the actions and reactions of millions of people … probably going all the way back to when the Mayflower landed at Plymouth Rock. For example, we really should have left John Casor in Africa! So, please, don’t be a Moran with your #BoomerDerangementSyndrome.
1968 was in many ways un-civil as all the various tribes of renegades retreated into their own self-made cocoon of selfish interests. Abraham Lincoln in his first inaugural address said; — “I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection”
Citizenship is a shared thing. How is shared citizenship even possible in America when its would-be citizens share so damned little in common anymore? Just about all we have in common is the pornography of food, the McDonald’s Big Mac, also introduced in 1968. Citizenship simply can’t be shared between hostile alien people who happen to occupy the same territorial space.
In closing, citizenship also requires at least some level of self-sacrifice. Perhaps it even means giving up some of our own perceived individual “rights” for the benefit of the whole. But, how is that even possible in today’s America where virtually every aspect of community is strained through the narcissistic filter of the most extreme childish kind — like that giant cosmic infant in 2001 Space Odyssey whose entire universe revolves around itself.
The Great Inward Narcissism of 1968 had the motto; “Turn on, tune in, drop out.” In 2018 it’s #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo, ad infinitum. Our world ends where our noses do. And that’s no way to keep a country.
.
The End.
Replying to TMWNN August 9, 2018 1:35 pm
It is one of them MWNN… I think there were multiple versions after the Anonymous one. If this posts, it will be the first “reply” I’ve been able to make.
I couldn’t reply. Let’s see if I can still Comment..
Ta Da… I have been elevated to the OC level of TBP commenter. Original comments only, never a reply. Has kind of a Return to Sender ring to it, doesn’t it?
Edit: And, while I can edit my comments for the hour, I can’t REPLY to my own comment, which was what I was trying to do when I discovered the thumbs up issue.
So, I might assume the lad with no label, boy with no badge or the titan with no title is perusing this and might tell me which cookies I should eat so that my replies might be acceptable.
The baby boomers didn’t start the fire. They only threw full gas cans on it.
That’s a simple point to a complex generational equation I up-voted.
Sometimes the fuel of a fire is accidental and sometimes its intentional but every time the accident or the intention comes down to the individual.
Me…I have my issues on a lot of selfish, prideful sins in my past…but on this one…I sleep sound.
Nihilism took root among western civilization long before the boomers, but they commercialized and promoted it.
The boomers put the lotion in the bucket for subsequent generations and started yelling “It puts the lotion!!!”
Yep! That’s why I voted for Trump! Burn baby burn.
It is unwise to blame a generation, when no generation is an island.
The truth is that history (time) never ceases. It is easy to point out some causative events from any particular point and say “this is what led to the shitty situation in which we find ourselves”.
Ultimately, the only blame we can place on our current situation is in the mirror – asking “what have I done to remedy the situation”. I think people stop at that point and say “but it is rational to see that one man can not change the things that need changing”. To which I would reply: who says you have to? If enough people could master themselves, much of the rest would work itself out.
EC… I write a huge comment to provide background for my own argument that the ADA of 1990 was the actual straw that broke everyone’s back.
And all you saw was the breastfeeding reference.
Perv.
I cannot reply. I am in OC (Original commenter) status. I will be known as that strange lady with the big dog who randomly posts replies in odd places. It will become a game to figure out to whom I am replying.
Or not.
Waves at MC… the joke about the nanny goat is that her name was already Mary Bess.
It began in 1965, with the Hart-Cellar Immigration Act, when Boomers couldn’t vote, after a number of insane laws had been passed earlier, like ADC, which discouraged marriage and work. We can safely blame those laws on the WW2 generation and the Silent generation….
Thanks, Stuck, well done.
Obviously, a combination of many factors has led to the decline of America and its culture and morals. Many of those factors are listed in the above comments. One that came to my mind was the movement of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research from Frankfurt, Germany to Columbia College in 1935.
It was then, it seems, that the long march through the institutions began. The incremental degradation of our morals and culture was intentionally set in motion by (((those))) that still seek to do further harm to this country, drip by drip.
I just can’t seem to reply here, yet I can make a direct comment to the original post. Interesting.
I wanted to slip this into the discussion about the on-again/off-again taboo on nipples here on the platform. I tried to reply to SUDS:
Especially when breastfeeding over a period of several months.
NOT YEARS, you MORAN.
Stuckito, I recall your advice to candidate Trump was, be likable. Governor Reagan had to commission some folks to find out how he could become likable. It served him well later when he was running for president. Later, when Bush 2 stole the election, he began sounding like Uncle Ronnie. Hillary adopted Obama’s “Let me be clear” phrase.
Where I am going with this is, the person we know as president is a product developed from whatever worked with the electorate. If Uncle Ronnie appeared daft in his second term, Bush 2 also acted like a moron. Trump has adopted some of this persona to curry favor with the dolts who support his hazy policies.
I mentioned once or twice before that the tough guy presidents we grew up with (JFK, LBJ, Nixon) morphed into Clem Kadiddlehopper after the Nixon goat rope. Maybe they got the message that Boomers were not going to knuckle under to the bitch-slap and dukes of the previous generation.
