Forty Years after the Death of a Party

Cole's Note - the previous two posts have been re-editied into one long quote, where the author is talking about the 1968 Demoncratic National Convention in Chicago.There is a call to turn the 2008 DNC in Denver to a recreate 1968 riot. But as I read this, I keep thinking "soon all the hippies will be dead"

Incredibly, a political party largely reconstructed around the notion that its own nation is evil andits own citizens are dupes or worse, has survived and thrived in America. Itsparty leaders more or less openly root for the defeat of American soldiers inwar. Its party bigwigs hobnob with America-haters like Michael Moore at national conventions. Its party faithful, according to public opinion polls, stenseriously to arguments that the American government planned war upon its ownpeople..... The baby-boom generation was likened by demographers as a pig in a python. After the snake eats, it's prey creates a large bulge in the body as it moves to the stomach to be digested. We were the largest generation moving through the institutions of this society. Forty pupils per
classroom, creating a building boom across the nation.

We were spoiled. Our parents had grown up in the depression. Our fathers went off to war against the most invidious forces of evil ever produced--by modern technology imposing 19th Century diktats upon Europe and the Far East.

Our fathers won that war against evil and returned home. No one wanted their children to suffer the privation of the Depression. No one wanted their children to know war.

We were given everything, generally speaking. Tiger Joe tanks,Barbie Dolls, and Color television were our due. We had it easy thanks to the great sacrifices of the Greatest Generation.

Life was easy, life was good. We got high to alleviate the boredom of such easy lives. We tuned in,turned on, and dropped out.