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Guest Post: Bad Moon Rising
Submitted by Jim Quinn of The Burning Platform
Bad Moon Rising
I see the bad moon arising.
I see trouble on the way.
I see earthquakes and lightnin’.
I see bad times today.
Creedence Clearwater Revival – Bad Moon Rising
“Human history seems logical in afterthought but a mystery in forethought.” – The Fourth Turning – Strauss & Howe
The above statement by historians William Strauss and Neil Howe is
very significant as we try to make sense of the events unfolding before
our very eyes in today’s world. On September 17, a mere six weeks ago, a
few hundred young people showed up in Zuccatti Park in Lower Manhattan
to protest our corrupt, broken and Wall Street manipulated economic and
political system. That first night, approximately 100 protestors
occupied the park and were outnumbered by the NYPD in full riot gear.
The idea to Occupy Wall Street began circulating on the internet in late
August. The Millenial Generation used their social networks and put
their tech savvy talents to work. Before long, thousands of protestors
showed up in cities across the U.S. The model for this movement was the
successful demonstrations in Egypt and Tunisia, earlier in the year.
The initial reaction among mainstream media and politicians across
the land was bemusement. A bunch of young hippy throwbacks were going to
make a meaningless statement and then fade away. The attention span of
Americans is as long as the commercial break between contestants on
Dancing With the Stars. Everyone knows the Millenials aren’t to be taken
seriously. They are a bunch of spoiled, coddled, lazy college kids who
need to get a job. But a funny thing happened during the commercial
break. The kids held their ground. They didn’t leave. More young people
arrived. More young people began protesting in cities across the
country. Middle aged people began to get involved. Even some older
people joined the cause. Before long there were thousands of people
getting involved. It spread to Europe, with young people occupying
London and Rome. Donations and supplies began to pour in from around the
world. There’s something happening here, but what it is ain’t exactly
clear.
The six weeks since September 17 have been chaotic, venomous,
confusing, and verging on deadly. Wall Street gyrated wildly with stocks
falling 8% by October 3 and rebounding by 15% by October 28 and
plunging again this week. The Economic Cycle Research Institute (ECRI)
declared the country was headed back into recession on September 30:
“It’s important to understand that
recession doesn’t mean a bad economy – we’ve had that for years now. It
means an economy that keeps worsening, because it’s locked into a
vicious cycle. It means that the jobless rate, already above 9%, will go
much higher, and the federal budget deficit, already above a trillion
dollars, will soar. Here’s what ECRI’s recession call really says: if
you think this is a bad economy, you haven’t seen anything yet. And that
has profound implications for both Main Street and Wall Street.”
The ECRI has called the last three recessions with no instances of
false alarms. Last week, the Conference Board announced the Consumer
Confidence Index plummeted to two and a half year low of 39.8, last seen
in March of 2009. The Dow Jones was trading at 6,500 in March 2009,
some 47% below today’s level. It is an interesting dichotomy between how
the average American feels about the world and how the Wall Street
elite feel about their Ben Bernanke sheltered world. The Consumer
Confidence Index was 110 in 2007 and 140 in early 2001. We’ve come a
long way baby.
During these past six weeks the European Union has teetered on the
verge of disintegration. Non-stop negotiations, agreements, plans,
declarations, special purpose vehicles, bailout funds, and lies have
poured forth on a daily basis. Greece still lives – on a ventilator – as
it has been brain dead for months. The sole purpose of all the public
relations efforts, press conferences, summit meetings and lies has been
to keep European banks, their stockholders and bondholders from
accepting the consequences of their irresponsible lending to the PIIGS.
Essentially, the German people have been put on the hook for losses that
should have been born by the stockholders and bondholders of the
biggest French, German, Belgian and English banks. The EU has put a
tourniquet over a cancerous tumor. The entire world is awash in bad debt
and until this debt is liquidated, we will stagger from crisis to
crisis like a drunken sailor. John Hussman describes the master plan:
In effect, European leaders have
announced “We have agreed to solve our debt problem, leveraging money we
do not have, to create a fund, which will then borrow several times
that amount, in order to buy enormous amounts of new debt that we will
need to issue.”
As politicians and central bankers around the world desperately try
to keep their debt drenched ponzi scheme going for awhile longer, the
mood darkens among the populations of developed countries around the
world. I came across a quote from, of all people, Vladimir Lenin that
describes how the last six weeks seemed to me:
“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.”
It seems like history is accelerating. Momentous events have been
occurring regularly since 2007. Our political and financial leaders are
blindsided on a daily basis by each new crisis. The majority of the
American public continues to be apathetic, willfully ignorant, and
constantly absorbed by their array of electronic gadgets and mindless
drivel spewed at them by media conglomerates. Rather than think
critically, most Americans allow left wing and right wing mainstream
media to formulate their opinions for them through their propaganda and
misinformation operations. Linear thinkers, who make up the majority of
the political, social, media and financial elite in this country,
believe the world progresses and moves ever forward. In reality, the
world operates in a cyclical fashion, with generations throughout
history reacting to events in a predictable manner based upon their
stage in life. The reason the world has turned so chaotic, angry and
fraught with danger since 2007 is because we have entered another Fourth
Turning. Strauss & Howe have been able to document a fourfold cycle
of generational types and recurring mood eras in American history back
500 years. They have also documented the same phenomenon in other
countries.
The housing collapse, near meltdown of our financial system,
revolutions in the Middle East, economic turmoil in Europe, poisoned
political atmosphere in Washington DC, and most recently the Occupy Wall
Street movement are part of a larger cycle. The four living generations
have each entered the phases of their lives that will lead to a
convulsive upheaval and destruction of the existing social order. We’ve
entered a twenty year period of Crisis as described by Strauss &
Howe:
“A CRISIS arises in response to
sudden threats that previously would have been ignored or deferred, but
which are now perceived as dire. Great worldly perils boil off the
clutter and complexity of life, leaving behind one simple imperative:
The society must prevail. This requires a solid public consensus,
aggressive institutions, and personal sacrifice. People support new
efforts to wield public authority, whose perceived successes soon
justify more of the same. Government governs, community obstacles are
removed, and laws and customs that resisted change for decades are
swiftly shunted aside. A grim preoccupation with civic peril causes
spiritual curiosity to decline. Public order tightens, private
risk-taking abates, and crime and substance abuse decline. Families
strengthen, gender distinctions widen, and child-rearing reaches a
smothering degree of protection and structure. The young focus their
energy on worldly achievements, leaving values in the hands of the old.
Wars are fought with fury and for maximum result.” - Strauss & Howe
History is Cyclical, not Linear
“There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations
much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation
of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.” – Franklin Delano Roosevelt
I’ve been trying to decipher which direction this Fourth Turning will
lead, and the last six weeks has started to crystallize my thinking.
I’ve been fascinated by the intense reactions, opinions and arguments
that have taken place across the airwaves and internet regarding the
true nature of the Occupy movement. Some of the reaction is based upon
pure ideological grounds, with media outlets like Fox News, the Wall
Street Journal, NY Post and CNBC, disparaging, ridiculing and demeaning
the movement. The anti-rich tone of the protests may not sit well with
the multi-billionaire owners (Rupert Murdoch, Mort Zuckerman, Roberts
Family) of these mega-media corporations. The liberal media such as
MSNBC, Huffington Post, and CNN have sometimes been fawning over the
movement in an effort to co-opt it into liberal Tea Party for the
benefit of Obama and the Democratic Party. The propaganda and
misinformation coming from both these ideological camps is easy to
discern for a critical thinking person. Sadly, the nation is filled with
people that don’t want to think. Therefore, they let their opinions be
formed by talking heads on a TV screen.
These reactions were predictable. What caught my attention was the
generational reaction to Occupy Wall Street. I know all the rugged
individualists out there chafe at being lumped into a generational
cohort, but the fact remains that groups of people born during the same
time frame encounter key historical events and social trends while
occupying the same phase of life. Because members of a generation are
molded in lasting ways by the eras they encounter as children and young
adults, they also tend to share certain common beliefs and behaviors.
