The last 40 years of conservative growth in power is a reaction to the 10 years called the "60's"

[jtuck004]

14. It's more like liberal thought pops up in a continually right-wing world. The programs of the 30's

the growth of unions, etc, were almost an aberration, but they were really a response to the extreme (for the time) right wing policies. (such as Ludlow Massacre in the early 1900's, worker conditions, ), and the unemployment that resulted after the greedy bastards created the Great Depression. Those policies didn't even last till the 40's, got cut and back we went into a recession. If it hadn't been for WWII and the government\taxpayer investment that ensued, with the destruction of so many countries and resultant world trade we would likely not have seen the more affluent time that followed.


The 50-60's were more a freeing from oppression, and by implication economics, for a time, first with civil rights, then a revolution of the relatively well-off young of the "middle-class". But they, and most of us didn't follow up, insist that it be taught. We forgot to teach people about the very real investment millions of people made very day in simply going to work and making things.

All that working and reliance on cheap foreign energy finally bit us in the ass. But when Carter then tried to reign in the economy, Reagan offered a "painless" way out, and began a trend of spending the wealth our labor had created, people began to value capital more than people.

We did occupy those periods. With our credit cards, and oversize SUVs, and McMansions, and debt. And more debt, and forgot this is a running battle against a perpetually right-wing world. People have always been swayed from the harder work by "easy" money. Ask any prostitute, or maybe a politician that sends money to banks or votes with the NRA, lowers taxes for the rich while taking away heating assistance for the most vulnerable. (And I apologize right now to prostitutes everywhere for besmirching their name by the comparison to politicians. Your job is hard enough.).

We forgot that we have to teach these ideas every single day. And now we may have to wait until the greedy bastards kill it all again, so we can gain a hearing. Maybe we will find a way to keep the lessons going next time...

Oh, and that's in the U.S.