In the year 1989 The Dallas Times Herald ran a feature series retrospective on the 1980s, calling it “The Mean Decade.” The adjective was attention getting, you see, because those were the revered Reagan Years. But the faux optimistic veneer of Morning in America was pulled back to reveal the Reagan Revolution of less government assistance and reduced taxes on the wealthy produced: millions more citizens living in poverty, because the poverty income had been lowered; young adults who had to forfeit college, because student loans and grants were severely cut along with the Johnson-era Social Security benefit guaranteeing a child of a deceased parent would get a college education; poor elementary school kids watching their better-off classmates eat lunch every day, because the federal school lunch program was cut; tens of millions of Americans with debilitating mental illness and the mentally challenged were kicked to the curb, because government institutions were defunded, emptied and closed; and lest it be forgot, the AIDS epidemic brought no compassion from our elected leaders who instead echoed moral outrage at millions of sick and dying victims homosexual or not. The Berlin Wall came down and the Cold War ended yet billions and trillions of U.S. tax dollars were diverted to expand if not bloat the God-Almighty U.S. military industrial complex.
Thank God democracy was restored in the 1990s with the Clinton Years, along with humanity, humility, reason, love—and most impressively trust and faith between the U.S. federal government and the people. That era is called America’s Last Great Decade because the greater good, benefit and welfare of the American people was put first and foremost.
The ‘mean’ adjective comes to mind when casting perspective on the times in which we live today and have experienced together during the tumultuous 20teens. But this decade has been meaner than mean, nastier than nasty, uglier than ugly, more horrific than horrible. Mean would be a rather tame description of our times compared to all the pain and suffering and ill-logic we the American people have had to endure and ruefully will continue to live through every day: mass shootings; disregard for truth, justice and the American way; contempt for journalism and journalists; indifference and cruelty toward desperate and frightened Latin American families rightfully escaping vicious narco states just for the hope of asylum in the U.S.—where they want nothing more than just to live.
In the beginning, there was light
President Barack Obama, elected in 2008 and inaugurated to the most positive and impressive mass viewing in 2009, was during the 20teens a light, ironic given his skin color. But compared to his predecessor, he had a clear vision of what America should be. He also knew all too well what America was and could be. He walked a tightrope every day trying to work with Republicans, rich white men in suits, mannequins, humorless, pasty faced save one. Sitting at the round table with America’s first black president, these white legislators never allowed themselves to crack a smile at Obama’s humor and charm. No, for eight long years they remained sourpussed, bitter, holding their breath, always evading to glance at President Obama whom they obviously perceived as just a monkey in a suit. They did not fool anyone with intuition. I know my people.
White legislators from all over the U.S. knew their people, too, their constituents, the white male loud mouths who did not take kindly to a black man in the White House. The mass anger started then. Throughout the Obama years, there were federal investigations into several government departments and police agencies across the country caught using racial slurs and passing along if not creating derogatory pictures of President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. So many investigations of government workers carrying on like this, it could only be the antics of certain white men but a lot of them.
Blacks were angry, too, pushing back when time and again an innocent black male was shot to death by a white police officer, sometimes by several officers in a spray of gunfire. The shootings were even videoed live by citizens with smart phones. Still, nothing changed in society despite who the U.S. President was. So the protests and chants of Black Lives Matter and ultimately the violence and fires began. Whites don’t like U.S. cities burned in what they term a race riot, and the way was paved for a law-and-order guy to run for President in 2016.
During President Obama’s two terms in office, he confided with the American people his biggest regret was not being able to stop America’s gun problem, the mass shootings that can only be accomplished by high-powered war rifles not handguns or a huntin’ arm. He routinely called the families of our war dead, because he could not quickly stop the Iraq war or pull America out of Afghanistan, both conflicts started in the Bush years and cemented in the minds of a generation the term ‘perpetual war.’ Obama also took the time and sympathy to call the families of each person killed in every one of America’s mass shootings during the 20teens.
But the white people’s rage spread, infiltrating our young males who remain the dominant mass shooters. These are young guys who often kill themselves in the process or want to be killed, who want to die. They prefer death to their miserable American lives. They assume everyone else feels the same way. Well, we don’t.
Dark side of the moon
President Donald Trump really didn’t win the election fair and square. Because he ran as a Republican, he simply got more states with larger electoral votes to claim the dubious victory. But his Democrat opponent won the popular vote by a couple million American voters, lest the facts be forgotten.
Trump’s Orwellian inaugural speech maintained rampant crime throughout the country and a Mexican and Latin American overthrow of ‘American culture.’ He also implored the world now bows to the U.S. and will pay trillions owed for unfair trade tariffs. White Americans perhaps breathed a sigh of relief, a freedom most had never known: the freedom to finally say exactly what they’ve been a-thinking about people of other flesh tones, languages, religions and cultures. Perhaps they were sick and tired of having to keep it all bottled up, never permitted to share harshly defined resentment toward blacks and Mexicans, even Jews, the tired old story how they’re taking over America and this ain’t my country no more. Whites have belly ached for centuries about this same fear even while fighting Native Americans for their land. Slave owners certainly must have thought the same while standing along their neo-Roman porticos to survey their vast plantation fields worked by dozens of African-American slaves young and old from sun up to sundown. Surely white land owners could see they were the minority even then, so brutal force was necessary to stay in power.
During the 20teens computers were in all schools, businesses and homes and the palm of our hands adult and child. The internet’s social media allowed platforms where Americans enjoyed free speech more than they ever could have thought possible two decades ago. Whites were free to say openly how they hate other races, masses of humanity. Young people were left unsupervised to roam the darkest recesses of the internet—the filthy images, words and bigotry.
Finally we’re coming to a new era of the 2020s. America ricochets politically from one extreme to the other, liberal to conservative and back again. Like a perpetual bumper car race, we hit the other guy and ram him to the side while individually we once again try to make our way to win the race, whatever that might be in life: job, career, salary, healthcare, housing, money, security, peace, personal happiness. Americans think they should have everything they want in life. The rest of the world thinks that’s awfully selfish of us, of anyone.
Americans of the 2020s will be not unlike young people in their 20s. They’ll relish total freedom. They’ll be a lot more mature than they were in their 20teens. They’ll learn to watch their words and actions and appreciate consequences. They’ll start developing a deep concern for humanity, even altruism. As most will be parents, they’ll see themselves in their children and take the time to censor their own poor behavior, speech and judgement—because no one really wants to turn a loving unprejudiced child into an insensitive bigoted smart ass. If human history can teach us something about an evolving society through the decades, we learn that each term begins with promise and appreciation but then ends in exhaustion and anger. In 2020 we have an opportunity to become the Americans we are supposed to be in the world: a kind and generous people who willingly embrace all cultures and all colors for that is our ultimate strength and truly what makes America great. We are freedom loving and peaceful, open minded and diplomatic, abundantly blessed agriculturally, spiritually and intellectually. We’re the Good Guys, remember.