Aware of the experiences and traits that they share with their peers,
members of a generation also tend to share a sense of common perceived
membership in that generation. To deny the reality that large clusters
of human beings tend to act with a herd mentality is contrary to all
visible evidence. The herd mentality can be observed in the Dot-com
bubble, Americans unquestioningly allowing passage of the Patriot Act,
the housing bubble, the mass hysteria over the latest iSomething, Black
Friday riots at retail stores to obtain the “hottest” toy or gadget, and
the slaves to the latest fashions and trends as directed by the
corporate media machine. The masses don’t realize they are being
manipulated by the few who understand the power of propaganda:
“The conscious and intelligent
manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an
important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this
unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is
the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are
molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have
never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our
democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must
cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly
functioning society. In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in
the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical
thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of
persons…who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the
masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.” – Edward Bernays – Propaganda – 1928
The Occupy movement is being driven by the Millenial Generation. They
have used their superior technological and social networking skills to
organize, educate, and inspire people to their cause while befuddling
and confusing the authorities. They continue to rally more young people
to their fight against Wall Street and K Street tyranny. The
generational lines of battle are being drawn. The Baby Boom Generation,
who is at the point of maximum power in society, fears this movement.
They control Wall Street, corporate America, Congress, the courts,
academia and the media. They have reached their peak of influence and
power, which will rapidly wane over the next fifteen years. They see the
Occupy movement as a threat to their supremacy and control of the
system. The cynical, alienated, pragmatic Generation X is caught between
the Boomers and the Millenials in this escalating conflict. It is
likely the majority of this generation will side with the Millenials,
realizing the future of the country depends on them and not the elderly
Boomers. To clarify, not every Boomer, Gen Xer, or Millenial will act in
concert with their generational cohort. But it doesn’t matter if a few
cattle stray from the herd, when the herd is stampeding in one
direction.
The chart below details the Strauss & Howe configuration of
generations and turnings for the last two Saeculums in American history.
They describe their generational theory in the following terms:
“Turnings last about 20 years and
always arrive in the same order. Four of them make up the cycle of
history, which is about the length of a long human life. The first
turning is a High, a period of confident expansion as a new order
becomes established after the old has been dismantled. Next comes an
Awakening, a time of rebellion against the now-established order, when
spiritual exploration becomes the norm. Then comes an Unraveling, an
increasingly troubled era of strong individualism that surmounts
increasingly fragmented institutions. Last comes the Fourth Turning, an
era of upheaval, a Crisis in which society redefines its very nature and
purpose.” – Strauss & Howe
Each new generation is born approximately three years prior to the
next turning. This results in Strauss & Howe having a slightly
different generational grouping than government demographers.
| Great Power Saeculum (82) | |||
| Missionary Generation | Prophet (Idealist) | 1860–1882 (22) | High: Reconstruction/Gilded Age |
| Lost Generation | Nomad (Reactive) | 1883–1900 (17) | Awakening: Missionary Awakening |
| G.I. Generation | Hero (Civic) | 1901–1924 (23) | Unraveling: World War I/Prohibition |
| Silent Generation | Artist (Adaptive) | 1925–1942 (17) | Crisis: Great Depression/World War II |
| Millennial Saeculum (67+) | |||
| (Baby) Boom Generation | Prophet (Idealist) | 1943–1960 (17) | High: Superpower America |
| 13th Generation | Nomad (Reactive) | 1961–1981 (20) | Awakening: Consciousness Revolution |
| (a.k.a Generation X) | |||
| Millennial Generation(Generation Y) | Hero (Civic) | 1982–2004 (22) | Unraveling: Culture Wars, Postmodernism, Digital Technology |
| New Silent Generation (Generation Z) | Artist (Adaptive) | 2004–present (6+) | Crisis: Great Recession, War on Terror, Declining Superpower, and Globalization |
There is nothing mystical about their theory. Strauss & Howe are
historians who have created a framework for understanding why people act
a certain way to events differently, depending on which stage of life
they occupy. The theory is so logical because it is based upon the
average 80 year life cycle of a human being. A human being goes through
four stages during their life: childhood, young adulthood, midlife, and
elderhood. During each of these stages, you will react to the same event
in a very different manner. During an 80 year cycle, there will be four
generations at different stages of their life. The interaction between
the generations at each 20 year turning determines how history is
steered through the events of that cycle. The life cycle stages can be
seen in this chart:
| Prophet | Nomad | Hero | Artist | |
| High | Childhood | Elderhood | Midlife | Young Adult |
| Awakening | Young Adult | Childhood | Elderhood | Midlife |
| Unraveling | Midlife | Young Adult | Childhood | Elderhood |
| Crisis | Elderhood | Midlife | Young Adult | Childhood |
Strauss and Howe compare the saecular rhythm to the seasons of the
year, which inevitably occur in the same order, but with slightly
varying timing. Just as winter may come sooner or later, and be more or
less severe in any given year, the same is true of a Fourth Turning in
any given Saeculum. The theory does not predict the events which drive
history, but it does predict the generational reaction to events
depending upon their age. We entered the Fourth Turning Crisis in 2007
with the housing collapse and the implosion of our financial system. The
configuration of elder self righteous Boomers at 60 years old, midlife
pessimistic Gen Xers at 40 years old, and coming of age Millenials at 20
years old is an explosive mixture that will provide the impetus and
fury to this period of catharsis and pain. Winter has arrived. There is
no way to avoid it. The bitter winds have begun to blow. The first harsh
front arrived in 2008 with the near meltdown of the worldwide economic
system. There has been a lull in the biting gale force winds of this
Crisis through the shoveling of massive amounts of newly created debt
into a system already drowning in debt. The Occupy movement and the
impending collapse of the European Union charade will usher in the next
blizzard of pain and suffering. We hurdle towards are rendezvous with
destiny.
“The ‘spirit of America’ comes once a
saeculum, only through what the ancients called ekpyrosis, nature’s
fiery moment of death and discontinuity. History’s periodic eras of
Crisis combust the old social order and give birth to a new. A Fourth
Turning is a solstice era of maximum darkness, in which the supply of
social order is still falling—but the demand for order is now rising.
It is the saeculum’s hibernal, its time of trial. Nature exacts its
fatal payment and pitilessly sorts out the survivors and the doomed.
Pleasures recede, tempests hurt, pretense is exposed, and toughness
rewarded—all in a season.” – Strauss & Howe
Millenials Rising
Over the last six weeks I’ve watched as the young protestors around
the country have been called: filthy hippies, losers, lazy, coddled,
socialists, communists, spoiled college kids, parasites, useful idiots,
and tools of the left. Most of the wrath being heaped upon these young
people for exercising their Constitutional right to free speech and
freedom of assembly has been from the Baby Boom Generation, who are at
the peak of their power in our society. Sixty percent of the Senate is
made up of Baby Boomers, with the next closest generation being the
Silent Generation with twenty five percent. Over 58% of the House of
Representatives is made up of Baby Boomers, with the next closest
generation being Gen Xers at 27%. They occupy the executive suites of
the Wall Street banks (Blankfein, Dimon, Pandit, Moniyan) and the
Federal Reserve (Bernanke). They make up the majority of judges, local
politicians and school boards. They run the Federal government agencies.
And they dominate the airwaves as the high priced mouthpieces for their
corporate bosses. This Prophet generation will lead the country through
the trials and tribulations of this Fourth Turning.
The disdain and contempt for these Millenial protestors flies in the
face of the facts about this generation. They use drugs at a lower rate
than their parents did at the same age. Teen crime rates and teen
pregnancies have declined. They will have the highest level of college
education in U.S. history. They were protected during their youth as
organized sports taught them teamwork. They are the most technologically
savvy generation in history. They volunteer at higher level than
previous generations. They have been more upbeat and engaged than their
predecessors (Gen X). And they are much closer to their parents than
Boomers were at the same age. They reject the negativism and cynicism of
their parents and believe positive change is possible in our society.
They have shown respect for authority up until the last six weeks. They
were primed to be led by Boomers that could articulate a positive vision
of the future based on reality and a better tomorrow. They were ready
to make sacrifices in order to create a brighter future. But a funny
thing happened. The Boomer generation failed to deliver on their part of
the bargain.
Prior Hero Generation Americans had braved the winter at Valley Forge
and stormed the beaches of Normandy as Prophet leaders like Ben
Franklin and Franklin Roosevelt provided inspirational guidance and the
vision of a better tomorrow. Strauss & Howe accurately assessed the
Millenial Generation in their book Millenials Rising: The Next Great Generation, published in 2000 when the 1st Millenials were graduating high school:
“As a group, Millenials are unlike
any other youth generation in living memory. They are more numerous,
more affluent, better educated, and more ethnically diverse. More
important, they are beginning to manifest a wide array of positive
social habits that older Americans no longer associate with youth,
including a new focus on teamwork, achievement, modesty and good
conduct. Only a few years from now, this can-do youth revolution will
overwhelm the cynics and pessimists … will entirely recast the image of
youth from downbeat and alienated to upbeat and engaged — with
potentially seismic consequences for America.” - Strauss & Howe
The youth of America listened to their parents and stayed in school.
