[Gay State Conservative]

An interesting perspective.As for travel (just to address one point) the only grandparent that was alive when I was born (the others all having died young) was born in Ireland but once she arrived in the US she only left Massachusetts to visit two places...New Hampshire and Connecticut.

OTOH my Dad (her son) traveled the world both for business and pleasure.And I've traveled to even more places than my Dad...every continent but Antarctica (and Antarctica's on my bucket list).

The idea that the American middle class of today lives better,in many important ways,than did the Rockerfellers of 100 years ago is very compelling in my mind.

[Mr. Douglas]

The idea that the American middle class of today lives better,in many important ways,than did the Rockerfellers of 100 years ago is very compelling in my mind.

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I firmly believe we do, but it is really about expectations. Relative to the expectaions of the day, they lived better. Much better. And some of it was the “feeling” about your life that comes from being on top and in control.

As long as they didn’t know about what we have today, they were relatively satisfied and happy. I heard one guy say that if someone had given one of our forefathers a cabin in the woods with a nice outhouse they would have been in want of nothing else.

But now even the poor expect a lot more, and we actually look down on those that choose to live in such conditions.