Our Great GreatGrand Children Will Hate Us, Or Love Us
by Jan Stephen James Cavanaugh, Ph.D. on 03/25/13
Our Great Great-Grand Children
Will Hate Us, Or Love Us
July 27, 2012jsc
Self Disclosure:
I was born in 1943, making me a World War II war baby. Therefore I can somewhat disassociate myself from the boomer generation starting in 1947 and their children, even as I am part of what I decry.
My Duty:
I feel the duty of the prophet to foretell what I foresee based on what I see. It ain't pretty.
My thesis:
The boomers and their children will be hated by their great great-grandchildren, assuming the yet, untapped generosity of spirit and sacrifice that is within their golden-calf-worshipping souls remains corked.
My argument:
I believe the boomers and their children could rise to be America's next great generation just as their great-grandparents did, if they would but learn the lesson. It is in their DNA, but I do not yet see this manifestation in sight as of today. America's greatest generation, those of the Great Depression and humanity's second Great War, suffered and sacrificed much. War bonds to pay for the war, they did not defer payment to the next generation, supporting huge government investment in the machinery of war. Everyone was put to work who could work. That focus is needed today only what is needed is not war effort, but instead law effort. Our great grandparents agreed to huge debt, high taxes, lived off of victory gardens, and Rosie the riveter as women stepped into all manner of war production; the courage of the Tuskegee Airman showing us true bravery, and sons going off to war and by the thousands coming home in pieces. And not done, post-war built great infrastructures and world class institutions of learning, paid down the debt, and from that a booming middle class, rivaled perhaps only by the Roman Empire. What happen?
Choice point: Psycho-politics and Grandpa Reagan
In 1973 "The Lewis Powell Memo - Corporate Blueprint to Dominate Democracy" - set in motion a plan to destroy the democratic middle class that had gotten in essence, too comfortable, in Powell's view, with government working for them. "We the People" accepted that cleaning up the environment of the effluvia of the industrial engine the drives the power of our civilization made sense. Powell viewed the harnessing of the power of corporations to live clean as good stewards as a threat to the free enterprise system. If harnessing the power of corporations to clean up as we go along does not makes sense, then what in God's great universe does? Have we not learned that living clearer is living healthier? But when profit is supreme Earth Consciousness is bad for profit. His social contract is so at odds with the first line of Constitution, the definition of why we are called to nationhood. Nothing in the first line, lines up with worshipping the golden calf. Powell later became a Supreme Court justice, the beginning of the takeover of our Supreme Court that has resulted in corporations being granted "personhood". Citizens United. Job well done.
In 1980 the fruition of the plan to "dominate democracy" started with the election of Ronald Reagan. The boomers and their children in clear majority agreed with the corporate sponsored message that said in essence, your great grandparents had it all wrong. The "New Deal", was really a bad deal, unconstitutional, and anti-American. Bad for business, for business is supreme, free and unregulated. In large majority boomers forgot that business supreme and unregulated is what caused the Great Depression. Our great grandparents who got us through that era of great depression and great wars followed a great leader ... but apparently our grandparents were fools to do so according to our corporate masters.
In clear majority the boomers bought the pink juice, and even to this day support a trillion dollar a year war budget and no taxes to pay for war. And talk of reducing the war budget is presented as treasonable action. This way of thinking all part of a grand delusion, Powell's "wet dream" comes true. They were told they are "special", had an "exceptional" place in history. Grandpa Reagan made the boomers feel good. And having charmed them, led them on a path of self surrender to a U.S.A. dominated by corporations. Not a shot was fired. So much for guns protecting rights to share in the bounty of our liberty. The main stream media used to distract with strong talk of guns and second Amendment rights, and all the while the plutocrats rob us, we the people, blind. Mainstream media is the great circus of our time. But good times come to an end, and good times built on folly always end very badly.
In 2008 under the leadership of George Bush their fantasy world came all tumbling down much to the "surprise" of the corporate media. It is called managing the message. In 2012 the outcome is clear, the boomers and their children gave over without a fight that which made America grand, a large and prosperous middle class. They agreed to a social contract in which a small elite captured 95% of the gains in wealth and the bottom 90% have gotten poorer. The Great Recession of 2008 caused the loss of perhaps 20 trillion in middle class wealth … and the rich today are ever richer than ever. Grand theft if ever there was, yet no one is punished. Even as plutocracy sits on two trillion in investment capital they will not lift a finger to do what needs to be done. Their goal is to put one of their own back in the White House to continue the rape of "we the people". The "capitalists" could be imaging great projects and put everyone to work making our future secure and at peace as we prosperously engaged the rest of humanity. But instead, they want more of our collective wealth. Some them want it all I am told.