If getting elected is simply a matter of being likable, I gotta run. I will be a shoo in. Nobody more likable than me anywhere!
Personally, fuck likeable. I want competent. I hire and employ lots of assholes. But those assholes make me money. I learn to like them as a result.
They are all lovable at election time. I’m just wondering how appearing to be retarded is a presidential quality? Retardedness becomes a Teflon sheen, people excuse your errors in judgment because, dumbass.
A really nice post, Stucky. Obviously it took considerable time. Very well written. All too often people post shit that reads like “thinking out-loud pablum”. Thank you for taking the time to make it read well.
Now on to the “hate”: as one of the oldest Gen Xers (born in ’66), what we recognized in the Boomers was how you first tolerated the lunacy you just described. But you went on to completely accept it. Then you actually championed all of it. And now you have moved-on to passing laws that penalize those who refuse to embrace the insanity. That speaks of a generation that lacks any real discernment.
God speaks of judging people via the Generation. The Jews have a long written and oral history. They have a theory that asserts that any generation that follows a generation that accomplished great things (think Greatest Generation winning WWII) that the next generation always has a rebellious spirit out of spite because they know they can never measure-up to what their parents accomplished.
I just wanted to put in my 2 cents to help on the way to 200 comments. The piece deserves it.
I’m pretty sure young people read your shit and think Yuppie Douchebag, not boomer asshole. Overeducated useless assholes are a dime a dozen.
OK, here’s your dime now let’s see your performance.
Nah waste of time Junior… ole Dennis is worth a nickel at best and he is still somehow an asshole
A fuckin nickel? Well that’s inflation for you. Go back to suckin dick at the bus station to pay the rent frog warrior.
The boomers didn’t really take the reigns of society until the 1980’s. They changed the culture by the 70’s. Society has been accelerating downward since JFK was fucking pill heads in Sinatra’s living room. Casually accepted abortions started long before the 70’s. It was a generational domino effect. This country has had big social problems for a long time, and they’ve been catching up more and more rapidly.
The baby boomers were an acceleration of all that decline. The rampant drug use, divorce, etc.
I do appreciate that they put skylights and recessed lighting in their kitchens. That was the best thing they did.
Throw this in pot and stir. My folks surely did their fair share of skylights, walkout sliders, and recessed lighting back in the day.
[img
/[img]
Look, people younger than the so-called Boomers are just jealous because we discovered sex, had all the good music (these Millennials certainly don’t have any good music), we had great cars, we had jobs, money and knew how to enjoy life. These young smudges can’t even pour piss out a boot with the instructions written on the heel and they blame us? Sorry, snowflakes, you want everything handed to you plus you want your participation award. Move out of the parent’s place, get a job and stop whining.
Boomers went through wild changes over several decades. We were busy hanging on and trying to be normal per what our parents said was normal. It didn’t work out that way for us, but we just kept on going.
“Every generation blames the one before.” [orginal author unknown]
I don’t take anyone seriously if they assess blame to an entire generation — they are a dim witted individual immersed in group identity. Such a person is probably suffering from low intelligence, or they’ve been forcibly programmed. It’s best to ignore them unless you feel personal responsibility to rescue them from their own stupidity.
That said, as a mid-generational boomer, the consequences of our youthful indiscretions, in terms of yielding a FUBAR representative government, is pretty embarrassing! Clearly, the generation before is to be blamed for developing weapons of mass destruction, mutually assured destruction, and the duck/cover drills that drove Bill and George to doing brain damaging drugs 😉
I still can’t reply to anyone else’s comments. Don’t bother TMWNN. I will get my rocket scientist son to help me figure it out.
I can’t believe LLPOH didn’t jump right into my shit over my “dead ovary” stipend. Believe me, there have been times I’ve tried to figure out how to stop taking the dead ovary money yet stay on the service-connected list for medical care purpose. Since there have been several complications from that botched operation (beginning with a OB/GYN doctor who was, indeed, fired for practicing without a license but I could not sue since I was active duty) which led to hernia repair and [EGAD!!! ADMIN, she’s talking about the agony of menstrual cramps!]
irregular bleeding.
What does this have to do with Stucky’s thesis? I think it relates.
I was born in December 1961, so I’m barely a boomer. My oldest sibling, ten years older, wore hippie garb (when parents allowed) and listened to In A Gadda Da Vida nonstop (it seemed) in the 8 track player under the dash in the 1972 Chevy Vega she drove. I admit thinking it was the neatest little car… then I bought it from her in 1978 and learned to repair/replace alternators, belts, carburetors (I installed a Holly 4 barrel! in that little POS) and I became close enough friends with the junk yard owner I could climb the fence on Sunday, find the part I needed and remove it from the three junk Vegas he had on site, leave him a note and pay him next visit. I was a regular. The stories I could tell. Some I may have already told here.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 did a lot more damage to cultural norms than any of us can grasp, I believe.
There is a herd of elephants in that room. No fault divorce, abortion, birth control and a relentless advertising campaign designed to maximize the numbers of people able to purchase products which were being mass produced on a scale never before conceived. I remember the Russian comic Yakov Smirnov? joking about the first time he went to a US grocery store and saw an entire aisle full of cereal boxes and had a nervous breakdown.