They’ve racked up over $1 trillion in student loan debt getting college
educations. Meanwhile, our Baby Boomer leadership had an opportunity to
address the country’s unsustainable fiscal path by accepting the
consequences of a thirty year debt binge and liquidating the banks that
took extreme risks with extreme leverage. An orderly liquidation (aka
Washington Mutual) would have punished the stockholders, bondholders and
management of the Wall Street banks, while leaving the depositors whole
and purging the system of debt that can never be paid off. Our
politicians could have ended our wars of choice in the Middle East and
cut our war spending by hundreds of billions without sacrificing one
iota of safety for the American people. The political leadership could
have put the country on a deficit reduction path that would have insured
the long-term viability of our republic.
Instead of doing the right thing, our Baby Boomer leaders did the
exact opposite of the right thing. They held the American taxpayer
hostage and absconded with trillions of their tax dollars and handed it
over to the same Wall Street banks that had run the largest fraud scheme
in world history and blew up the worldwide financial system. The Boomer
Chairman of the Federal Reserve decided to not only save the Wall
Street banks but to purposefully try to pump up the stock market, while
destroying the lives of savers and senior citizens with his zero
interest rate policy. His policies have led to a surge in energy and
food prices and contributed to revolutions in the Middle East. The Wall
Street banks have used the accounting gimmick of relieving loan loss
reserves to create fake profits over the last two years. Wall Street
celebrated by paying themselves $60 billion in bonuses between 2008 and
2010. The poster boys for the .1% Jamie Dimon and Lloyd Blankfein
“earned” $23 million and $19 million respectively in 2010.
The politicians borrowed trillions from future unborn generations to
inflict a Keynesian nightmare of solutions on the American economy that
included: an $800 billion porkulus program, $22 billion pissed down the
toilet on a homebuyer tax credit as home prices are now lower, $3
billion for Cash for Clunkers that cost $24,000 per car sold, loan
modification schemes, tax credits for windows, doors and appliances, and
payroll tax cuts. The result of all the Federal Reserve and politician
“solutions” has been to increase the National Debt by $5.3 trillion in
three years, a 55% increase. It took the country over 200 years to
accumulate the first $5.3 trillion in debt. Everything done thus far has
benefitted only the top 1%. The real unemployment rate is 23%. The real
inflation rate is between 5% and 10%. The economy is headed back into
recession. But at least the top 1% are doing well, as the stock market
has risen 84% from its 2009 lows. Somehow, the oligarchy that runs this
country is taken aback by the protests growing increasingly contentious
across the country. It is not a surprise to those who understand the
cyclical nature of history and the darkening mood in this country, which
has been deepening since the Tea Party protests of 2009.
Hope You Are Quite Prepared To Die
Hope you got your things together.
Hope you are quite prepared to die.
Looks like we’re in for nasty weather.
One eye is taken for an eye.
Creedence Clearwater Revival – Bad Moon Rising
It seems the young people in this country have realized they have no
future when the system is run for the benefit of an oligarchy consisting
of Wall Street banks, mega-corporations, media conglomerates, and
puppet politicians in Washington D.C. These people will stop at nothing
to retain their wealth and power. Not only do they want to retain it,
they are actively trying to increase it. They have achieved their goal
beyond all expectations, and are still able to convince a large portion
of the population through their propaganda machine they deserve every
penny. The chasm between the “Haves” and “Have Nots” has never been
greater in U.S. history. The truth is that Americans have always admired
entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates who created businesses,
created jobs, and ended up with vast wealth. But, that is not the wealth
protestors on Wall Street and across the country are angry about. They
are angry at the hyper-concentration of wealth in the hands of men that
have rigged the system in their favor through bribery (lobbying &
contributions), fraud (no-doc loans & AAA rated toxic derivatives),
accounting schemes (special purpose vehicles & suspending mark to
market) and holding the American middle class hostage (TARP & zero
interest rates). When the 400 wealthiest Americans own more than the
“lower” 150 million Americans put together, you have a system that is
badly broken.
Do the Millenials have a right to be angry? The table below shows how
the economic solutions of the oligarchy have worked out for the youth
of our country. There are 19 million young people between the ages of 18
and 29 that are not working. Some are still in college, but most are
not. That is a lot of potential Occupiers.
| Age Group | % not employed |
| 18 to 19 | 65% |
| 20 to 24 | 40% |
| 25 to 29 | 27% |
After observing the reactions to the OWS movement over the last few
weeks, I’m more convinced than ever that different generations view the
same event through the prism of their own life experiences, beliefs,
prejudices, and biases. I’ve found the Baby Boomers have generally been
doubtful of the protestors’ motives, condescending towards their
intelligence, scornful about their appearance, and derogatory regarding
their flaunting of authority. This is fascinating considering that
Boomers love to reminisce about their glory days protesting the Vietnam
War. The Boomer generation was at this same age configuration in 1970.
Their GI Generation parents probably had the same opinions about the
long haired, drug using, sex crazed youthful Boomers in 1970. Now the
Boomers are the establishment and they don’t like seeing their authority
challenged by these naïve troublemakers. Strauss & Howe saw the
likelihood of this conflict back in 1997 when the oldest Millenials were
only 15 years old:
“When young adults encounter leaders
who cling to the old regime (and who keep propping up senior benefit
programs that will by then be busting the budget), they will not tune
out, 13er-style. Instead they will get busy working to defeat or
overcome their adversaries. Their success will lead some older critics
to perceive real danger in a rising generation perceived as capable but
naïve.” – Strauss & Howe
The Millenials spearheading these protests are most certainly
capable. In a matter of six weeks they have created a worldwide movement
occupying every major city in the world. The biggest complaints coming
from the Boomers is they are naïve, misguided, immature, and don’t
understand the real problem. The bitter condemnation of the protestors
for breaking a myriad of minor administrative laws, regulations,
ordinances, and curfews is beyond laughable. Fox News, CNBC, the Wall
Street Journal, NY Post and the other mouthpieces of the ruling
oligarchy are apoplectic about the young protestors camping out in
public parks, but they were not too concerned by the Wall Street banks
systematically defrauding millions of people by creating mortgage
products designed to deceive.
They weren’t irate when Wall Street held Congress hostage for a $700
billion ransom. They weren’t enraged when Ben Bernanke bought a trillion
dollars of toxic mortgage debt from the Wall Street banks at 100 cents
on the dollar. They weren’t furious when the government officials forced
the FASB to abandon mark to market rules, allowing the Wall Street
banks to falsely report their financial statements. But, they are
outraged by young people exercising their right to free speech and right
to assembly. When their paid armies of thugs attack the protestors with
tear gas and billy clubs, they declare the protestors had it coming. It
seems the 150 year old American tradition of civil disobedience to
protest unjust laws, defined by Henry David Thoreau, is not too popular
among Boomers or the corporate mainstream media.
“Unjust laws exist: shall we be
content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them
until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?” – Henry David Thoreau
Many of the protestors are naïve, misinformed about the true causes
of the financial crisis, impulsive, and seeking solutions that would
result in more government control. Their critics say they should be in
Washington DC, not on Wall Street. The Boomers don’t like their
flaunting of rules and regulations imposed by local authorities. Again,
the older generations have conveniently forgotten how naïve, impulsive
and rebellious they were at the age of 20. The amazing thing to me is
this generation never showed this side during their younger years. Their
slogans like “Tax the Rich” are misguided. They need assistance from
older generations, but instead they are getting beaten and arrested by
the older generation. Some Boomers, like William Black, have opened a
dialogue with the protestors, but the majority of Boomers are resistant
to the movement. In prior Fourth Turnings, the Hero archetype followed
the orders of the Prophet archetype. I fear the Boomer Generation,
through their intransigence and refusal to proactively address our
structural problems, have set in motion a revolutionary chain of events
that will lead to class warfare and possibly civil war in this country.
