I don't think your Dad made a poor prediction, necessarily. Based on this testimony, he had a strong sense of what people wanted (and still want) and he described a real desire to transcend material acquisitiveness in favor of searching for deeper meaning in life and work. Globalization made things much more cut throat just as Reagan deregulated so many industries. It's amazing how much less philosophical our leaders in business and politics have become in such a short time. What angers me most about the current president slapping his name on the wall of the Kennedy Center is he could and would never speak so eloquently about art, philosophy and literature as Kennedy did. Though, these days, people don't much care.
I agree. I think circumstances changed significantly under Reagan/Volcker, but the underlying issues remained. This piece is partly designed to pair with its predecessor, Dangling Time: It feels like the country should have made significantly different decisions about itself sometime around 1980, but instead ran up big deficits, surfed globalization for incredibly cheap consumer goods, and went into a political nostalgia that's only now becoming untenable.
It amounts to a lost opportunity, an enormous turn not taken.
Quentin, What a story and what a father. The apple doesn't fall far....
As I read this, I was transported back to those times and what made us feel so much uncertainty and despair. Watergate, the fall of South Vietnam, the Arab oil embargoes, inflation, the gas lines and energy saving measures, the Iranian revolution. So much seemed to be falling apart. I believe it maxed out after your father's remarks, later in 1979 with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Iranian hostage crisis, the dollar's collapse and the brush with hyperinflation. It all seemed so out of control.
There were so many things: 2000 domestic bombings in the U.S. between 1969 and 1972. The Mayaguez after Vietnam. Nixon's wage/price freeze. Eurodollars and the reality of moving off gold. Recreational cocaine. Arson for profit in New York. The IRA. I could go hours.
But I do think we flinched from real change, using cheap goods and deficits while underfunding education, to create a short-term consumer society with long-term alienation and despair for many people.
My wife only really knew my father as he was falling into dementia, but she said that looking at the testimony was like hearing me talk. I was mildly shocked, gratified, and mildly mystified.
Very perceptive. And note one of the footnotes: "He then joined the ROTC because HE NEEDED CLOTHING. Becoming wealthy and consequential was strange to him, though unlike many people like that I’ve known HE MOSTLY WORE IT LIGHTLY, and was more bemused than consumed by his occasional bout of imposter complex.
Thank you! I am so grateful when people notice the little touches. For the most part, I don't expect them to notice them overtly, I figure they take it in subliminally. That doesn't mean it isn't there, and that doesn't mean it doesn't have an effect.
I remember those days of stagflation that included gas lines and an overall malaise in Detroit (where I was born/lived). Your dad captured the solution so well, and we had candidates and presidents who worked both sides of it.
Also a reminder of what the current generation is missing in tech journalism.
I don't think your Dad made a poor prediction, necessarily. Based on this testimony, he had a strong sense of what people wanted (and still want) and he described a real desire to transcend material acquisitiveness in favor of searching for deeper meaning in life and work. Globalization made things much more cut throat just as Reagan deregulated so many industries. It's amazing how much less philosophical our leaders in business and politics have become in such a short time. What angers me most about the current president slapping his name on the wall of the Kennedy Center is he could and would never speak so eloquently about art, philosophy and literature as Kennedy did. Though, these days, people don't much care.
I agree. I think circumstances changed significantly under Reagan/Volcker, but the underlying issues remained. This piece is partly designed to pair with its predecessor, Dangling Time: It feels like the country should have made significantly different decisions about itself sometime around 1980, but instead ran up big deficits, surfed globalization for incredibly cheap consumer goods, and went into a political nostalgia that's only now becoming untenable.
It amounts to a lost opportunity, an enormous turn not taken.
Quentin, What a story and what a father. The apple doesn't fall far....
As I read this, I was transported back to those times and what made us feel so much uncertainty and despair. Watergate, the fall of South Vietnam, the Arab oil embargoes, inflation, the gas lines and energy saving measures, the Iranian revolution. So much seemed to be falling apart. I believe it maxed out after your father's remarks, later in 1979 with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Iranian hostage crisis, the dollar's collapse and the brush with hyperinflation. It all seemed so out of control.
And yet, it's worse now.
Thanks!
There were so many things: 2000 domestic bombings in the U.S. between 1969 and 1972. The Mayaguez after Vietnam. Nixon's wage/price freeze. Eurodollars and the reality of moving off gold. Recreational cocaine. Arson for profit in New York. The IRA. I could go hours.
But I do think we flinched from real change, using cheap goods and deficits while underfunding education, to create a short-term consumer society with long-term alienation and despair for many people.
Sigh. BTW, "hugely gratifying and mildly mystifying" sounds exactly like something you'd say.
My wife only really knew my father as he was falling into dementia, but she said that looking at the testimony was like hearing me talk. I was mildly shocked, gratified, and mildly mystified.
Very perceptive. And note one of the footnotes: "He then joined the ROTC because HE NEEDED CLOTHING. Becoming wealthy and consequential was strange to him, though unlike many people like that I’ve known HE MOSTLY WORE IT LIGHTLY, and was more bemused than consumed by his occasional bout of imposter complex.
Thank you! I am so grateful when people notice the little touches. For the most part, I don't expect them to notice them overtly, I figure they take it in subliminally. That doesn't mean it isn't there, and that doesn't mean it doesn't have an effect.
I stand effected. Or is it affected? Or maybe both.
I remember those days of stagflation that included gas lines and an overall malaise in Detroit (where I was born/lived). Your dad captured the solution so well, and we had candidates and presidents who worked both sides of it.
Also a reminder of what the current generation is missing in tech journalism.