After looking this week over the NFL mess, continued political bickering, Reality Winner, and public dysfunction....this is one of those essays to review how exactly we reached this point.
1. The loss of McGovern in 1972. Most have no memory of the era and what happened. It was the mid-term with Nixon and the Democrats went and got the intellectual's intellectual to run against Nixon. I've finished a great book by Thomas Frank this week, entitled 'Listen Liberal' which goes into detail about this one moment in American history.
It was a fairly low turn-out....55-percent. When they finished the Electoral College count, it was dramatic....520 votes for Nixon and a mere 17 votes for McGovern.
There was a review after this election to understand what happened. The Democrats decided that they had the right guy, but the wrong audience. Working-class Americans, union folks, and simple America....weren't smart enough to handle intellectuals. So the Democrats latched onto a new direction....they would build the candidates to be designed for themes, urban topics, and agendas for 'smart' people. I know....it is silly if you think about it.
Most of the effort in the 1980s failed. Then came Clinton. The highly educated and intellectual Clinton....had the accent and ability to be two characters. In this case, it worked. It almost worked later with Gore. With Obama? He could squeeze out two accents and voice his way to fit both groups, but every part of his platform was geared toward the urban crowd...mostly the same with Clinton. Hillary? She couldn't really do the two voice trick, but her theme and chat was to the urban and brighter audience....not working-class Americans. Trump? His style, his words, his platform? All geared toward working-class Americans.
2. Part of the shift in the 1970s was to hype up bringing in the right people to be college professors, and use them as instructors for the new future. As you go into the 1980s and 1990s....those individuals who came out of the system...leaning to the new agenda....were fresh new high school teachers.
Over the past decade, these were the teachers who taught young minds like Reality Winner, and Manning.
Today, these are the students showing up and playing their 'snowflake' role at the university system....trying to say they are smarter than the professors and know better....when they are probably not even mature enough for the atmosphere.
3. The art of division. It doesn't matter where you go today....into a religious setting, a sport setting, a family reunion, a Thanksgiving dinner, or office party....it's now set to be divided. The recent Goggle story of the attempts to politically hype up employees and create a division in the work-place? Just another example.
4. In 1975, your news came primarily from Newsweek, Time, the local paper, the three networks, Paul Harvey, and the Sunday political chat shows.
In 2017, Time and Newsweek are virtually dead. The NY Times and Washington Post survive mostly without substantial profit because of owners subsidizing them. Paul Harvey is gone. So you are left with Facebook, Twitter, cable news, something called 'Drudge', and twenty-odd political chat shows that go way beyond Sundays.
5. Most political platforms are written into a method that make no sense. You work to convince people that solution 'X' will be the final word on solving a big mess. You wake up three years after implementing solution 'X', which was fairly complicated and contrived....to realize that it merely solved this problem and then created a whole new fresh problem which is now as big as the previous issue.
In the 1980s, 1990s and past decade, this made sense. But year after year....people are now asking questions and becoming more capable of looking at the whole solving problems routine. If you can't resolve things....why make this into some dramatic opera?
6. The invention of Common Core. You were basically told that there is this great and highly developed teaching method called Common Core. Intellectuals all flock to it. It's marvelous. Then you sit and try to grasp what the discussion is about. Hours pass, and you eventually reach a point where you just don't grasp where this is better or how it'd improve much of anything. You are briefly told.....you aren't intellectual-enough to grasp this.
In this method, you get downsized and pushed back. Just accept the intellectual discussion and things are fine. Something about this seems crazy, but these intellectual people must know what they are talking about.
7. Young people doing stupid things, with no real grasp that this will lead to a court visit...a judge reviewing your actions....and potential jail time. Legal costs? Never imagined. You have literally thousands of individuals who are walking the thin-line....waiting to visit some jail or prison....over something that seems like a political-cross to bear.
8. Inability to accept conversation or debate. If you had suggested in the 1970s that a significant number of educated individuals would be unable to have conversations or debate on a topic of importance....most would have laughed. Yet here we are.
High schools and the university system are slowly drifting away from debate skills. In another dozen years, you will have a large segment of American graduates who can't debate, can't discuss topics with co-workers with true positions, and believe there can only be one single side to things.
9. Capitalism is evil. It's a common theme today....yet you look at the guy talking about this: (1) a $700 smart-phone, (2) $400 theme-prescription glasses, (3) a $25,000 car, and (4) $100-shoes. The guy talks excessively about evil capitalism. Maybe if he was wearing Indian moccasins, lacked a smart-phone and lived under a bridge....it'd all make sense.
10. The division of the nation is based upon urban-America versus working-class America. The two groups have totally different character, charm, and dreams.
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