In providing skillful leadership in a hostile political climate President Obama managed to avoid a Great Depression II ... but with the lack of political will to make the hard choices of their great grandparents, the boomers may have set up a social contract in which the worst may yet be ahead. If Israel strikes Iran and does so without humanity's approval ... this will be one more step toward World War III, and the ensuing economic chaos creating ever tightening circles of interlocking vectors as humanity tumbles into the black hole of catastrophic war.
The boomers and their children, while in a large majority, originally supported the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and a tripling of war funding to field large armies and Special Forces everywhere, but no discussion about funding the war. They were promised quick and easy wars, but instead they are long and hard. War debt mounts, but no talk still of paying for the wars. Talk of tax is verboten within the Republican Party. That ought to be warning enough that our democracy is in trouble. Someone is pulling the strings. Everyone talks patriotism, but only a few, who are ignored, talk of a war tax to at least pay for the wars. That we don't, our enemies love that about us as our behavior plays right into their war plan. The East has studied Sun Tzu well. Thus the East understands that our wealth is our center of gravity. It is our main vulnerability, and so they are making good progress if our debt be a measure. For they know that when our wealth is done, we are done making war on them. Which is all they want. Stop making war on Muslims and the war is over.
Can one not make the case for treason for those who so led, and lead us? For surely in the great cosmos of history, such arrogance, will not go unpunished.
The Choice:
Once upon a time the boomers had a chance to be adults. President Carter called on them to pay attention to the ever-increasingly international world that was then upon them and their future. They ignored and scorned him. Carter asked the boomers and their children to play by the rules of international law; he took concrete steps to end the Israel Palestine conflict. That conflict so at the heart of the age of terrorism that is upon us. He asked the boomers to make sacrifices for their children so that they would not be beholden to terrorist regimens for oil. The large majority of the boomers and their children rejected Carter’s call. This allowed the "less government less taxes", Powell minded crowd to get their foot in the door. This set in motion a political mantra of less government less tax mantra the boomers and now their children bow to. Carter based his policies on human rights and human dignity, the kind of things one would think that the good conservative Christians would have loved him for. But no. Grandpa Reagan came along as the kindly and good-natured indulgent figure who loved (Robert Bly) and loved to spoil the grandchildren.
He was a good story teller and told the boomers that they did not have to grow up and take on responsibility in a complex world.
Many of us from an earlier generation were shocked at Reagan's election. A generation spoiled by any measure was told, “You do not have to listen to that bad Carter. He is a bad dad ... he is weak. He is not a real American. He is asking you to make sacrifices and peace with the world. We are Americans, we make others sacrifice, pay the price, we make war, not peace. Peace is Chamberlain-like and “appeasement”, and the boomers and their children bought into what their corporate masters had planned for them.
President Reagan's audience in great number chose to believe in the fantasy that they could have it all at no cost, moral or otherwise. We all love a good cowboy movie ... in this version of the movie “America” comes riding in on his white horse and the bad guys flee for their lives (remember “shock and awe”), leaving us in charge of the ranch and the gold and the girl - and so we have what we have. It seems as though this movie is not going to end as well as Grandpa Reagan wanted us to believe. He might even be a little horrified at the monsters he spawned.
If they had been adults and followed President Carter's call to greatness, September 11, 2001 could have been prevented. If we had built good relations of amity, trust and mutual benefit with North Africa and East Asia, sided with forces within valuing individual rights and human dignity, instead we support terrorist regimens out of misguided self-interest. If we had followed Carter's lead our enemies would never have become our enemies, for we would be on the right side of history and so they would have had no reason to attack us. While there is always someone shouting for more war, in Carter's vision of the world these voices would have less and less a say as humanity comes to global order as the rule of law becomes stronger.
As it is, the boomers and their children are leaving a mess that will only get messier if we remain on the present course. Unless the Carter call to sacrifice is again given and this time heeded, they will go down as the most self-centered, narcissistic, and deluded generation in history.
Conclusion:
It is for these reasons that, when the Age of Catastrophe is upon them, our great-grandchildren will come to hate us. They will despise our very existence for the misery we caused them. They will see us as simply minded, good little consumers who ignored the consequences of our gluttonous consumption. Or will they read, having broken out of our denial we stepped up to the plate, and became adults in the world of humanity.
Those who have not yet given up hope must impress on the present generation to listen to their great grand-parents, so that our great grandchildren can hail us as America's next great generation. For with justice comes peace, and with peace the next level of human development focused on human potential. With the technology we can lay the next step in the foundation of law that will allow civilizations where peace and love is the "normal" way of daily human life.
And for that sacrifice our grandchildren will love us.
Post Script: 2016
That so many young are supporting a self-described "social democrat" for president ... suggests the "socialist" DNA in our soul is coming alive ... our youth our greatest hope.
