What exactly were the excesses of the 60's and 70's?

Of course, besides Civil Rights?

you know, an average day in many European countries, you know FREE countries

:shrug:

wish I lived there......

They all have to be vetted ~ even the inspirational & charismatic ones that make us want to believe.

You aren't paying attention. However, that doesn't shock me. :eyes:

See this disturbing comment from his book.

Pages 156-157

"The conservative revolution Reagan helped usher in gained traction because Reagan's central insight--that the liberal welfare state had grown complacent and overly bureaucratic, with Democratic policy makers more obsessed with slicing the economic pie than with growing he pie--contained a good deal of truth."

He makes the argument the DLC made about the size, role of government. When people talk of expanding the pie rather than slicing it they are using smokescreens for talking about cutting back on social programs.

The man can't seem to separate Republican propaganda from truth.

Woman and minorities started taking bigger pieces of the pie. Reagan needed to reign them in with fiction that he was going to make enough pie for everyone. He made that promise optimistically and with clarity, of course.

but their capers back then look like peanuts in comparison to what is happening now.

was peanuts compared to what Bush flaunts every day.

I guess trying to hold the President accountable to some ethical standard is considered a far-out fringe hippie thing now.

Try Beatles (long hair), 1968 Democratic Convention, Woodstock, Mamma Cass, Inna Gadda Da Vida, etc.

and remember Vietnam, ERA marches, Peace, flower children, MLK, JFK, RFK, Malcolm X...
I remember our rights being fought for.
I don't remember that MUCH excess. So I really want to know what is this excess they speak of?
Because if he considers Civil Rights an excess.....then he can kiss my lily white ass.

Too bad Rev Donnie was not there to save those angry drag queens from themselves.

(Wilderness Act, EPA, Earth Day, banning of DDT, etc.), more emphasis on teaching unvarnished American history (especially in the post-Nixon years), more personal freedom

far too little debt upon graduation....

oil lines, recession, high interest rates, Iran Hostages.....

see other post

sorry

sort of

Watergate was an early '70s thing. Nixon was forced from office in the summer of 1974.

The first oil lines, I believe, were in '74 or '75 when we backed the Israelis in their defense against the Jordanian and Egyptians at that time. The Saudis cut us off.

The recession began when Ford lifted the wage and price controls that Nixon put on the guns and butter war economy and the interest rates went sky-high.

Interest rates went even higher in the second oil shock at the end of the decade.

Iran took hostages in the late '70s after Carter let the deposed Shah into the U.S. for medical treatment.

The '60s were JFK--election and assassination--, the Free Speech movement in Berkeley, Civil Rights demonstrations in places like Selma and Birmingham, the passage of the '64 Civil Rights Act and the '65 Voting Rights Act under LBJ, Vietnam and the draft, draft riots, the assassinations of RFK and MLK in '68, the Chicago riots at the Dem convention there in '68, Nixon's comeback, LBJ's Medicare and the Great Society, and lots and lots of money all over the place. It was all guns and butter.

Oh yeah, a few guys advocated "free love," after birth control pills came out, but that didn't last long, and some folks moved to communes, which also didn't last long. Obama seems to be keenly aware of this.

I suspect that you didn't live through any of it and therefore put the '70s stuff in the '60s. I'm writing from original memory.

so that they could have ammunition for their War on Drugs?

for the tastes of the Reaganites. Aww! to hell with them.

Power to the people!

Vietnam and tears, tears, tears.

Your point?

What's your point?

But Obama specifically said "the excesses of the 60's and 70's".
Not only that..they really were NOT that different. The end of the 60's blended in to the early 70's. However, The early 60's were very different from the late 70's.

or the '20s from the '30s for that matter.

It is clear that he did not study modern American history at either Occidental or Columbia.

I like your candidate, but I'm not interested in debating you on this topic.

SNCC, SDS, SCLC, CORE, various anti war movements, picket lines to walk, Grapes to
boycott,and lots of other things that took time to do for others, neglecting doing for
ourselves. Some excesses are worth it.

