America’s Worst Generation

Magic City Morning Star ^ | 12/26/05 | Paul Streitz

[AZRepublican]

The valiant generation of Americans that fought World War II to preserve our liberty and western civilization was followed by the worst generation in the history of the country: the Baby Boomer generation born from 1946-1964.

The elite Baby Boomers turned the United States from the most prosperous countries on the planet to a country heading toward bankruptcy. It acquired a massive foreign trade deficit that will take generations to pay off. It deconstructed U.S. industries and the invited the invasion of millions of illegal aliens.

The Baby Boomers declared the Constitution to be a worthless piece of paper. It derided the notion that United States was unique place among the nations of the world and declared that it was only the equal of other countries, if not worse. The Baby Boomers mocked the nation’s Christian heritage and forced ordinary citizens to fight to keep Christmas in public places.

In David McClelland’s 1961 opus, “The Achieving Society,” McClelland shows that rises or declines in the “need for achievement” precede the economic rise or decline of a society. For him growing societies have a great deal of “need for achievement” This need for achievement plateaus as the society becomes wealthier and eventually declines. This precedes the eventual dissolution of the society. He notes that the wealth of the society prevents parents from developing self-reliance in their children. This lack of self-reliance leads to the children having a reduced need for achievement. Describing Athenian society, McClelland says,

[paltz]

We Didn't Start The Fire" by Billy Joel

Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio

Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe

Rosenbergs, H-Bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom Brando, "The King and I", and "The Catcher in the Rye"

Eisenhower, vaccine, England's got a new queen Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye

CHORUS We didn't start the fire It was always burning Since the world's been turning We didn't start the fire No we didn't light it But we tried to fight it

Josef Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc

Roy Cohn, Juan Peron, Toscanini, dacron Dien Bien Phu and "Rock Around the Clock"

Einstein, James Dean, Brooklyn's got a winning team Davy Crockett, "Peter Pan", Elvis Presley, Disneyland

Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Khrushchev Princess Grace, "Peyton Place", trouble in the Suez

CHORUS

Little Rock, Pasternak, Mickey Mantle, Kerouac Sputnik, Chou En-Lai, "Bridge on the River Kwai"

Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball Starkweather, homicide, children of thalidomide

Buddy Holly, "Ben-Hur", space monkey, Mafia hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no go

U2, Syngman Rhee, payola and Kennedy Chubby Checker, "Psycho", Belgians in the Congo

CHORUS

Hemingway, Eichmann, "Stranger in a Strange Land" Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs Invasion

Lawrence of Arabia British Beatlemania Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson

Pope Paul, Malcolm X, British politician sex JFK, blown away, what else do I have to say

CHORUS

Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon, back again Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline Ayatollolah's in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan

"Wheel of Fortune" , Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide Foreign debts, homeless vets, AIDS, Crack, Bernie Goetz Hypodermics on the shores, China's under martial law Rock and Roller Cola Wars, I can't take it anymore

CHORUS

We didn't start the fire But when we are gone Will it still burn on, and on, and on, and on...

[ZULU]

This is true to a degree.

But it was the "Greatest Generation" which PRODUCED the baby boomers. A generation which started the drive towards loose morality, a generation which raised their kids to believe they could have anything they wanted - without workinig for it, a generation which expected the social programs of a socialist President to support them and their kids as though money grew on trees, a generation which was more than willing to throw away the legacy of America's past for immediate gratification for themselves and their kids.

The Greatest Generation wasn't the generation which fought WW2 - it was the generation which led and directed it to victory - the Pattons, etc.

America's problems are rooted in Rooseveltian socialism (FDR style) of the 1930's and 1940's, not solely in the Baby Boomers - who did more than their share.

After all, the generation which fought and bled in America's worst military catastrophy since the War of 1812 was directed not by baby boomers, but by a political military establishment made mainly of members of the Greatest Generation.

Under the Pattons, the Pershings, the Teddy Roosevelts, etc. Viet Nam would have been a victory and voices of treasonous dissent suitably stifled.