The real danger, as experienced in other countries (France, Russia,
China), is that a demagogue could gain control. Strauss & Howe
envisioned that possibility in 1997:
“This youthful hunger for social
discipline and centralized authority could lead Millenial youth brigades
to lend mass to dangerous demagogues. The risk of class warfare will be
especially grave if the 20% of Millenials who were poor as children
(50% in the inner cities) come of age seeing their peer-bonded paths to
generational progress blocked by elder inertia. Unraveling era adults
who are today chilled by school uniforms will be truly frightened by the
Millenials’ Crisis-era collectivism.” – Strauss & Howe
The most outrageous accusation made against the protestors is they
are somehow responsible for their current plight. The Boomers declare
they are spoiled kids who need to get a job. A critical thinking
analysis of the Millenial Generation demographics reveals how ridiculous
it is for Boomers to blame Millenials in any way for our current
economic debacle. There are 97 million Millenials and 54 million of them
are under the age of 20. Another 21 million are between the ages of 20
and 24, barely getting started in the real world. Only 39 million of
them were eligible to even vote in the last Presidential election. It
should be clear to even the most dense CNBC anchor that the young people
protesting in the streets are not to blame for the raping and pillaging
of the U.S. economic system by the barbarians on Wall Street over the
last thirty years, with the consent and encouragement of the bought off
politicians in Washington D.C.
| Generation | Age | Total Pop.(mil) |
| G.I. | 86–109 | 6 |
| Silent | 69–85 | 22 |
| Boomer | 51–68 | 73 |
| Gen-X | 30–50 | 83 |
| Millennial | 7–29 | 97 |
| Homeland | – 6 | 29 |
After placing the living generations in their assigned age buckets, I
was shocked to see the Millenials being, by far, the largest
generation. I had assumed it was the Baby Boom Generation. At their peak
in 1970 they totaled 76 million and made up 37% of the U.S. population.
But, time has not treated them well. Approximately 3 million have left
this earth and they only make up 24% of the population. Both Gen X and
the Millenials now outnumber the Baby Boomers. They will continue to see
their power wane as the years roll by. The Millenial power will grow as
the Fourth Turning progresses, since they make up 31% of the population
today and will see that ratio grow as the G.I. and Silent generations
die off. There are very few people remaining that lived through the last
Fourth Turning. The initial phase of this Crisis has revolved around
the Wall Street induced housing collapse with the consequences of not
enforcing the rule of law by liquidating insolvent banks and prosecuting
the white collar criminals that reaped ungodly profits by committing
fraud on an epic scale. This has left the country with an unsustainable
level of debt, a hollowed out economy, and unemployment at Great
Depression era levels, while Wall Street bankers, media titans, and
career politicians reap compensation packages fit for kings. Jesse from Jesse’s Café Americain describes our political system perfectly:
Kleptocracy:“rule by thieves”
is a form of political and government corruption where the government
exists to increase the personal wealth and political power of its
officials and the ruling class at the expense of the wider population,
often without pretense of honest service.No outside oversight is
possible, due to the ability of the kleptocrats to personally control
both the supply of public funds and the means of determining their
disbursal.
The Millenials were raised by parents who believed government could
solve all our problems. The welfare-warfare state became monolithic
during the Boomer reign of error. Therefore, it is understandable these
young naïve revolutionaries still cling to the belief the government can
solve our problems through more taxes or new programs. The point being
missed by all the doubters and detractors of the OWS movement is these
young people have zeroed in on the right culprits. They are not stupid.
They understand these basic facts:
- The $15 trillion National Debt, headed to $20 trillion by 2015, is the gift we are leaving to the Millenials.
- The $100 trillion of unfunded entitlement liabilities will never be honored by the time the Millenials retire.
- The Millenials know the $1 trillion per year spent maintaining our
military empire is more than the next 18 countries’ spending combined,
and it benefits only the corporations peddling armaments, while making
us less safe. - The soldiers getting killed and wounded in our wars of choice in the Middle East are predominantly Millenials.
- There are 14,000 professional lobbyists in Washington D.C.
representing mega-corporations, unions, trade groups and other special
interests, which have doled out $30 billion over the last decade
influencing (bribing) politicians to write the laws in their favor, and
not one lobbyist was working for the Millenials. - Millenials know Wall Street has spent $154 million on political
contributions and $383 million on lobbying in the last decade. The
buying of political influence by our bastions of crony capitalism was as
follows: Goldman Sachs – $46 million; Merrill Lynch – $68 million;
Citigroup – $108 million; J.P. Morgan Chase – $65 million; Bank of
America – $39 million. - The Millenials know the 71,000 page Federal tax code and 140,000
pages of Federal regulations are written to protect the interests of the
few, not the many. - Millenials know the financial industry consciously created products
designed to induce mortgage fraud, knowingly packaged toxic mortgages
into derivatives, bribed the rating agencies to rate them AAA, sold
these worthless instruments to their customers, shorted these same
derivatives, and pocketed billions in fees and ill gotten gains. After
blowing up the financial system and costing taxpayers trillions, not one
person has gone to jail. - Millenials know how to read a chart:
- Millenials know that Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are the same face
of a never changing oligarchy. Change brought about through opposing
political parties and elections has been rendered obsolete as the
oligarchy chooses the candidates, uses their wealth to create policies
and programs, and is able to control the masses with their propaganda
message machines.
So here we stand, about five years into this Fourth Turning, with
protests in the U.S. growing increasingly violent and intense. The calls
for civility after the Gabrielle Giffords assassination attempt in
January of this year went unheeded as the political vitriol has grown
increasingly nasty. January seems like a lifetime ago. Revolutions have
overthrown rulers in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. Unrest and bloodshed
continues in Syria, Gaza, Yemen, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. The European
Union is disintegrating before our very eyes and violent protests
against austerity measures flare up on a daily basis in Greece, Italy
and Spain. There is no doubt we have entered the 2nd stage of
this Crisis – the more violent and dangerous stage. I can sense fear
and uneasiness among the more connected members of society. The drones,
which constitute a large portion of America, are highly focused on Kim
Kardashian’s divorce after 72 days and a $10 million wedding. The
Millenials leading the protest movement are connected. They understand
what is at stake. Strauss and Howe had it figured out 14 years ago:
“Of all today’s generations, the
Millenials probably have the most at stake in the coming Crisis. If it
ends badly, they would bear the full burden of its consequences
throughout their adult lives. Yet if the Crisis ends well, Millenials
will gain a triumphant reputation for virtue, valor and competence.” – Strauss & Howe
So what happens next? The truth is that no one knows what will happen
next. We can only try to connect the dots and peer into a foggy future.
We know that our leaders have not solved any of the financial
imbalances that existed in 2007. They have made them worse, as have
leaders across the world from China to Japan to Europe. We await the
next Lehman moment, except this time it will be a sovereign nation and
the contagion will be ten times greater than the 2008 meltdown. Our
already fragile economy will be brought to its knees in a replay of the
1930s. As nations plunge into economic chaos, civil strife will likely
lead to authoritarian figures rising from the ashes of the turmoil.
Could Russia and China take advantage of this turmoil to acquire new
resources through military means? Possibly. When the American middle
class sees their remaining wealth dwindle to nothing, will they take to
the streets? Revolution seems too remote to fathom, but it seemed remote
in 1764 and 1855 too. When people have nothing left to lose, anything
is possible. The collapse of our economic system is baked in the cake.
Our current fiscal path is destined to end in fatality. Strauss &
Howe knew the outcome of this Fourth Turning would depend upon the
wisdom, strength and fortitude of the American people:
“The risk of catastrophe will be
very high. The nation could erupt into insurrection or civil violence,
crack up geographically, or succumb to authoritarian rule. Thus might
the next Fourth Turning end in apocalypse – or glory. The nation could
be ruined, its democracy destroyed, and millions of people scattered or
killed. Or America could enter a new golden age, triumphantly applying
shared values to improve the human condition. The rhythms of history do
not reveal the outcome of the coming Crisis; all they suggest is the
timing and dimension.” – Strauss & Howe
Winter has arrived. There will be difficult hurdles with many trials
and tribulations in front of us. You may have to choose sides in a
generational war. No one wants to face bitter choices. No one wants
bloodshed and war. But it really doesn’t matter what we want. There is
no real justice in a country that attacks and incarcerates young people
for exercising their right to free speech and dissent, while allowing a
psychopathic Wall Street banking cartel to wreak havoc upon our nation.
The generational alignment is such the existing social order will be
swept away in a violent manner. What replaces the existing order will be
up to the American people. You may lose your wealth, security, freedom,
or life during the coming struggle. The years ahead will require steely
determination and courage like our forefathers exhibited on the frigid
barren fields at Valley Forge, the undulating wheat fields at
Gettysburg, and the bloody beaches of Normandy. I have three teenage
sons at home. My choices will be dictated by what I feel will be best
for their futures. I will do WHATEVER it takes to
secure a better tomorrow for my boys. If that means standing beside them
in battle, so be it. Lines are being drawn. You will not be able to
avoid choosing sides, just as you cannot avoid Winter if you ever want
to see the dawn of another Spring.