The need to get both parents out of the home, working and purchasing as many products as possible was disguised as women’s liberation.
So, back to my dead ovary.
Why, exactly, do I get a hundred dollars monthly for the loss of my creative organ, which btw, I wasn’t planning to use for creating any more? In fact, Nick got a vasectomy ASAP when I turned up pregnant. I was still pregnant when he had the operation. How come the AF didn’t give him a disability rating for the loss of his sperm? Voluntary? Um, no. A female friend of mine got an elective hysterectomy while in service, then separated after 8 years and was awarded that 50% disability for loss of all creative organs. Really. She had bad cramps and asked the flight doctor to authorize the operation. A few years later, she got out of service and applied for the disability for it. That was in 1990 and she has since graduated from college and is a GS-12 at the “depot” there in OKC. You do the math if you know pay rates.
So, when I found out I was going to get a lump sum to separate from the USAF with a disabling condition that was hardly disabling (just because I couldn’t bend far enough to pass the flying physical requirements while holding 30 pounds or whatever the stupid requirement was) and the VA would pay for me to complete college… well, I felt like I’d hit paydirt and asked where to sign.
Admit that you do not blame me, EC. You were in the USAF then, too. It sucked while Clinton was king and the idea of NOT having to deploy to stinking Saudi Arabia ever again appealed to me. I really did loathe that place for many reasons, not the least of which was that the Saudi “handlers” appeared to be arrogant assholes who considered every one of us (male and female) beneath them. I hated watching our commanders kiss the asses of those fat dudes in white dresses. I mean, really… did we need a MISSION that badly? I suppose so, but I had just returned from a horrid post-Desert Storm deployment to Saudi when I began to experience back pains, so it was easy for me to declare the injury happened in the air in Saudi, which made it combat-related. Big. Cheesy. Grin.
I knew then I would not get a disability check, which was fine, because the lump sum severance would have to be “repaid” by the VA disability I would normally receive. Honestly, I did not care. I was going to get to stay home with my baby, attend college at my leisure and receive a VA subsistence allowance ($600 + monthly for full-time students) and, gasp, purchase all my school supplies at the Campus Bookstore, where an account in my name allowed me to buy ANY book or item I could convince the store manager was related to my Vocational Rehabilitation. I bought a really nice EOS Rebel (Kodak) when I took my first photography class, for example. I still have it. I love it. It is obsolete.
I graduated and went to work as a government contractor. (Choice of driving into the city to work for the stinking OKC media or drive a couple miles to base and edit courseware close to son’s school.) Worked and saved to buy this place to retire early.
Here’s the rub.
A couple of years ago, that disability stipend paid off that lump sum medical severance. And, since SCOTUS has deemed medical severance from the military non-taxable, I am going to get a check for the taxes they withheld (we didn’t make enough money then for it to make that big a difference. Really. But, I’ll take it) and, apparently, there is some litigation ongoing which may end up throwing that entire lump sum severance I have repaid with my disability (talk about peter and paul) my way. Really.
LLPOH, are you listening? I am not lying. My husband says this: Well, the bastards stole a chunk of my retirement and gave it to my lesbian ex-wife (yes, she is and a bull-dyke to boot!) because of that bitch Schroeder who stuck a significant piece of law into the Defense Bill called the Former Spouses Protection Act, which the SCOTUS refuses to hear in spite of it being unconstitutional on its face!… I digress.
Okay, here is an email from Quinn asking about my reply problem. What other blog has an Admin who watches over us like a nursemaid trying to resolve our problems with posting? I’ll stop my ramble for now, ready for all the blasts about how I should just stop taking the dead ovary money because, well, it isn’t right.
How does one stop taking the stipend and still retain the right to have the medical problem caused by the military treated, if necessary? Or, is the “right” for military treatment an imagined right on my part?
I may edit this, but I can’t reply to any replies. Yet.
So, here’s the money shot.
What did that serpent say to Eve at that tree, fellows? Did he tCell her she could become like the Creator if she were to eat of that tree? Or, did he tell her some other half-truth which even better accomplished the Fall?
It was the other half-truth, I think. The one about having the Right to eat of the tree.
Charmed by the strange lizard at the forbidden tree where she and Adam loved to sit and thread clover stems into long chains to weave into their hair, which was blond or black, depending upon whose viewpoint you wear, Eve couldn’t resist the idea that the tree was indeed in her garden. Certainly, she had a right to know what was growing on that tree. Then, she remembered the Creator’s exact words: Choose as you will, freely. Free will. Hmmm. Could there possibly be wiggle room to imply a right to choose? And, if one has a right to choose, then that certainly widens the gap to suggest one would know the outcomes of the choices. Making it absolutely necessary that she taste the fruit of that tree, as was her RIGHT, according to her new Salamander pal. The Free Will gift required it.
I suspect the serpent was a sleezy trial lawyer, who was naturally present for the first matrimonial dispute. And, after planting the idea in the woman’s mind that because she could actually produce life inside her body, she was actually already LIKE the Creator, so by eating of the tree of knowledge, along with Adam, the serpent convinced her, would honor the Creator by showing that their exercise of Free Will was their Right.
