Okay….SO….A little bit of a history lesson today.
I think everyone has seen the images of the Helicopter pulling the staff from the Embassy in Kabul compared to the identical picture taken in Saigon circa 1975. That got me to really thinking about some things.
If you take a close look at the late 60’s and early 70’s in comparison to the last few years there are a lot of similarities.
Natural disasters were just as prevalent then. An earthquake in Peru took 67,000+ lives. A cyclone in Bangladesh killed 500,000+ and the resulting famine took as many as a million. (Take that Global Warming!)
We were at the height of the Cold War with Russia. For those of us who can remember, the world was full of spies and villain’s bent on the destruction of our way of life. Everyone was just as leery of Russia then as they are of China now.
Today you’ve got Black Lives Matter and ANTIFA…back then you had the Chicago Seven, the Black Panthers and the Weather Underground.
Crooked behavior and back alley deals plagued politics and eventually led to the impeachment and resignation of President Nixon.
Demonstrations were taking place all across the country in reference to women’s right, civil rights and opposition of the war in Vietnam. Compare that with #Me Too, BLM, etc., etc.
You had the OPEC Oil Embargo, the near catastrophic loss of Apollo 13, The Kent State Massacre…..assassinations, mass shootings, and unemployment.
In comparison there was a lot more wicked shit going on in the country from 1968 to 1975 than we’ve seen in recent years. I could go on with the comparisons for hours. Best I can tell the only things they had that we don’t…..better music and better cars.
And you know what? We came out on the other side of it stronger than we were before. Economically, socially, militarily….we weathered that storm and not only survived but found a way to strive on the other side of it.
The decade that followed all that turmoil produced a massive upswing in the economy, the space shuttle program, the resurgence of the American Auto Industry, the fall of Russia in the Cold War, the conception of the personal computer, Live Aid, Band Aid, Farm Aid….the first female astronaut and Supreme Court Justice…and some of the best movies Hollywood ever produced.
I’m not trying to tell anyone not to be upset about what’s going on. The outcry from the public in the 1970’s brought on a lot of those changes because the voting habits were influenced by that outcry. So bitch if you feel the need….but have a purpose behind your bitchin’.
I’m just telling you to B-R-E-A-T-H-E. Don’t walk off the cliff over this shit…and stop all the talk about civil war and uprisings. We can get through this without bloodshed…we’re AMERICANS, dammit. You can knock us down…you can even kick us while we’re down…but stand by to play rough when we get back on our feet.
Nothing….NOTHING….can kill this Republic except us. I think that’s hard for a lot of people to understand. If China or Russia wrecks our economy it’s because we let them. If our military gets weakened to the point that we can be overrun, it’s because we allowed that to happen. We the People….we vote for the idiots that allow things like that to happen….or we vote for people who prevent that from happening. It’s all up to us.
SO….take your voting responsibility seriously. Speak out against the things you see that need changed. And relax….just BREATHE…and know that regardless of what you see on CNN or Foxnews the air you breath is the air of a free country.
And HEY……SMILE, dammit! (Everyone’s so damn grumpy anymore)