General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Is the America we know coming to an end? [View all]DFW
(54,658 posts)Looking at it from afar now, and from a country that has in some ways evolved greatly from what it was when I was first here, I have to say that the America I came of age in (late 60s to early 70s) was a place that had already disappeared by the 1980s, by which time I had started to spend a lot of my time overseas anyway. The optimism and the right wing push back of the 1960s was already there. Flower Power vs. George Wallace and Spiro Agnew. The hope that sprouted up after Bill Clinton's election and the gloom after the success of the Gingrich push-back. The despair of Cheney-Bush and the Iraq invasion followed by the optimism of Obama's election, and again the despair of McTurtle's impenetrable wall of meanness and hate. Trump was just the icing on the cake to prove to the world that yes, there IS a way to make things worse than one ever thought possible.
Things have always been an uphill battle, ever since I can remember. THAT, at least, has been the one constant, swaying back and forth from OK to bad to worse to maybe better to "oh NO, you gotta be kidding me!"
The control freaks have ALWAYS been trying to make things miserable for us because THEY feel miserable unless they control things. Thus it has always been, and thus, I fear, it will always be.