Back to my dead ovary.
Did any of you know that I have an entitlement to a piece of the tax pie because the Air Force hired a bunch of cheap quack doctors to staff their OB/GYN clinics in the Clinton years? You know, those days when Hillary was doing a big push for medical reform and there was all kinds of Reinventing of Government through public/private competition, wink-wink. Those days when big pharma and big military industry were introduced.
Well, those were also the days when the idea of it “being time” for a certain gender in a certain job became commonly understood. (Big Coincidence… Nick just turned on the TeeVee and there was a story of Ruth Bader Guinesberg’s impact on the court — ask VMI). Exact time frame I’m referencing.
And, it really is all tied together in a big knot, just like my oversized ovary got all knotted in my innards and has cost the U.S. taxpayer about a hundred bucks a month since November 1994. You do the math.
I had a RIGHT to that ovary.
And, now that I can reply and before smartypants tbp pops in… I really am “Beating a Dead Ovary” here to make a point.
That has to be a first here on the platform, eh?
I can’t use a dead ovary. How about that bra, did you throw that in the water?
Well, Hmmmm…. I gave several folks an opportunity to call me out for being on the government dole for an ovary which did not release the cysts accumulated during pregnancy as one Dr. Rich said at six weeks postpartum. Less than six months later, he’d already been terminated as a doctor there, the AF base hospital commander getting intelligence that the doctor had lost his license to practice in Kansas due to unorthodox alternative maternity practices. He was a perv. Thank God Nick was a doting husband and father-to-be and went to every examination with me. I simply told the man I would have a traditional delivery and we would forego the hot oils on the vaginal lips treatments to prepare for delivery. (I think I get the complaints about unorthodox practices. I can only imagine what got him fired. It must have been that it was 1994, which brought us the Contract With/For America and some really interesting shifts in the way bureaucracy worked in the military and VA, if you were able to have a beer with the kind of people I’d grown comfortable talking to in a variety of red rope type positions in my airborne radar tech position. Once in a while, even Aleshandro was right about people he’d met at the IRS when doing some undercover work (NOT at the beach in Pensacola.)
Nick and are really from two different segments of the baby boomers. Five years made a big difference in point of view then, in some ways more than now. Wait a second and let me explain, Me Hoe, before you get your panties in a wad again.
There’s Vodka pulling his hair out because you write like you’re thinking out loud. You’re not John Updike, not every damn idea is worth writing down! Tell us about the VA or about the Vega.
My goodness, every time I try to read one of your tracts, I have to take a smoke break just to get unpissed. All that schooling and no moranic instructor had the balls to tell you to keep it simple. Oh, no, fucking nerds thought your boobs were doing just fine.
You have a lot of great ideas, but dammit, didn’t somebody ever tell you that men have a one-track mind? Be kind, keep us on one topic for a few minutes. Let’s try this again, maybe start over, even. Now, you were on the beach and the bra came off. Could you elaborate in detail and leave the gross stuff about the ovary for the locker room?
Keep It Simple Stupid. Sure.
Actually, I haven’t included any of the really gross stuff. And, my point is not about the ovary or even the road that took me to volunteer at the VA one day a week after I started back to college. I helped the man literally in charge of the VA’s Vocational Rehab program sort through hundreds if not thousands of case files for veterans applying for retraining after separating or retiring from service.
Did you know a service-connected injury could qualify you for a paid college education (and I heard of cases of Ivy League schools being approved, believe it or not because it was hearsay albeit good hearsay.) I tested the theory a couple of years ago. I talked my cousin’s husband into applying for a disability for tinutus incurred during his two-year stint in Vietnam.
He was awarded a ten percent disability and now receives $110 and change monthly, direct deposit. At least he is 65 and won’t draw it for a half century like I have been doing.
I am not proud of getting him to sign up because now he’s jumped on the wagon with hopes of a PTSD award since he saw combat. But, I did want to test a theory. Tested.
The last time I cared what Vodka thought of me I woke up hugging the porcelain goddess.
And, what could be my final comment here if no one wants to go down this path in the blame game:
At some point, between the time I was born (December 1961) and the year I finished Kindergarten, in its infancy (does anyone remember when First Grade was where you started public education?), someone somewhere had decided there were not only such things as personal rights that could be easily violated by discrimination, those rights were COMPENSABLE.
And, since those violated rights are compensable, with a real dollar value placed on them by Honorable Judges with the unquestionable integrity necessary to determine just how much compensation is due the right-infringed, then it must be the government’s place to not only protect those rights, even RESTORE those rights through affirmative action, which sounds positive but is really very punitive to those innocent standbyers who just happen to have been in the general area when said rights were violated.
Maggie- An entire herd of dead horses have been beaten here but I’m pretty sure you are the first and only dead ovary beater. 🙂
Your a treasure, you take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’! I loved your inspirational speech tale. Don’t worry about my opinion or Vodka’s, Maggie. I do miss you a little bit when your gone.
It wasn’t Maggie’s comments that I had in mind when I mentioned the “thinking-out-loud” pablum spewers. I’ve taken a liking to her in the past year for her authenticness*.
* if this is not an actual word, it should be.
Authenticity.
Authenticity.