[Captainpaintball]

If you really want to play the semantic game, the REAL Greatest generation was the FIRST generation of Americans, led by George Washington and the Founding Fathers.

[ark_girl]

You've kinda gotta wonder if the 60's wasn't the boil on the butt of America that is leftism coming to a head.

If you think about it, we gave into leftism (ala FDR) out of desperation during the Great Depression. Then WWII came along, pulling us out of the Depression. By this point, the people who were adults during that time thought FDR was a genious because he was President through the worst of times.

If you think about it, the people who brought us JFK (and unfortunately LBJ as a result) and the people who, in the south would have voted Satan himself in if he were a Democrat were the people who grew up during Roosevelt's time.

Just like Gen-X has seen the worst that Liberalism has to offer (ala Jimmy Carter, welfare state out of control, the black hole that social security is for our generation), the teens and young adults of the 40's saw what they would have thought the best that American Liberalism had to offer.

The boomers got caught in the middle. It seems like they're kind of split.

[jordan8]

First of all the greatest generation was the first, not the WW2 generation. The generation that fought WW2 was the generation in power throughout the 60s and 70s.

[westmichman]

I didn't know that the word was Latin in origin!!

[NELSON111]

"The Greatest Generation must have consisted of really horrible parents."

I have had the exact same thoughts. I am a gen-xer but it seems it could have been some parenting.

[princess leah]

I saw a 2 year old screaming and yelling throughout the mall today while her mother did NOTHING to stop her tantrum and my first thought was, "man, I shudder to think what our country be like in 20 years with kids like this coming into adulthood!"

[LWalk18]

If you really want to play the semantic game, the REAL Greatest generation was the FIRST generation of Americans, led by George Washington and the Founding Fathers.

I tend to agree with you. Perhaps I should have put quotation marks around "Greatest" like I did "Silent".

[Lijahsbubbe]

Today we have an all volunteer Army (military) and the nobility of its members is unsurpassed by the WW2 group. Today's military do not get the same hero's coverage by the press, they are pictured as dupes of an unjust war at best, and half of the elected government officials have no use for them, but insist that they support them. Yet the fight a great battle and for the highest ideals of our democracy. This generation gets my vote for "The Best"

Wow. That is a GREAT post and I hope many read it!

[indthkr]

bump

[meadsjn]

Many of these generational discussions stemmed from the book described below, from a thread posted in Jan. 2004. I'd recommend it for anyone interested in historical trends, past, present, and future.

In The Fourth Turning, authors Neil Howe and William Strauss provide an excellent perspective on the cycles of America's history, the generations that shaped those cycles of history, and the generations that are currently in play as we enter another Fourth Turning (crisis era). This book was published in 1997, prior to Clinton's impeachment, yet has some accurate predictions of trends that have developed in the five years since, and some predictions of trends to expect in the next few years.

The cycles start with a High (i.e. 1946-64), an era of high productivity and spirit, followed by an Awakening (i.e. 1965-1984), an era of rebellious and self-centered enlightenment, drift into an Unraveling (i.e. 1985-2005?), during which the fabric of society seems to waste away, leading into a Crisis (2005?-?), a time of economic distress or a major war, or both, when the life of the nation hangs by a thread. Wars occur for almost every generation, but the wars of crisis eras tend to be total wars, wherein the shape of society and the direction of the nation are indisputably altered. The underlying thesis proposed by Howe and Strauss is that "history shapes generations, and generations shape history".

[brytlea]

They're already seeing them in the school systems. Remembr the little FL girl who was throwing a tantrum in the principals office, caught on videotape. KG and elementry teachers I know tell me this is pretty common behavior nowadays. Life will be awful for those kids, but I also shudder to think they're the ones who will be manning the nursing homes when we're old enough to be there. Be nice to your kids and maybe they'll keep you at home!
susie

[InvisibleChurch]

no the majority isn't hippied dominated in numbers but in social influence, tv , print, hollywood and the courts, legislatures and peta and greenpeace and aclu and the aba and illegal immigration and and and ... clinton was voted in because a bunch of punks wanted their own kennedy and ended up with two frankensteins and were happy with it... i'm afraid that there are more nonhippies who, though they didn't agree with clinton, still didn't do anything to turn their backs on the social gravy train ... many of them found a way to justify freebies and now I have to pay for them ... W isn't helping much either... of course, sweeping generalizations are easy to make but we know better, don't we?

