Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Clinton's Scandals: Is this corruption the worst ever? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bob Lao-Tse who wrote (12518)	5/17/1999 1:32:00 PM
From: Liatris Spicata	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13994

BLT- Congrats on a thoughtful post. Spot on (as the Brits say), in some respects. <<But not only was the nation's apparent success and plenty doomed to be short-lived, if for no other reason than "what goes up must come down," but it genuinely was, in some senses, false. It had been built on ...>> I believe there is one other important aspect of the "success" of contemporary American life that is insufficiently appreciated. Specifically, I worry that in important respects we are living off the moral capital of previous generations. As the rules of the road are relaxed- and in many cases I believe they should have been- people do not immediately adjust their behavior to take advantage of their new liberties. Patterns of behavior that existed before the rules were relaxed are frequently observed for some time (decades?). I'll cite one example that I realize some will consider controversial, even provocative: illegitimacy. At one time in the not-too-recent-past, it was a shame. It happened, but it was at the margins of society. It's ill-affects did not cut a broad swath through our society because it was rare. (Yeah, I know, not all illegitimate children are destined to lives of failure, but I for one consider it a strong risk factor for a child.) Today, as a result of the Pill and the decline in various social institutions including family and church, it is a commonplace. If I'm not mistaken, over two thirds of black American babies are born out of wedlock. But since blacks comprise only about 13% of the US population, the effects are still contained, even though the effects in the black community have been devastating. But more and more, that behavior is becoming an accepted alternative among whites. I am told I have to be part of a "village" to pick up the pieces of the resultant lives, and I resent it. IMO, our nation's civilization cannot endure if whites in this country emulate the behavior of blacks in that regard. To keep this post topical, I'll note that Sleazebag Bill's behavior over his lifetime, if it became the norm, would lead to a social catastrophe in this country. But to his supporters, who seem to get something they want out of the little creep, such concerns are not worth considering. Larry P.S. Your reference to "exploitation of the environment" was intriguing. I also believe our lifestyle consigns future generations to death, as we use this earth in an unsustainable manner- but I'll leave that for a future post.

To: Bob Lao-Tse who wrote (12518)	5/17/1999 3:32:00 PM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13994

Bob, there is some truth to what you say, but consider:when the voting age was lowered to 18, most of those people voted for Nixon. Currently, only two age blocs strongly support Clinton: those under 25, and those over 65. Republicans won against Clinton among whites, who are the only ones clearly caught up in the trends you enumerated; and among males (taken as a separate category), who should be especially represented by Clinton. Also, Republican candidates beat Clinton among those with families, and most boomers settled down, and are either in the middle of, or towards the end of, or have recently finished, raising their families. So the picture of the generation is more complicated...

To: Bob Lao-Tse who wrote (12518)	5/18/1999 5:38:00 AM
From: PiMac	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13994

Were the trans-generational argument less outrageous, it would be amusing. It sounds like a hundred tracts of the older generation blaming the next, just like the ones from Nixon's Agnew, Hitler, Rome, and Greece. The creators of <<the high-point of the American Dream>> also created a generation of vipers whose nature was to bite the breast that succors them and the hand that feeds them. Maybe that greatest generation really did miss something that their offspring were continuing in tradition to correct. <<the nation's apparent success and plenty ...had been built on the exploitation of our environment and people.>> Who was supporting the Establisment methods, the 60ers? The racial and environmental movements were peopled by these you denigrate. <<they attacked the system that had given them the plenty they had enjoyed. >> The 60ers were dangerous with their symbolic protest, dangerous enough for an expansion of police and military unseen before in peace. The 60s movement had immature strategies, but the substance was against exploitation of our people of color and our poor, against sexual customs that hadn't fit biology for 300 years, and against obsessive-compulsiveness that they'd seen ruin their parents lives. Accusing them for having little idea what to substitute is a meanness beyond my understanding. And to do it by force is unconscionable. The yippie to yuppie change disgusts me, but there is a limit to how often one will risk the choice of death in the jungle or living death in prison. The previous American Generation with demographics similar to the Boomers [numbers, family size, prosperity, ...] was the Generation of the Civil War. America should count itself blessed with the generation it got. We brought modern protest to history, the last brought modern warfare. To those facing Depression and War, the niceties of long-range and externalities are luxuries. Their children set off to correct these overlooked things in ourselves, our culture, our world. The balance was seen as a threat, and the old ways resurfaced: Force and single-mindedness, legitimatized by morality, crushed the nascent generation, and its purpose. Look to that greatest generation for the legacy. A world with customs shattered, and the reformers scattered like rats against the farmer. Look to your own hubris, not to our disintegration that you caused.