Absolutely. I had forgotten about that.:thumbsup:

and there was WAY too much liberty and optimism going on back then. A lot of people felt they had the AUDACITY to think they could change the world for the better, and often even making real and positive strides forward with such changes. Why, there some who even had the AUDACITY to stop a terrible war, and work toward getting rid of nuclear weapons and such silliness. And then came along the neocons, and they certainly set things RIGHT!!! If they hadn't have come along with Ronald Fuhrer Raygun and his brand of fear mongering and divisiveness who knows what kind of a country this might be. THANK YOU RONALD FUCKING RAYGUN for putting a stop to all of the excesses of the horrible and liberal leaning 60's and 70's, what would we have done without you and your fascist friends taking over this fine country?!!

for the better.

he's kind of a tool

I love the 60's but it was all about excess.

I heard the speech. I want it defined.

To demand change.

What do you mean by excesses?
BTW, have you ever been tear gassed?
Does excesses mean actually caring and acting upon your beliefs?
What, some pot, some acid and 'free love'?
Excess spirituality?
The rise in popularity of health food?
Are those the excesses you're talking about?

the nattering nabobs of negativism, pusillanimous pussyfooters, and hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history?

Who remembers the thousands of protestors of Nixon and his psychotic responses that led to Watergate?

Agnew resigned in disgrace for tax evasion.

Nixon resigned in disgrace for being Nixon.

was rolled in Spiro Agnew rolling paper

Ah yes. There was excessive freedom of the press back then, but we've definitely reined that in.

the big three!

In all seriousness? I am here to tell you as a healthcare provider, I see elderly people (mostly now over the age of 70) that were given all sorts of addictive drugs in the 40's and 50's (Valium, etc) that they are still addicted to today.
How many LSD addicts are out there?

Are you only concerned about drugs?

Many of us lived through the excesses without touching drugs.

:shrug:

I don't know anyone from back when we all were doing acid (35 - 40 years ago) that still does it, much less done any in the last 30 years or more. Those that were heavy into acid were usually already messed up and got worse doing acid. They're not real bright today.

It wasn't a myth. I remember the old saying that dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope. It was true!

taxed the shiiit out of 'em.

The middle-class was able to purchase luxury items like boats & resort property & private college educations for their kids.......you know THOSE excesses!

:smoke:

and my parents wouldn't let me. One of the funniest things though, my liberal Grandma boycotted Barbie's because she felt they were sexist. Instead she bought me the hippie dolls--the Dawn collection.
I didn't understand at the time...but it has become a treasured memory.

...but of much of the world, it is pretty darn hard to fine tune the effort to avoid all excesses. When dogmatic religion, entrenched institutional racism, sexism, mindless respect for "authority" and a war on a scale much larger than Iraq all are simultaneously taken on, that requires a big head of steam.

When an embrace of positive expressions of sexuality, of gay and lesbian rights, of organic farming, sustainable living, alternative energy, and creative expression all break to the fore, yes there undoubtably will be some excesses. When people become free to wear their hair in more than two styles, when comedians get thrown in jail fighting censorship that prohibits the use of certain "bad" words, when the wisdom of humans living in isolated atomic families and a flight to suburbia get challenged, yes there undoubtably will be some excesses. When people create the concept of "Earth Day" and proclaim all life and our planet sacred, some might get carried to excess.

LSD was a powerful drug with some unintended very negative consequences for some of those who used it at the time, but it was also a key that unlocked a lot of mental straight jackets too. Our culture by the late 1950's had become ponderously stifling.

Reagan came along and stifled it. Conservatism and all that shit.
Excellent response by the way.
So what Obama is REALLY saying is that he applauds how Reagan curbed the excesses that changed the trajectory of the nation from being "liberal" (When an embrace of positive expressions of sexuality, of gay and lesbian rights, of organic farming, sustainable living, alternative energy, and creative expression all break to the fore, yes there undoubtably will be some excesses. When people become free to wear their hair in more than two styles, when comedians get thrown in jail fighting censorship that prohibits the use of certain "bad" words, when the wisdom of humans living in isolated atomic families and a flight to suburbia get challenged, yes there undoubtably will be some excesses. When people create the concept of "Earth Day" and proclaim all life and our planet sacred, some might get carried to excess.)to the trajectory it is on now, it is of great concern to me what type of candidate Obama is.

protests of their outrageous abuses of power, I am sometimes appalled that this nation is not up in arms to the point of revolting against that ass Bush and especially Cheney.

they have all become domesticated "cattle", this new generation, afraid to do anything that is brave.