“Authenticity” sounds too much straight out of an Obama speech that was written in an attempt to make him sound authentic.
Voluptenticity – too well-endowed to disbelieve
Hey, Stucky, you’re right, 1968 could be the catalyst year. After 1967’s Summer of Love at Haight-Ashbury, which, according to Wikipedia, “attracted a wide range of people … teenagers and college students drawn by their peers and the allure of joining a cultural utopia, middle-class vacationers, partying military personnel from bases within driving distance, the Haight could not accommodate this rapid influx of people, and the neighborhood scene quickly deteriorated. Overcrowding, homelessness, hunger, drug problems, and crime” (including drug-induced rapes and gang-rapes) “afflicted the neighborhood. Many people left in the autumn to resume their college studies.
“And on October 6, 1967, those remaining in the Haight staged a mock funeral … ‘The Death of the Hippie’ ceremony” (including walking with a flower-strewn coffin). “Mary Kasper explained the message of the mock funeral as: ‘We wanted to signal that this was the end of it, don’t come out. Stay where you are! Bring the revolution to where you live! Don’t come here because it’s over and done with.’”
So following 1967’s Summer of Love and Death of the Hippie, all of those shattered utopian/Marxist ideas were taken home throughout the country and started the destruction of everyday America!
Once again, Blame is juts about the most worthless thing we do as humans, as it is ALWAYS backwards-viewing. NO problem has ever been solved by assessing who is to blame. Now, don’t spew that bullshit about finding cause or about establishing/losing trust…related to blame perhaps, but distinct concepts. Blame accomplishes NOTHING EVER…and human beings are fucking experts at it. Blame leads nowhere good.
Analysis of past mistakes, or of past successes and the unintended consequences thereof (which is what this article does and ALL it does), is a very good thing.
I was being facetious in comment above.
I wasn’t responding you your comment or any other specific comment, Vic. Just a general comment on blame.
OK. 🙂
I am told to try the other computer by my son. He is going to examine this laptop. In case you never hear from me again, remember this: Just stay alive! No matter what. Just stay alive.
(my version of Last of Mohican’s McCarthur inspiration)
I am now on Firefox to see if I can reply to myself, per smartypants’ direction.
Dammit. I hate it when he gets to be smug.
My son gets to be smug all the time with me when it comes to phones and computers.
You can unsmug him. I did something this morning that should have fixed the problem you were having. Just a coincidence that you got help at the same time. My fix may be temporary.
“My fix may be temporary” TMWNN said with cetainty as he sat himself back at the controls of the Milennial Falcon. “Let’s unsmug the bastard” he yelled over the roar of the engines as the ship left earth’s orbit.
I have a list of names of folks that need to be unsmugged.
I will “save” this unsmug. He has several interviews for jobs lined up and really needs his SMotherer to back off. I suspected it was you or the complete shutdown of all devices last night. When I was a radar tech flying around the world to keep the skies safe for democracy and stuff, that was the final step in the “Try to Fix the Damned Radar” Checklist.
In any event, I will save it for that day when he catches me in a true dumbass move and I will recognize the need to deflect his smugness quickly and will RETRIEVE this and deliver it promptly.
“Did I ever tell you TMWNN on that blog I read a lot said he’d fixed my problem hours before you insisted I use Firefox. Shit, I got rid of Firefox the next time I logged on.”
And I did. I use Start Page/Internet Explorer on here. Nick has whatever he has on the PC, which is the hub, I suppose, for all our electronic gizmos we use here. (we don’t use some of them here. ever.) He and I have Cricket phones, the free ones, so the memory lacks ability to create holographic images or whatever shit kids are doing these days. I ran out of memory taking pictures of goats on both my phone AND my digital camera and I’ve been reluctant to go in and view the videos I need to save and edit, or delete. Not procrastinating, just unable. (Oh, and I rarely uploaded images HERE, btw… dropping them into various photohosting accounts which may or may not continue to host them. At some point, there has got to be so much of our information gathered by those intent on collecting it that it has to be absolutely INCOHERENT in its totality. Sigh. Yet, searchable in minute and excruciating detail. SQL
I have recently found out that Salmonella is NOT the same thing as those cute lizards which eat bugs and spiders at the edge of the creek. No, Lawsy… I have now lost almost 80 pounds, with about 40 of it on purpose. I’m able to get online again more and more this week, but just between you and me and a couple of weirdos up a lot later than they ought to be on Friday night if they aren’t at a party: Never eat a ham sandwich that doesn’t quite smell right. Just say no. And now that I’ve thought about that particular sandwich and what it did to me for almost two whole weeks, I have to go take a Zantac. Prescription strength.
Never. Again.
200 I WIN!!!!!!!!
Stucky,
I forgot to mention how much I enjoyed your comments about Gene Roddenberry and one of my favorite shows growing up, Star Trek: The Next Generation. Captain Jean Luc Picard was the MAN, I hear he is coming back to the Star Trek Universe soon!
Your mention of ‘ Q’ is funny too. I had a friend over and I was trying to explain to him the Qanon phenomenon and his first thought was the Q continuum from the show!