“History offers no guarantees. We
should not assume that Providence will always exempt our nation from the
irreversible tragedies that have overtaken so many others: not just
temporary hardship, but debasement and total ruin. Since Vietnam, many
Americans suppose they know what it means to lose a war. Losing in the
next Fourth Turning, however, could mean something incomparably worse.
It could mean a lasting defeat from which our national innocence –
perhaps even our nation – might never recover.” – Strauss & Howe
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0 stars.
Another load of "it's inevitable" ... "resistance is futile" ... NWO propaganda!!
Funny how TPTB loved and fanned the flames of the Arab Spring until...oops...it applied to us. Guess they forgot that wherever you find humans, you will find human nature.
Actually history follows the pattern of a sine curve. I cannot get Kondratieff waves out of my mind.
Martin A. is that you?
It's just freaking terrible that the youngsters are almost all left out the jobmarket these last few years!
THAT'S OUR FUTURE!!
The role of the Occupy-ers is way overstated in this article...they lack cohesiveness and a coherent message. OWS is just noise.
I figured this was going to be pablum when it started with stating the "successful" protests in Egypt and Tunisia (ya mean lighting oneself on fire is successful?). BTW, those were about food scarcity more than anything else. Resource scarcity is the unwritten driver of most of these uprisings.
Last point: this story of crisis and upheavel is not new. It's recorded in Matthew 24 fairly well.
At least there IS noise finally.
I was seriously starting to think I was the only one that hadnt become one of the pod people yet.
Sorry, the Biblical Card is no longer that powerful.
The content of the "scripture" was decided on by a committee.
That committee established a consensus from the texts and ideology of the time.
OWS is what it is; a marketplace of ideas.
A noisy un-homogenized and unafraid marketplace. Have you been to any #occupy location, or is all your information through the eyes and words of others ?
Sorry, the Biblical Card is no longer that powerful.
Funny, that's exactly what was predicted in Matthew 24.
I've been to several of the so-called Occupy locations. Have you read Matthew 24 or the rest of the Bible, mon ami? I always say, it's the most criticized compendium of books never read by its criticizers. :D
OWS is what it is; a marketplace of ideas.
I'd like to hear (a) one original idea emanating from OWS, and (b) a list of five...scratch that, three things that more than 75% of the OWS completely agree on.
Take your time...
Well, when I get a free hour or two I may go through this. Longer than most pieces here at ZH.
The Millennials' idea of revolution is to beg the Boomers for more handouts. Remember, they had parents who wanted to be their best friends. Their formative years were spent during a bubble that allowed mommy and daddy to buy them everything they wanted on a HELOC. And as a result, they trusted adults who told them that they needed to go deep into debt for an education. Compare to the previous hero generation, which grew up during the Great Depression.
The crisis point was 9/11. America was attacked, the dot-com bubble had collapsed, debt was out of hand. And if we'd treated it as the crisis it was, the Millennials would have had a role to play. But we didn't. We played extend & pretend. We told everyone to go shopping. We used a volunteer military to fight relatively bloodless (for us) wars. We blew a new bubble. And when that popped, we kicked the can down the road some more. Now it can't be avoided. And the generation that could have played the role of Hero is unprepared for the challenge. They can't even muster the outrage to defy the police on the use of loudspeakers. Even in protesting, they obey.
The Millennials aren't the Heroes you're looking for. They're just an echo of the Boomers, their parents. I believe the Strauss & Howe cycles are basically correct, but we've created a dead-end offshoot from the cycle in Gen-Y. The real Heroes will be the ones entering their teenage years after the housing bubble, after the disappointment of Obama. They'll be the ones ready to do the work, because they've always lived in a world that didn't give them much. Just like the G.I. generation, which grew up during the Depression, and had only vague memories of the Roaring 20s.
Don't forget Generation X. Viewed as dangerous, or irrelevant, Gen X latchkey kids learned self-reliance and other life skills in the school of hard knocks from the beginning. We (Gen X) are surviving and thriving in this environment, while the "Millenials" stagger around, completely baffled that they aren't rock stars quite yet. The fact that the Boomers have always been puffing up the Millenials make them suspect IMHO. They seem to be a motley crew of soulless mercenaries and/or clueless fuck-ups/Internet exhibitionists dependent on Mommy and Daddy thus far, maybe they'll improve with age, but I put my money on Gen X to pull us through this mess. BTW OWS is okay in my book, at least the kids there are making some noise and not just sniffing glue at the mall after updating their Tumblr/Facebook brands.
+1 You'll know us by our Members Only nehru collars, bitches. And I see the boomers courting the millenials every fucking new "vision" that rolls out here at work. Fuckers ignored us when we were kids and they're trying to ignore us now.
It shall be their undoing. They forget we're the last generation to play real dodgeball.
"In all the things we describe... we merely only describe ourselves."
- Voltaire
Jim Quinn's posts from theburningplatform are exceptionally thought provoking. Thanks ZH.
Strauss and Howe are two Ivy League, Beltway policy wonks. Harvard Law and Harvards JFK school of publlic policy for Strauss. Nothing but goodness comes from those credentials, right. Oh yeah and they're both Boomers (born 1947 and 1951)!
Their work has been criticized as akin to Astrology but it's made them a fortune, so that's cool, I guess.
I guess Fraud 410 and Steal 415 were filled when they went to school.
If you can't question the facts, attack the messenger, right. (Too bad they were no genderless martians available to write that book.)
For a reality check on your reservations, I ask you:
What person, with which credentials, would need to have written the book, so you could look at it's contents without prejudice?
"History is cyclical, not linear." Time is linear. History takes place along that line so history is also linear. The cyclical part is that the same situations crop up over and over again on the line of time and it is the choices made that determine the outcome, more specifically the CONSEQUENCES. Einstein aptly said: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. That in a nutshell is what is happening today.
There is a difference between "line" and "straight line".
Why are Philosophers so bad at math? I prefer to start with an assumption for all positive polynomial times.
While I agree that my generation (the boomers) has fostered this crisis, I fear that the solutions proposed by the protestors will only make things worse.
My main issue, since I started voting (in early 70's), was always "who will cut the government deficit the most." Unfortunately, the answer was always that no one was really willing to shrink the government at any level to live within its means.
Along with the financial damage, we have suffered great societal damage from the constant drumbeat of "there out to be a law" and government must expand to protect the weak, government must expand to protect the whatever, government must expand ...
I fear that the protestors want the government to expand to fix their "problems" also.
The government is the problem but I see no significant group anywhere in the world that can address that fact and do anything to stop the headlong rush to government controlling every aspect of our lives (most importantly the economy) and therefore the result of the fast approaching crash will not be renewal but a descent into a socialist nightmare throughout the world.
When the majority of society demands freedom to succeed (or fail) and a reasonable level playing field, I will have some hope. However, the only way freedom can be increased is for government to be shrunk (obvious but impossible to get through to most people). Government is, always and everywhere, about controlling people and taking power and riches away from the average person and giving it to the ruling class. I don't think the OWS folks can even understand this concept. They want government to take from one class (the rich) and give to them. In fact the government will only take from everyone and give to the government class.
Unfortunately, the boomers learned only too well from there parents that big government can give you stuff. That works great until government robbery convinces most people that there is no point in trying to produce anything. Since the government can only get money by robbing its citizens, it goes broke once there is less to rob. Note: it will never rob the ruling class because they "are" the government. It will not rob the "rich" because they are, in our system, part of the ruling class (for the most part) or at least have strong ties to the ruling class.
Next the government will go after the last big pot of money left: the boomer's retirement savings.
Look out because you 401K and IRA is soon to be confiscated and "invested" in government bonds (a la Argentina). The same goes for PM's. They will be made illegal and confiscated within the few years.
OWS, IMO, represents a "cri de coeur" of a group of people taught they would have it all running up against the reality that the "all" left over from the last 80 years of government excessive spending is "not much."
Stop allowing yourself to be bamboozled by collectivist thinking. Historical cycles are physical in nature--the compression of a spring via force, and the inevitable release of this stored energy. The agents of this force depend on collectivist thinking to apply their push and pull, and to reboot the process.
Every power structure designed for the collective comes at the expense of its actual constituents. The institution employs literal, physical force to constrain and exploit its "beneficiaries" on behalf of the Grand Idea (ostensibly, the welfare of its subjects; in reality, the perpetuation of the extortion machine).
Stop it. Let the next turning be the last one.
If we are to believe the writing of the ancient past, the 4th Turning cycles are only micro-sections of much larger cycles that span hundreds of throusands of years, which lead to our maturity, a rising of our level of consciousness and a new beginning:
1,2,3,4
Golden Age, Age of Reason, Age of Giants, Age of Chaos
We are in the Age of Chaos, the 4th age where we need to learn something. It was designed to be this way: Light vs Dark, Sun vs Moon, Ying and Yang, Good vs Evil. It may very well be that God's work and his teaching during this time can only be experienced through polarization and chaos. We all have our role and we all have something to learn.