They invoke BUZZWORD names,like MLK, but this was a man who put everything on the line, including his life, which he knew was at risk.

Obama is a NO RISK panderer to the middle of the road.

Thanks, but no thanks!

"Obama is a NO RISK panderer to the middle of the road."

What happened?
What happened to Abby Hoffman?
What happened to idealism?

Damn, I'm getting depressed.

but we didn't start REALLY running deficits until Reagan.

At least as far as the big O is concerned.

isn't it?

Yeah Obama is no damn dirty hippie, that's fer sure. He understands how bad those days were and thankfully Ronald Reagan indeed did put an end to all that. Then we had GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEED. And it's never really gone away.

Don'tcha know that I love you?
In-a-gadda-da-vida baby,
don'tcha know that I'll always be true?

Oh won'tcha come with me,
and take my hand?
Oh won'tcha come with me,
and walk this land?

Please take my hand...

Let me tell ya now.
In-a-gadda-da-vida honey,
don'tcha know that I love you?
In-a-gadda-da-vida baby,
don'tcha know that I'll always be true?

(of course over and over for 20 minutes)

And you don't think that was excessive?

I was too busy getting married and having kids.

I think what Barack meant when he said this and wrote about it in his book was that the socialized welfare state kept people in their places in the 60's and 70's and did not give them incentives to move on up the ladder. I was lucky enough to move on when I went to college on a grant but many others didn't have the chance or knowledge to do that. If we just get complacent again and just pay for social programs without having a vision for more and better jobs (not just service oriented like Bush did) then the programs are not going to do what they have a potential to accomplish.

That is my call on it. I think sometimes Barack needs to be more specific on his discussions because he thinks he has said enough in other speeches to read between the lines. I agree that he needs to lay out a full explanation on these issues.

And emptying mental institutions, designating ketchup a vegetable, cutting food stamps and public housing was BETTER?
Oy veh I have just gone through the looking glass.

That was how he started his campaign, using everything we and those before and since fought for, everything we care about, everything we believe down to our core, all as fights we should abandon, and we should give way to a new type of politics.

--in our recent history. People my age were the beneficiaries of massive investments in higher education and scientific research. More people than ever before, starting with the GI bill in the 40s and 50s, and with generous state scholarship aid in the 60s became their families' first college graduates. And those who didn't go on to school could have good union jobs, and be like JE's dad who moved from working on the mill floor into management.

Just to piss off the Millenial Generation (and they jolly well SHOULD be pissed off), I'll just mention that I was able to get enough aid to graduate from an expensive private college with $2200 in debts (yes, that is the correct number of zeros at the end) with 2% interest that I didn't have to start paying until I was out of grad school, and which would have been partially forgiven if I had taught science or math at the K-12 level. In grad school, teaching and research assistanceships were not taxable, and health care and housing subsidized.

The 35 thousand men that President Johnson got killed in Viet Nam come to mind as excessive

actualize it's full potential.

We can't have any of THAT!

:sarcasm:

what we really need is a speech-making politician, whose words come off a telepropmpter.

No, make that a middle-of-the-road panderer.

No, make that a corporatist's dream candidiate, who takes drug money ( Big Pharma ).

No, make that a progressive who puts down Liberalism and famous liberals.

No, make that a "liberal", who HEARTS Ronnie Reagan. He equated Bill Clinton with Nixon.

Puhlease......

they actually have a Baskin & Robbins in downtown Hanoi...?!?

What a screwy idea that was.

People believing in peace.

People believing in love.

People believing in equal opportunity for all.

People believing that poverty can be abolished.

People believing in nuclear nonproliferation.

People believing in women's rights.

People marching for what they believed in.

People protesting against the war.

And the excesses of the '80s and '90s and 2000s?

Greed.

Self-centeredness.

Outsourcing.

Privatization of essential government functions.

War for no good reason.

Destruction of the rain forests.

Melting of the ice caps.

Creationism.

Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell (May He Rest In Peace.)

God, this place just disgusts me anymore.