We joked and both agreed that the episodes with Q in them were some of the best minus any episode with the Borg…
I confided that to him that this Q anon Trump A.J. draining the swamp fighting the deep state narrative is tarnishing the image and legacy of the Real Q from Star Trek The Next Generation !
I never understood why they never made a full length movie of Star Trek with Q…. after all they did one with the Borg.
Holy Crap. We hit 200. Never expected that.
Thanks all.
You are welcome, Stuckenheimer. Did you ever get the chance to read my account of my Billy Goat Simon trying to rape my Nanny Goat Mary Bess? What a PIG of a goat he is! I can’t believe I promised to NOT eat him.
I did NOT promise to not KICK him in the head with my cowboy boot.
Major dude you forgot….”Zimmy don’t I know yer name?”…Bobby Zimmerman…from ’61 “The Times They Are A-Changin” …to ’68 “Lay Lady Lay” Arguably (and regrettably by me) the most influential cultural world changing personality and lately Nobel Peace Prize? (some major prize) winner….he’s mostly still alive folks..like some of the rest of us pre-boomers.
true, you boomers were born well after the plan about a one world tyranny was started,, i dont know why the “woke” folks blame you oldies,, there was truly great whistleblowers from your gen that risked their lives to tell the truth.. so i guess they just take the easy way and blame other victims so they can keep telling themselves they are better..
Baby Boomers, 1968, Khe Sahn.
Where ever pawns go…there they are…and your point is?
MarshHare,
Come out and back up your play….
Chickenshit GenX or Millennia Lawyer…
I had a buddy that did too much LDS back in the 60’s–ended up becoming a missionary.
Sorry. I’ll show myself out. Nice essay Stucky.
It was
It wasn’t any particular Boomer per session, but yes it was the Boomer generation as whole that Fd up America.
The first generation reaping the benefits of world conquest, WWII, and a sense of entitlement for everything. From not serving their country to being amongst the most greedy and self-entitled generation the world has ever known. Now we have their walking abortions, kids, that are even worse. All leading to an eventual world war where they will have their asses handed to them and wish they had never been born. Of only they had fought as hard against affirmative action, equal opportunity, and socialism / communism as they did against the conservative voice.
I’d put money on it being 1973, when Nixon took us off the gold standard. The inflation chart shot up the next day and has never let up. Then the moron tried price controls! But, I look at everything through economics or psychology.
I think something that has been missed in this generational blame game is the role technology has played in it. Most of the young people were born into a world with computers and internet and easy access to information that we didn’t have. This is their reality and they seem to assume that it always has been. We grew up without an alternative media. The MSM was the only media. What Walter Cronkite, Chet Huntley, David Brinkley, John Chancellor, Dan Rather, Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw told us was the information we had to work with.
It’s only been the last 15 or 20 years or so that a lot of the information about what really goes on in the world, and who really runs it, has made it’s way to the citizen at large without first being filtered by the MSM. There was some brilliant ideology being published by the likes of Mises, Rothbard and Hayek , but it was not for mass consumption. It took guys like Ron Paul and G. Edward Griffin to bring it into the open. They could never have had the impact that they’ve had without the internet.
We are creatures of the media of our time. All boomers really had was what was spoon fed to us through our televisions, and yet I think you can give credit to the boomer generation for doing a damn good job of discerning the war lies concerning Vietnam and putting an end to it. Something that has yet to happen with our endless wars that GWB started in the ME.
America’s first major encounter with the Big Lie was not Tet. There was the USS Maine, the Lusitania, Pearl Harbor, Gulf of Tonkin, USS Liberty to name just a few that predated that one.
Yes, that’s correct. In fact, you can go all the way back to the Revolutionary War, as some Big Whoppers were spread around … it seems Wars AND Lies go hand-in-hand.
What I meant by America’s “first major encounter with the Big Lie” is that it was the First Time such a huge Big Lie was OPENLY EMBRACED AND TOLD TO AMERICANS by the television MSM. Cronkite absolutely knew he was telling a fucken lie, his bosses knew … and they went forward with it anyway … in order to affect the outcome. Sounds so much like 2018, does it not?
Speaking of our Revolutionary War ……
For a few months at least I have been considering doing an article or two on “Myths (Lies) About America’s War Of Independence”. There are quite a few — some well known (Paul Revere’s ride), and others are not (Molly Pitcher, a complete fabrication).
It’ll take some big effort … so, I’d like to know ahead of time if folks are interested in such a topic.
The top spot awaits your article. I’m sure it would be great. I’m glad you’ve regained your mojo.
I am. Am limited by how long I can sit here online with goats and rabbits and chickens (and rocket scientists in transit… imagine a (S)motherer with a son home setting up a very impressive calendar of interviews. Am keeping OUT of it, letting him mind his own business.
But, c’mon big firm in Denver suburb! Make an offer he can’t refuse. Momma needs a legal Colorado resident to visit!
I was told when I was a kid that Thomas Jefferson once stored his original notes and thoughts concerning the Declaration of Independence in a little cave near Brown’s Cove Virginia, a little pocket of Colonial Estates where Madison’s and Custers and Browns (obviously) lived, met and discussed how to set up a new way of doing things.
Am sure it was a myth.