Your conscience awakes and you see your mistakes
And you wish someone would buy your confessions
The days miss their mark and the night gets so dark
And some kind of message comes through to you
...
- Dan Fogelberg; "Part of the Plan"
Very well done.
the only hope for this country were born between 1984 and 1988. thank me later.
Thank your parents and grandparents.
o fortuna, velut Luna
This is the stupidest shit I've ever wasted my time reading. Is this fool really suggesting that all baby boomers identify with Blankfein and Bernanke and all twenty-somethings are the same as that punk Zuckerberg?
WTF, was this Fourth Turning Book just released in paperback?
The grand irony is that the whole thing was cooked up by two boomers who made a fortune selling it to universities to help them hustle students!
William Strauss e-mails Neil Howe after the first draft of The 4th Turding:
“Do you think we can find a publisher stupid enough to fall for this bullshit? ”
Neil responds, “You aren’t serious about trying to get someone to actually believe this shit and publish it?”
William fires back, “And why not…? ”
Neil counters, “Because it is shit that we just made up, that’s why.”
William stands firm, “That has nothing to do with it. You know it’s shit and I know it’s shit, but there are many stupid editors that won’t know it’s shit and millions of potential ignorant readers that are foolish enough to buy it if it’s published.”
Neil finally caves, “Well, it never occurred to me to try to get something this utterly vapid published. We both know that we made the shit up as we went along. But, hey, if you think it will fly, if you think people are this gullible, then count me in.”
“Earth to Neil… They published “Dow 36,000? a few years ago and look how many fools bought it… and Speaker Pelosi’s seminal work on government.
Trust me… we’ll both be up for Pulitzers by the time this thing runs its course.”
“Human history seems logical in afterthought but a mystery in forethought.” – The Fourth Turning – Strauss & Howe
You just don't understand seriously profound shit when you read it!
Hey DZ, no that was meant for DavidPierre with an implied /sarc.
Shallow catholic rhetoric... more aptly named The 4th Turd ... faith-based tripe ... "bring back tradition!" it screams... a true believer's rote catechism.
The 4th Turd is prescriptive, traditionalist, 'virtue-cratic', mombo-jombo, mixed with puritanism and a dash of Tipper Gore. Bring back values like honour and duty, observe decency in personal conduct, discipline, develop tighter societal standards, traditional virtues.
When it's not talking about early historical eras, the book is bemoaning the ever-branching diversity of choices and lifestyles in modern life or criticizing the edginess of pop culture.
All the absurd theory about supposed cycles of the supposed generations, the fabled historical parallels, the dire warning that a new era of crisis is to come, is just an excuse to tell readers to prepare for a crisis era that may or may not be coming by celebrating the importance of authority; cease unconventional behaviour in an era that will demand conformity, and settling down to focus on prescribed values. A hollow diatribe, pushing to get back to trust in public institutions and in the government... more restrictions on personal behaviour.
Advice to set up strict regimes of rules, zero tolerance of conflicting opinions, demands on conduct and development to make sure that children can grow up to be the next 'HERO' generation, as they are corraled as fodder for the eternal crusades... a heavily conservative bent sticking out like a sore thumb, no doubt reflecting some of the attitudes and wishes of the infamous liar, SmokeyQuinn.
The theory about "generations" and "turnings", the quotes and events of early historical generations are only fished out of the shallow AmeriKlan Sea, and, more importantly, ignore the rest of the world... only to find a few lame examples that will make the generations seem to fit into the imaginary pattern.
Worse yet, the portraits painted of the four recurring generational archetypes in the whannabee theory, the predications are incredibly vague and sound like weakly created parodies.
Of course many theories will run into a FEW problems like this, but The 4th Turd is whipped up to sound just convincing enough to sell an authoritarian ideology.
Though there is some element of truth in The 4th Turd, certainly mankind's recorded experiences have been one of cyclical ebb and flow, one cannot make anywhere near the many pat characterizations and conclusive and farfetched leaps of simple reason and logic.
If intended as a work of propaganda, the book is perfect, for all good propaganda contains enough of an element of probable truth to be plausible.
Most everything in this book is arranged and written with the assumption that the thesis is essentially correct, a mode which is overreaching, suspect, and at best sloppy.
The wholesale grading & categorization of people is facile, diminishing, and overly fatalistic.
The book is an oligarchic collectivist's wet dream. The warning is that we are but mindless automatons, locked in an endless and stupid cycle of mass destruction, following our collectivist predestination, but that we might fail and then woe is to us. A stock false choice if there ever was one.
Either these guys were commissioned to write this stuff, or they have a more than adequate knack for figuring out which way the ill wind is blowing and sucking up to the NWO Elites for fun and profit.
Where in The 4th Turd is the experience of Korea, Viet Nam, the Cold War, all the endless wars, Globalism, consumer society, etc. etc.?
The TRUTH of September 11, 2001, when it is dealt with openly and properly, will be the pivot to the next TURNING.
Truth might finally emerge someday in the semi-consciousness of people like SmokeyQuinn? Best take that neo-con ameriKlan ring out of your nose!
"In 1999, Strauss and Howe founded LifeCourse Associates, a publishing, speaking, and consulting company built on their generational theory. As LifeCourse partners, they have offered keynote speeches, consulting services, and customized communications to corporate, nonprofit, government, and education clients." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss-Howe_generational_theory
Reading thier bios, neither Strauss nor Howe served in the military (Vietnam era). Neither do I see a mention of any participation in anti-war or civil rights activities. Rather they went o ivy League schools and spent their "working" lives sucking off the beltway tit. They essentially avoided any participation in the defining events of their time. It's no wonder they think boomers are worthless.
You didn't need the Hoodoo of "Turnings" to see, 35 years ago, that the financial system was compounding it's way to catastrophe. The Dying of Money, published in 1976, made a crucial point that inflation is socially destructive by incenting vast mis-allocations of capital, human and monetary. and undermining ethics and productivity. WTF does this have to do with "Turnings?" LBJ took us off the deep end fiscally, while most boomers were still sticking boogers under their desks in school.
Look to the Fed and the fiat system, if you want to get to the root of the problem and the solution, then to the murderous CIA, and the rest of the secret, fiat debt funded war-state machinery, riding on top of the Corporate owned House of Ill Repute known as the US Congress.
What a great community this is, full of so many people that know everything about everything, and everyone else is wrong! You're a communist! You're a Nazi! Fox News is propaganda! CNN too! MSNBC CNBC and all the rest! OWS are all drunks, druggies and freeloaders! Bankers are all criminals!
But the point is, my ideology is all or nothing, bitchez! No middle ground, no gray areas allowed! You're either with us or against us.
I may be dirt poor but if I carry water for the job creators™ they'll give me a shack on their estate and let me call them lord!
With-out ideology, action becomes un-directed and energy is wasted. Every next choice becomes a debate.
So put up or shut up, Bitchez, you know where you are!
And with ideology action becomes mis-directed. Mostly.
Historians know the outcome and they try explain said outcome by going back and selecting events which would seem to be the cause. It's like writing a book and starting from the ending and working your way back to page one.
Blah, blah, blah.
Here's part of a cogent sociological analysis of OWS at The Volokh Conspiracy.
"The New Class has always operated across the lines of public and private, however, the government-university-finance and technology capital sectors. It is not a theory of the government class versus the business class... [but as] the class that bridges and moves effortlessly between the two. As a theory of late capitalism (once imported from being an analysis of communist nomenkaltura) it offers itself as a theory of technocratic expertise first - but, if that spectacularly fails as it did in 2008, it falls back on a much more rudimentary claim of monopoly access to the levers of the economy. Which is to say, the right to bridge the private-public line, and rent out its access...
In social theory, OWS is best understood not as a populist movement against the bankers, but instead as the breakdown of the New Class into its two increasingly disconnected parts. The upper tier, the bankers-government bankers-super credentialed elites. But also the lower tier, those who saw themselves entitled to a white collar job in the Virtue Industries of government and non-profits — the helping professions, the culture industry, the virtueocracies, the industries of therapeutic social control."
In other words, what we see before us in the OWS is the result of the wannabe plutocrats - after all didn't they spend all of our years and years of class time raising our self esteem and pushing us to "change the world" - finding that the real economy just can't finance the rents necessary to "employee" these now surplus hoards of unproductive do-gooders. OWS = the 21st century Hoovervilles.