[westmichman]

That kid is headed for serious problems later in life. People think that not disciplining is nice to kids when it is really just the opposite.

[MediaAnalyst]

I think the problem here is not that all baby boomers are bad people, but rather that the bad baby boomers are defining that generation, and are probably a majority. I, like I'm sure just about everyone on this thread, know baby boomers that are great Americans and only want to see success for this country (with Rush and W at the top of the list). But the others usually go on to live quiet, productive, lives in the private sector.

Unfortunately, the bad baby boomers have taken over much of government, all of the public schools, and all virtually all of the MSM. It is them who are defining this generation, and they are evil, rotten, people - they have given Western Europe its death sentence by inviting in millions of Muslims, and they have put this country in a very precarious position by giving the Chinese what they need to be a military superpower. They need to be stopped at all costs, even if means taking steps that we conservatives would rather not do, like getting into the mud politically.

It was best stated, by someone other than myself, that "the baby boom generation is like a bad meal. You hope to survive long enough for it to pass through."

[A Citizen Reporter]

These generation generalizations were created by marketing professors who were trying to teach their students to "reach a market".

I will never forget a meeting I attended as a small business owner in the late 1980's, as part of an advertising co-op. The question was posed to the corporate marketer--"How can we continue to spend so much money to reach a broadcast audience, when the numbers show that they are turing to cable?" Guess what the answer was? More $$$$$$$. Like more taxes.

[rdb3]

1927-1945- "Silent" Generation

That's my parents' generation (1934-38). So that's where I get my old school mind!

All of my friends' parents are boomers.

[spectre]

I did go and read the whole article, so I'm posting the last few paragraphs..

"The Minuteman Operation led by Jim Gilchrist and Chris Simcox on the Arizona Border in April 2005 was a historic and monumental event in American history. It demonstrated the frustration the American people were having with the rule of the elite Baby Boomers. President George Bush steadfastly refused to protect the border and instead offered an Open Borders country with his various amnesty schemes. The American people were having none of that. Immigration will unseat a number of legislators in 2006 and a strong border control President will be elected in 2008.

Americans have realized that globalization is a giant fraud. They have realized that cheap prices at Wal-Mart are not worth the loss of job security and high income manufacturing jobs. Not since the French Revolution has a social, economic class so turned its back on the lives and struggles of the average American. "Let them eat globalization,' is the cry of the Wall Street Journal and the supporters of the destruction of the American society. Americans have rejected that.

Americans are also rejecting the valueless, anti-Christian efforts of the Baby Boomer elites in media, government and academia. The average American is winning the cultural war. After decades of anti-Christian and anti-Christmas political attack, the average American is striking back. It is not the "Holiday Season;" it is "Christmas."

"It ain't over till its over," said Yogi Berra. In this case, "It ain't over, because it's just begun," as Americans fight to restore their culture, their borders and their economic prosperity."

Paul Streitz
Director
CT Citizens for Immigration Contro

[muir_redwoods]

Bravo Sierra. I am sick to death of this silly lionizing of the WWII generation. If they had had the sense to hold Germany to the Versailles treaty, Hitler and his goons would never have threatened the world, the Holocaust wouldn't have happened and the Soviets would never have become the slave master to half the world. That dope, FDR would not have been able to get elected 4 times and the economic poison he inflicted on this country might not have happened. The supposed Greatest Generation solved a problem, at great cost, that they themselves let come into being and fester.

Say what you want about boomers but they never embraced policies that endangered the whole world and put half of it into slavery for 50 years. The world is freer and richer today than it has ever been and guess who's in charge.