Admin / BL / Maggie
OK. Done deal. I’ll shoot for Sept 1.
It’s not that it will take THAT long … but, my mom is taking up a LOT of my time … for example, she can’t even peel potatoes anymore so, I’m cooking/preparing most of her meals … and she doesn’t generally like what Ms Freud and I eat … so, I’m cooking for us and her … and so on with other stuff as well.
Um, Stucky, I think it’s safe to say, all your articles are well received. Well, most of them anyway. 90+% probably. Besides, you’re retired. What else you have to do?
If I read a post I will usually read all the comments that follow before I post a reply so I don’t repeat something someone else may have done better. On a really long thread like this it took some time and I wanted to reply- something not that important about my experience in 1968- but realized that I now have to scroll all the way back to the beginning of the thread to post. By the time I got back to the top I forgot what I was going to write.
Not a good feature of the new layout.
Edit to add; And on posting I discover that the thread is actually inverse with my reply posted at the top of the thread. Does this mean we are always seeing the newest posts first? That makey no sensey.
It goes to the bottom once you refresh.
Still no rule of law in 2018 Trumpland, at least for white folks. Think about it, and stop drinking the Q-Aid.
The criminal illegal who crashed into and killed Afghanistan vet Kevin Quin was free on $1,000 bail, due to his supposed inability to pay higher bail! Until the people flush the bench warmers in state and federal courts, these unelected cocksuckers will make the rules for daily life.
[img
[/img]
I wanted to wait until I had time to read this article before replying. I couldn’t do that during the week because of work responsibilities. The thing about replies is that if you take too long to make them the post is old and no one reads it. Nevertheless, this is about my reply to the “Millenial Socialism” article which got me labeled (unfairly, I truly believe) as an amoeba. I went back and read the article and my reply and I still think my reply was spot on. Do boomers even read? Maybe that’s what changed in 1968. I said we need to stop bashing Millenials and I asked who raised them. That is a valid question. I also pointed out some valid criticisms of Boomers. I never said they started the degeneracy in this society, they simply went along with it and enjoyed it. I said they were not evil and called them cucks. Do Boomers even know what a cuck is? Believe me when I tell you the Comanches and the Mongols were anything but cucks.
The Boomers inherited degeneracy from the Silent generation and the “Greatest Generation”. And from where did those generations learn the degeneracy in their culture? How far back does it go? The fact of the matter is, Boomers as well as numerous others have forgotten cause and effect. That our ‘nation’ is in grave trouble to the point of endangering its continued existence and the lives of day-to-day people did not just happen. Do Boomers not believe in cause and effect anymore? I’m sorry maybe they’ve just been reading too much David Hume. We did not get where we are without some seriously bad decisions on the part of people before us. Who were those people? That is a question worth asking.
Fat guys parading around in tri-cornered hats talking about “muh constitution” are not going to bring back any semblance of sanity to this nation. You can forget the ‘effin constitution. After George Bush finished wiping his ass with it there wasn’t enough left to save for Obama. Was Bush the one who started that? Maybe we should go back to that fool Abraham Lincoln and ask him his opinion of the constitution. Maybe to find the first constitutional ass-wiper we should go back to the first George, who made damn sure to pack it as ass-wiping material when he marched across the Allegheny Mountains in 1792 to arrest my people for exercising their constitutional rights to make a living. That little bit of unpleasantness is unfairly called the Whiskey ‘Rebellion’. There was no rebellion to it. Do Boomers even read enough to know what that is? I guess not, at least, nothing more taxing than ‘effing Lewrockwell.com. Just keep believing that libertarian bull-shit they feed you with your cereal every morning. Your social security and medicare payments and what pensions you have left will keep you fat and fairly comfortable until you die.
My point is that we will not solve the problems we are facing with the tools we have been given by our masters. We are going to have to look up from the television and stupid Yahoo long enough to see that we have been lied to most of our lies and that almost everything we have been told is, indeed, a lie. If you would be truly free, you will have to cast off almost everything you have believed up until now and start asking question; Why? Who? For what reason? The result, after some initial discomfort, will be a great exhilaration when you realize that you are not crazy after all; that you are not Fredo Coerleone after all; you really are smart; that all these things you believe in your heart to be lies are indeed just that. The cognitive dissonance will disappear. Will you then have the answers to our problems? Probably not, but you will have gone a long way toward finding them.
Aodh, First you tell us we don’t know how to read and then you tell us our problem is that we’ve read too much David Hume. If we were as illiterate as you presume Hume would be some tough sledding. You sneer at Lew Rockwell, who is anti-war, anti-state, pro free markets and pro-liberty. You rail about our masters out of one side of your mouth and then you rail against the very people who have pointed out who the masters are, what they are doing to us, why they are doing it and what must be done to rid ourselves of those masters from the other side of your mouth. And then you have the gall to lecture us about cognitive dissonance.
If abolition of the state is not the answer, then please tell us what is. We can’t rid ourselves of tyranny with a different sort of statism when statism is the root cause of all tyranny. I suppose you believe that some men are entitled to coerce others. Sorry but that’s what got us where we are.