Great report/information, thank you.
As a 13th Nomad generationalist.
The kids are most amusing. Government is the problem but they are going after Wall Street. Some one has educated them very well.
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."
~ Thomas Jefferson
Sorry... this is not a Jeffersonian quote:
http://www.snopes.com/quotes/jefferson/banks.asp
Shocker, a progressive quoting Lenin. Hope nobody paid for this content.
Great article summary of the continued kleptocracy.
The kids will need to become critical thinkers, for they have nothing better to do. The boomers are self serving meme fuktards.
A society that does not take care of others, is a guaranteed fail. You are finally starting to see it unfold. We reap what we sow. From field of dreams, onward to the parking lot of turds.
Nice summary of the situation.
A bad moon, indeed.
For my part I like to remind people that the Earth may be round but that does not mean it has no edges. There are places where people go off the edge of the map once in a while -- by the millions -- into a terra incognita of the soul and there is such a threshold just up ahead. We are all heading there, heads in the clouds distracted by the rattle and hum of modern life. We'll take that fateful step one day and suddenly the map will be all wrong. We won't stop though because we won't know how to stop and by the billions we will lurch forward blindly into a realm of flat shadows full of knives. And then sudedenly with the very next step, there will be monsters.
Soylent Grey. Slowly cook at a low temperature for a longer time, and it won't be so tough to chew.
I was all excited to learn about Strauss & Howe and cycles and generations but wow... Total verbage slippage. Please edit and resubmit...
Socialism is the devil in the details. Socialists would rather control hell than serve in heaven, which is why it always results in fascism, and crony capitalism, the other side of the something-for-nothing bipolar coin, is the Apple. The road to hell is incremental; complexity is just a diversion, the lights attracting the evangelists to the casino.
There is nothing wrong with making 2 and 2 = 3 one day and 5 the next; that’s relativity. Illogical people install beautiful facades, and few want to live in a world run by computers, but persistently arguing that 2 and 2 is not 4 is pretty damn stupid.
The proprietors can only run a ponzi so long before it implodes, because the surplus to shoulder the “error” propagation, power draw down, has to come from somewhere, and that power ultimately rests with those capable of saving in a dimension beyond the perception of deficit spenders. So, the AMA is due a 30% haircut. One guess where it comes from. Peter is stealing from Peter now.
Reality can be scary as hell -thus the great market for explanatory frames. Gives a little relief from uncertainty to try and fit events into a predictive pattern. Doesn't hurt as a mental exercise as long as one includes a grain of salt and periodically throws out their current frame for the sake of a fresh and unprejudiced perspective.
But continual force fitting is what most people do and is the reason they are so easy to control. That is, until reality knocks the crap out of them, and as Tyler is wont to quip: "No one could have ever seen it coming!"
Best article I've ever read. I'm right between Boomer & X'er (1962) but I'm definitely against the ruling class elitist oligarch Boomer society. One day I might end up at an OWS protest with a sign that says: JAIL ALL CRIMINAL BANKSTERS. JAIL ALL CRIMINAL POLITICIANS. RE-INSTITUTE THE U.S. CONSTITUTION.
Interesting article, but in toto, a mish mash of conflicting insights and conclusions drawn from biased observations. There is only a facade of credibility by using respectable historian research. Some Reality:
-ginning up intergenerational war is counterproductive
-boomers got screwed along with everyone else, and they'll be eating dogfood
-We've had Euro-style socialism in America during our decline, & not possible if we had not had our sound money taken away from us by the anti-hero FDR
-"Oligarchs" fault? or "boomers" fault? ... make up your mind, for the sake of thesis clarity? And, if it's just another 80 yr cycle, how can it be anybody's fault?
-OWS is led by the old guard socialists, marxists, communists (recycle: 1960s marxists), takes 10 minutes for non-linear thinkers on the internet to pull it up
-Bill Ayers, Pink Ladies, and Obama bundlers were community organizing Hamas and Arab Spring last year; explains signs in English, it was propaganda for linear thinkers
-the educated millenials who shall be the next great generation are not the ones at OWS
-Sadly, rapes and thefts at OWS are a common occurence, even a deaf young man was raped at OWS NYC the other day
-Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton are mellinials... just saying
-Not the Oakland mellenial martyr you were looking for: Olsen was kicked out of the marines for cocaine and pot, been running an anti-military hatesite ever since.
-The guy who shot Giffords was a crazy skull-worshipper who went to H.S. at one of Obama's-Ayer's Annenberg Charter schools that indoctrinate
-OWS is propaganda. Non-linear thinkers already figured it out. Nancy Pelosi --"God Bless them!" Michael Moore, CNN -- "No, I'm not a 1%. No! Not me!"
-Elizabeth Warren, on OWS: "I created much of the intellectual foundation for what they do." She is a boomer and the creative braintrust of the CFPB, which is the FED secret police for all domestic money activity, run by the FED for the FED, and not accountable to congress. She was discredited after it was discovered she was already pummeling and bullying state Attorney Generals for compliance over private records a year before the office was even up and running and had any authority.
-If you don't like FOX, change the channel back to MSNBC while you can still enjoy the privilege. Venezuelas can't. The FCC is now moving to take over your internet
-how come OWS doesn't have to pay for permits and follow the laws and rules like the Tea Party?
-Why are OWS such horrible litterbugs destroying the "Gaia"
-It is disturbing when a government decides that for some, the laws shall be ignored, while the same laws shall be strictly enforced against others. Society will follow by becoming lawless.
-Morality, values, and principles are the common enduring threads among generations. They are important. They are not corny. In the end, they are all that really matter.
"The U.S. leads the world militarily and economically. But they don't lead the world morally and politically anymore." -- Lech Walesa, November 2010. Walesa recently refused to meet with the OWS movement because he became aware of the radicals that have taken it over.
I won't take part in this revolution. I'm going to the woods and escaping society when the shit goes down. I'd never kill for ideology and I'm not about to start taking orders. I refuse to be a tool. Shit is bad yes, but I'm not buying into any utopias or false solutions. Nothing good will come of violence. I expect one thing and that is to be left alone and I'm not about to start imposing my beliefs on anybody else.
yeah, violence doesn't solve anything. Communism, Nazism, slavery...
Best of luck with your refusal to participate. They call that non-compliance and it's good enough even today to get your ass pepper sprayed, dog bit and/or tasered.
I'd rather be shot being noncompliant than shot being compliant.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." ~ George Santayana
"Those who don't know ass from elbow condemned to smelly pants" -- Confucius
I Enjoyed the article; it gave me a ray of hope. Then I got to the mean spirited and cynical comments.
The oldest Millennials aren't even 30 years old yet; the youngest are only 7 years old and you asses paint them all as drug addled spoiled consumers. Talk about projection.
How about giving them a chance before you tell us again how great you all are and how sucky these "kids" are.
Sure, they don't know anything about anything because they were raised in our media controlled world, but at least they're doing something.
Ask yourselves; What the fuck are you doing/done?
Exactly....gotta love all these arm chair whiners. Know the system is rigged but look down on the people trying to change it! Cowards.
This article is incredible. Join the r3VOLution.
From the article: ""As a group, Millenials are unlike
any other youth generation in living memory. They are more numerous,
more affluent, better educated, and more ethnically diverse. More
important, they are beginning to manifest a wide array of positive
social habits that older Americans no longer associate with youth,
including a new focus on teamwork, achievement, modesty and good
conduct. Only a few years from now, this can-do youth revolution will
overwhelm the cynics and pessimists … will entirely recast the image of
youth from downbeat and alienated to upbeat and engaged — with
potentially seismic consequences for America."
*I'm sorry, but as a Millennial myself I just cannot agree with some of these points. Modesty and good conduct? Seriously? I wonder if these authors spent some time on college campuses. I'll never forget how cynical my college experience was. Never in my life did I encounter such a selfish, vulgar and noncomittal bunch. In fact, me and my friend got so used to getting blown off by potential friends that it ultimately became a standing joke if the person we were supposed to hang out with would actually uphold their word and show up, or if we'd just get stood up. Many, many times I've lost entire days to potential friends completely forgetting about our agreement to do something (grab lunch, see a movie, etc). And I've also heard of many selfish behaviors of college students from my friends. Just a few examples:
-A college friend's roomate was recently dumped by his girlfriend (rather harshly, too). Then, a few days later, she randomly shows up at his dorm and asks him if he can buy her beer because she's not 21 yet!
