Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Was "The Greatest Generation's" Greatest Fault Its Progeny?

(NOTE: I AM a baby-boomer, mid-cycle. I was born in 1957 to a WWII North Africa and Europe veteran who won a unit bronze star driving in blackout conditions against the Nazis, a 'better day's work than I have ever done'. The latter quote is from one Christopher Hitchens, heretofore famed as a liberal-turned-(well!)-non-liberal on security matters, whose own father sank German convoy raiders.)

For some time, I have suffered the burden of believing that my generation -- now regnant, but retiring, from university chairs and Congressional chairmanships, or being voted into retirement! -- has been the 'worst generation' of Americans, regarding its exceptionalism and existential goodness.
The military draft ended the spring of my high-school senior year, but I've always respected those who served in Vietnam. I rooted against Nixon, but regretted my only presidential vote for a Democrat, Jimmy Carter. I voted 'present' (actually, Libertarian, via Ed Clark) in 1980 before acknowledging Ronald Reagan in 1984. My big-L Liberalism lasted much less time than that of many.
Thus, it is notable to me that a pair of former Leftists who have left 'the cause' are in the news these days: David Horowitz and Hitchens, recently diagnosed with serious cancer.
Horowitz has penned a thoughtful and reasoned description of his long-term interactions with Hitchens, which may not serve to ingratiate either with today's Democrat/Liberal complex, but instructs us about it origins and progressions, nonetheless:
Second Thoughts, Part 1
Second Thoughts, Part 2
They do not make us Baby-Boomers proud, but rather the self-proclaimed, privileged progeny of generations better than ourselves.
Two of the last three U.S. presidents -- Clinton and Obama -- have been of this caustic tradition, and have done much to destroy the moral fabric of the Founders' well-grounded national prescriptions.
While there remains hope that subsequent generations have not succumbed to the national suicide that Sixties' Leftists began adopting, Horowitz and Hitchens lay plain what motivates and results from adherence to their philosophies: destruction of the only truly liberal and generous government that has achieved international prominence during man's history.
The time is short to renew an American path to future world harmony. There is, at present, no other path that espouses and allows personal freedom.