Here is a link to a free download that might help broaden your awareness. It’s less than seventy pages, but there is more in that seventy pages than you’ll find pretty much anywhere else. Educate yourself.
https://mises.org/library/anatomy-state
Boomers don’t understand sarcasm either, do they (Hume comment)? Go eat your mises.org and I guarantee you’ll die free.
” If you would be truly free, you will have to cast off almost everything you have believed up until now and start asking question; Why? Who? For what reason?”
And your answer continues to be ……… Boomers. LMFAO.
On the bright side, it seems to me — based on responses here — that 98% of the folks here see the foolishness of blaming any single generation for all the woes of a nation. Of course, you and GilNUT are free to continue your rantings.
But, will anyone listen?
I’ve never once stated or implied,in my “ranrings”, that Boomers were solely responsible for anything. I’ve only ever said that, as the largest population demographic, you bear a good chunk of the responsibility.
However, as usual, the response to this idea is being called “stupid” or “crazy”. That’s a valid opinion I guess, but delusional.
I expect more articles on this topic, especially now that Millenials are surpassing Boomers as the largest population. Becoming less relevant is a tough pill to swallow. Trump is the first president in decades not chosen by Boomers, that makes me smile.
I really don’t think you can see past your bi-focals. The sense of everything I have said is that there is a history of this degeneracy. It did not begin with boomers but they are the latest incarnation of a long line of error-makers in this nation. The point is that whatever generation you consider yourself to be a member of, you need to examine your beliefs and act accordingly. The fact that you think it’s just about you is a good sign that boomers are the latest and largest contingent of narcissists in this nation. Look at it like this; older people have been traditionally seen as wise and experienced and for that reason are best able to give guidance to the young. If you cannot see the beam in your own eye, how will you justify casting out the mote in the eye of a younger generation. A little humility here would go a long way, but humility has long been in short supply among boomers.
You’re latest post makes a lot of sense! I especially like this; —
Indeed!!!
Here’s some wisdom from an older guy — regardless of who is to blame, I think we’re all fucked six ways to Sunday.
Anyway …. you’ve been a good sport!!
Aodh, I actually agree with you on some of what you are saying here. James takes a long and roundabout route to get where he is going with this video, but he makes a profound point with it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiNDNyh-XtA
this is a good start. If you do not believe in conspiracies, you do not believe in history. History is one long list of conspiracies.
Absolutely correct. I think we are very much on the same page in regards to finding truth in history.
The house of cards is on it’s way down. It not in any way sustainable or viable. The big question is what will end up taking it’s place? The human race is one long history of genocide and tyranny. For the last thousand years or so we’ve been fumbling towards a freer existence where men and women are increasingly able to conduct their affairs and pursue their dreams and goals with more liberty. I would love to expand that trend not regress back into authoritarian totalitarianism.
1968 USS-Scorpion SSN-589, USSR K-129, INS Dakar and French ‘Minerve’ were sunk.
25 January 1968 the last Firefall in Yosemite fell after nearly 100 years of regular spectacles.
William Lind submitted an excellent article on the LewRockwell.com website last month that provides his analysis on “Who Stole Our Culture”. It goes back before the Boomers.
Good ole’ Abe brought over a lot of Red’s from Europe to help the North in their fight with the South in the Civil War
This destruction has been occurring over a long time.
Allin
Allin, Lind has a good article. He is one of the most articulate writers on subjects like this that we have. I am not that surprised that it was on LewRockwell.com. I usually go there for the recipes but occasionally they have good information like this. I don’t think much of their Libertarian “muh free-market” bull-shit but I also go to Counterpunch on occasion. Even a Marxist clock can be right twice a day.
The alternative to “muh free-market” bull-shit is a centrally planned economy. That leaves you with either fascism or communism. Neither are compatible with natural rights or individual liberty.
Almost every negative industry, those antithetical to individual liberty and beneficial to Elites is Jew run. Porn. Hollywood. Same thing. Banking. Government. Same thing. Academia/News/Learning. Communism/ socialism. Feminism. Jews. Jews. Jews.
Even the destruction of the Churches, via the National Council of churches was jew spawned.
Kicked out 109 times in their long history.
#110
Hey Maggie,
I’ll race ya against El C to ring the 300 bell. He is very sneaky Mags, we must be very vigilant.
Wow. This is still here. Not online just driving by.
I saw the Sharon Tate anniversary post the other day and wondered if Charley was the rough beast loosed upon the world.
All beginnings are are ends. & vice versa. Looks like this: ∞. Demolition derby.
1861 and 1913. Those were the two years that started us down the path we are on now, not 1968.
300. I WIN
STUCKY IS DEFINITELY BACK.
Was poking around the net just looking for interesting stuff ….. just found this article …
“1947: The Year Everything Changed”
The Events Covered;
— Operation Highjump
— The Roswell Incident
— Truman Signs the National Security Act
— Formation of the CIA, the Most Devastating and Destructive Intelligence Agency in World History
— Formation of MJ 12
http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/1947-year-everything-changed/
Never got the list of things boomers did to strip out all the wealth in the last fifty years from the crybabies Stucky.
Moaners and whiners have to have a reason to not answer for their shortcomings. Boo Fukkin’ Hoo.
Hey crybabies, act like a man:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idP5-vtkhBE