-When I was in high school I began hanging out with a fellow student during the summer of my senior year. We had a good time together and made plans to see each other the next day. Then 1PM rolled around (the time we were supposed to meet) and he didn't show. Soon it was 3 PM and I called him to ask where he was. No answer. In fact, I never did receive an answer. I never saw him again. It was like he dropped off the face of the earth!
-I made plans to get lunch with a Millennial-age coworker one day. The day came and he didn't call when he was supposed to. Hours went by and I finally called him and his excuse was, "Oh sorry dude. Totally forgot! I actually have to go Christmas shopping with my girlfriend so..."
-My friend's girlfriend was supposed to attend his Halloween bash this year but couldn't because her friend was supposed to give her a ride but blew her off. Her friend told her that her boyfriend would be picking her up and bringing her back to his house which was down the street from the party and he would give her and my friend's girlfriend a ride to the party. So hours went by and the time came for her friend's boyfriend to pick her up. Nothing. No call -- nothing. Finally my friend's girlfriend called her friend and she said, "Oh I'm sorry! I forgot to tell you -- my boyfriend actually is going to spend the night at my place so he can't give you a ride!" So what happened? My friend's girlfriend missed the Halloween party.
I know these aren't just isolated incidents. These incidents have happened in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Texas, and many other people my age say the same thing happens to them.
And I also don't think Millennials are necessarily very tech savvy. Many have shockingly poor computer literacy even though they can text with the best of them. I see this every day at the library I work at. Recently a student working at a computer said to me (after using his smart phone, of course), "Hey dude are you good with computers? I fucking suck with them. How do I save my word file to the desktop?" It's not so much that Millennials are tech savvy, it's just that they've come of age in an era of tech gadgets that are so user-friendly a moron could use them. Not very impressive in my book.
You aren't describing the actions of Millenials. You are describing the actions of College kids... regardless of their generational cohort.
But seriously, if your worst complaint is people didn't show up to lunch, you really are making the author's point. Stories from previous generations of college kids would go something like:
"So I ran into this girl at a party and she was so drunk/high that I didn't even have to use my roofies on her. In fact she went down on me and 3 of my friends before completely passing out. That's when it really got interesting. Thank God when I saw her in statistics she didn't remember it at all. But I've got the video so I'll be able to remember it."
"This weekend totally sucked. Spent hours on Saturday night in the emergency room because my roommate got alcohol poisoning and threw up all over our room before completely collapsing and gashing his head on a... wait for it... broken beer bottle. Then when he's discharged that little prick was "too sick" to clean the place up. I was so pissed I made him sleep in the stairwell."
So, yeah... my friend's girlfriend's best friend didn't give her a ride to a party... sounds comparably like modesty and good conduct.
Well actually now that you say it, hawks, I DO have some stories of college students from my generation that are comparable to what you mention:
-Kids snorting lines of adderall and staying up for days and then getting psychotic and violently attacking each other and then having to be institutionalized because they were a danger to themselves and others
-I also know many students who have had ambulance rides to the ER for alcohol poisoning and had to have their stomachs pumped.
-I knew a kid who would spend many hours watching extreme internet porn and snuff/real death/torture videos (like Taliban executions) and then cut his girlfriend with a knife when they were having rough sex.
How bad is it really? Brookings did study of Cleveland poverty. In a word, SCARY. And this huge growth in poverty is in the suburbs, not just the inner city.
Brookings reports finds poverty-stricken neighborhoods jump dramatically in Cleveland area Published: Thursday, November 03, 2011, 12:01 AM By Dave Davis, The Plain Dealer The Plain DealerLisa DeJong, The Plain DealerVolunteer Sue Valle gathers cans for a food basket for families in need at the Parma Hunger Center inside the Parma Lutheran Church in February 2010. The hunger center packed food for 67 families on this day - just shy of its all-time record of 68 families in one session.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The number of people living in extremely poor neighborhoods has grown faster in Northeast Ohio suburbs than elsewhere in the nation, poverty figures released Wednesday by the Brookings Institution show.
By the end of 2009, 13 Northeast Ohio suburban neighborhoods had poverty rates of at least 40 percent, Brookings researchers found. Ten years earlier there was none.
With an 8 percentage point increase, Cleveland's suburbs claimed the nation's 4th highest rate of growth of the poor in poverty-stricken neighborhoods. These neighborhoods include parts of Cleveland Heights, Elyria, Euclid, Kent, Lorain, Painesville, Euclid and Cleveland Heights, each of which Brookings considers "high density" urban suburbs of Cleveland and Akron.
More than 24,000 people called these neighborhoods home.
"Yes, this is exactly what we've seen," said Claudia Coulton, a professor and co-director of the Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development at Case Western Reserve University. "It (poverty) has hit the suburbs hard."
The Brookings study, "The Re-Emergence of Concentrated Poverty: Metropolitan Trends in the 2000s," looks at the nation's 100 largest metropolitan areas and neighborhoods where 40 percent or more of the residents lived in poverty from 2000 through 2009. The neighborhoods are based on census tracts, areas which average about 4,000 residents and loosely follow neighborhood boundaries.
While the concentration of poor people was up in big cities and suburbs alike, the steepest increases were found in suburbs, where the growth of poor people in extremely poor neighborhoods outpaced big cities 41 to 17 percent.
Overall, the great Lakes Region, which suffered from large losses in manufacturing jobs, fared the worse. Detroit, Toledo and Youngstown all saw the number of poor people living in extremely poor neighborhoods more than double.
Researchers say that looking at concentrations of poverty is important because people living in these neighborhoods don't have as much access to the resources -- good schools, health care, a safe environment and jobs - needed to improve their lives.
In Northeast Ohio, Coulton points to a dramatic rise in food stamp assistance in the suburbs, a key indicator that she watches closely. In Cuyahoga County, excluding Cleveland, the number of people receiving food stamps rose from 15,758 in 2000, to 27,031 in 2005 to 57,214 last year, according to numbers complied by Coulton's center.
Coulton and others attribute the severity of the region's poverty to the foreclosure crisis, job loss and cuts in pay.
View full sizeRich Exner, The Plain DealerSome portions of Greater Cleveland have poverty rates in excess of 40 percent, according to estimates from the Census Bureau for 2005-09.In the seven-county Cleveland-Akron area, $6.9 billion in wage earnings has disappeared over the last ten years due to job loss and pay cuts, according to federal wage figures complied by George Zeller, a economic research analyst.
As of September, 113,000 jobless workers in northeast Ohio were looking for work, according to the latest unemployment figures.
"Everyone has been hit hard by this," said Zeller, "but what's new is that the fastest growth in poverty has been in the suburbs, not the center city. "We don't have a lot of infrastructure out there to help people."
No one knows this better than Stephen Wertheim, director of the United Way's 211/First Call for Help, a 24-hour referral service that helps people find emergency assistance.
From 2005 to 2010, our calls from the suburbs increased 121 percent, Wertheim said. That compares to a 92 percent increase in calls from Cleveland.
Though Wertheim's staff handles calls from Cuyahoga, Medina, Geauga, Holmes and Wayne counties, everyone in Northeast Ohio can reach a 211/First Call for Help office by dialing 2-1-1 on their telephone.
According to Wertheim, the top requests for help last year - and the percent increase from 2005 - from suburban residents include: Utility assistance, 7,837 calls, up 143 percent; food pantries, 7,572 calls, up 97 percent; rent assistance, 3,081 calls, up 212 percent; and homeless shelters, 2,813 calls, up 46 percent.
The requests from the suburbs and Cleveland are now much the same, Wertheim said. "They have a lot to do with housing and families having big trouble staying together in these hard times," he added.
The Brookings Institute, based in Washington, D.C., is one of the nation's most respected public-policy think tanks. The poverty numbers released by Brookings differ from official federal poverty estimated released earlier this year because the Brookings reported focused on people living in neighborhoods with an overall poverty level of 40 percent or more.
At least 2.2 million more Americans now live in neighborhoods of concentrated disadvantage than at the start of the decade. Brookings officials said the report's findings make a case that local, state, and national policies, from land-use and economic development to providing safety net services, need to be re-considered from a regional perspective.
"Everybody knows that we had a terrible downturn at the end of the decade with unemployment at a generational high," said Alan Berube, a Brookings research and co-author of the report. But Berube said the figures show that Cleveland and other similar areas went through a decade-long recession that created large numbers of neighborhoods of poor.
Added Berube, "Now layer on that a poor-performing school, high crime, worse health problems, limited access to jobs because there's no economic activity in the area. And these things make poverty more difficult for families to escape."
Very well structured essay, good line up of thoughts and perspectives, no hyperbole.
I almost completely agree.
Excellent!!!