We need a national debate about what the aspirations of our young people are going forward.
Are we content to convey the mundane message that they can someday join the "middle class?"
Children of my generation were told that they could grow up to be president. Do we now allow the feudal mindset return? "Your dad was a blacksmith, so you will be a blacksmith. Maybe if you work hard and don't make any waves you will be a mailman."
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. Ronald Reagan 40th president of US (1911 - 2004)
"First come the innovators, who see opportunities that others don't. Then come the imitators, who copy what the innovators have done. And then come the idiots, whose avarice undoes the very innovations they are trying to use to get rich."
Warren Buffet
Applying this to jazz, you have John Coltrane as innovator and Kenny G as idiot. In the political world, you have Reagan as an innovator and then Sarah Palin. We are not in a very innovative phase at this time. Innovators build on the past, and keep pushing the envelope. These days, many of us are (myself included) very enamored with looking back to when things were good or when we thought they were good. We have enormous social problems that will not be "fixed" by market solutions. I see some innovation, but mostly just repetition of platitudes that have long gone tired.
Jean, Max is using Sarah as a derivative of Reagan's philosophy, and I can see his point. There is no doubt that Reagan was the great 20th century conservative innovator, maybe more of a renovator in my thoughts.
Staying with the subject heading. The progressives were innovative in their turning the curve on community. Hillary's "It takes a Village" set the hook with a generation of women, mostly single women is seems, that follow that school of thought. Safety and conformity in numbers, a substitute for the formerly revered patriarch. This all grew out of Wilson and FDR of course. Obamacare extends this movement.
A vote is a vote. Like oil they are fungible. Large groups of satisfied well taken care of people vote the way they do for a reason. Look in the mailbox at the right time of the month and the check is there like clockwork.
The fact that we have so many out of wedlock children points to a terrible future. Once the checks stop, or are reduced for any reason, well then, we all know what is happening in Greece and the aspirations that those poor folks have for their children.
"This all grew out of Wilson and FDR of course. Obamacare extends this movement."
Here, William, you return to complete nonsense. The death of the nuclear family is absolutely as much about economics as anything else. Post FDR, we had forced sharing of wealth with the working class and they used that money to raise families where there was always a parent home, and they also used that money to build houses, roads and all kinds of infrastructure. What is gone today, in part thanks to your idol Reagan, is a sense of responsibility to each other and to our country. What is present today is a well ingrained "fuck you, me first" attitude that is blatantly present in the poor, the wealthy and many in between.
Reagan did not preach this of course and likely would be offended today by what his party does in his name. Still, starting with him, we have a clear point in history where we chose, as a nation, to reject the notion we had problems to solve and skipped happily down a road where the government is the whipping boy for everything we find disagreeable with life. The famous "War on Poverty" became a war on those IN poverty. There is no shortage of profit to divvy up more fairly. There is no shortage of money in corporate tills to invest in this country. What there is a shortage of is the will to demand a fair standard of living for those who choose to work instead of collecting a check.
We need a national debate about what the aspirations of our young people are going forward.
ReplyDeleteAre we content to convey the mundane message that they can someday join the "middle class?"
Children of my generation were told that they could grow up to be president. Do we now allow the feudal mindset return? "Your dad was a blacksmith, so you will be a blacksmith. Maybe if you work hard and don't make any waves you will be a mailman."
I for one say B S to that!
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
ReplyDeleteRonald Reagan
40th president of US (1911 - 2004)
"First come the innovators, who see opportunities that others don't. Then come the imitators, who copy what the innovators have done. And then come the idiots, whose avarice undoes the very innovations they are trying to use to get rich."
ReplyDeleteWarren Buffet
Applying this to jazz, you have John Coltrane as innovator and Kenny G as idiot. In the political world, you have Reagan as an innovator and then Sarah Palin. We are not in a very innovative phase at this time. Innovators build on the past, and keep pushing the envelope. These days, many of us are (myself included) very enamored with looking back to when things were good or when we thought they were good. We have enormous social problems that will not be "fixed" by market solutions. I see some innovation, but mostly just repetition of platitudes that have long gone tired.
OK, I must be slow. What does Sarah Palin have to do with any of this?
DeleteJean
Jean, Max is using Sarah as a derivative of Reagan's philosophy, and I can see his point. There is no doubt that Reagan was the great 20th century conservative innovator, maybe more of a renovator in my thoughts.
DeleteStaying with the subject heading. The progressives were innovative in their turning the curve on community. Hillary's "It takes a Village" set the hook with a generation of women, mostly single women is seems, that follow that school of thought. Safety and conformity in numbers, a substitute for the formerly revered patriarch. This all grew out of Wilson and FDR of course. Obamacare extends this movement.
A vote is a vote. Like oil they are fungible. Large groups of satisfied well taken care of people vote the way they do for a reason. Look in the mailbox at the right time of the month and the check is there like clockwork.
The fact that we have so many out of wedlock children points to a terrible future. Once the checks stop, or are reduced for any reason, well then, we all know what is happening in Greece and the aspirations that those poor folks have for their children.
1773-2009 DI
"This all grew out of Wilson and FDR of course. Obamacare extends this movement."
DeleteHere, William, you return to complete nonsense. The death of the nuclear family is absolutely as much about economics as anything else. Post FDR, we had forced sharing of wealth with the working class and they used that money to raise families where there was always a parent home, and they also used that money to build houses, roads and all kinds of infrastructure. What is gone today, in part thanks to your idol Reagan, is a sense of responsibility to each other and to our country. What is present today is a well ingrained "fuck you, me first" attitude that is blatantly present in the poor, the wealthy and many in between.
Reagan did not preach this of course and likely would be offended today by what his party does in his name. Still, starting with him, we have a clear point in history where we chose, as a nation, to reject the notion we had problems to solve and skipped happily down a road where the government is the whipping boy for everything we find disagreeable with life. The famous "War on Poverty" became a war on those IN poverty. There is no shortage of profit to divvy up more fairly. There is no shortage of money in corporate tills to invest in this country. What there is a shortage of is the will to demand a fair standard of living for those who choose to work instead of collecting a check.