Is the U.S. better or worse than it was 50 years ago?

[chequita guevara]

[Vandal-1]

The VCR 's and the TV s are on credit at 18 APR and the kids are raised by state ran preschools then schools then colleges. no mom that means no mom's values and in alot of cases no family. . The divorce rate is 60% and moms wages don't even cover Walmarts take when its all said and done. I don't think that technical advances and socail engineering have made this nation better only more efficient at exploiting people and rescources,which have caused crisis in agriculture and irreversable damage to our ecology.Just eat yer pizza and watch yer football and buy Budwieser sleep sleeep sssleeep its all gonna be OK :zzz Not all of us buy the lies and we are not f6^@king happy.

[chequita guevara]

I think I like this guy.

[Ted Striker]

WW2 and the post war boom was a one time occurance. So, sort of the golden age where the bar was raised artificially high.

[Joseph]

Originally posted by St Leo
Of course it's better. If I had to livie in the US in my year of choice, I'd pick 2003 over 1953.

You were not alive in 53, so how would you know. I was. I was 9 year old. We did not have to lock up our house. No shooting at schools. Kids had respect for adults. Coke was a dime. In fact we could go to the movies for a dime. Hambuger were 6 for a dollar. Gas was $0.19 a gallon. Little traffic even on freeways. (Modesto, California area).

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Joseph
You were not alive in 53, so how would you know. I was. I was 9 year old. We did not have to lock up our house. No shooting at schools. Kids had respect for adults. Coke was a dime. In fact we could go to the movies for a dime. Hambuger were 6 for a dollar. Gas was $0.19 a gallon. Little traffic even on freeways. (Modesto, California area).

But you didn't have Poly or Civ! What ever would we do without those?

[Joseph]

Originally posted by DinoDoc

But you didn't have Poly or Civ! What ever would we do without those?

I spend to much time here now. Did not know about Aployton until 98 or 99. I was on the Compuserve 20 hrs per week back then and never when over my time.

Back to 50s. Woman did not have to work then because the husband made enough to support the family. Another thing there was no drugs in my High School. We had 1,600 kids and no drugs. Turlock High, Turlock, Ca.

[Drake Tungsten]

Worse. Hippies killed this country...

[Dis]

feminists would have you believe women were oppressed not to work.

things were great if you were white and middle class without a doubt. It was easily better than 2003 in that regards.

I just don't get feminists. They strove so hard to eradicate attitudes from the 50's and they are still so pissed off

[Berzerker]

Coke was a dime.

My God, you sold me, we were better off 50 years ago.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Ned
However, we have a president that is effectively fighting back, in contrast with the feckless Truman.

The Truman Doctrine's policy of containing the expansion of the Soviet Bloc became the strategy that eventually led to the destruction of the Evil Empire without a world war.

[Sava]

Originally posted by rah
50 years ago there was no CIV, No Apolyton.

Much better now.

I live in it now, so it must be better

Nice .... I was thinking the same thing!

[MrFun]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
MrFun, 50 years ago you could go to jail or be involuntarily committed to an asylum just for being gay. You couldn't hold a government position. As bad as things may be today, they were worse 50 years ago.

That said, I think America's social peak was in the 1970s. We have a better standard of living today, but we were freer thiry years ago.

There's still racial discrimination, even if it is illegal. Discrimination based on sexual orientation is still legal in many aspects.

Yes, things have definitely improved from 50 years ago, but there's always something wrong with our society because too many people feel the compulsive need to have a minority group singled out for hatred and discrimination.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Zkribbler


The Truman Doctrine's policy of containing the expansion of the Soviet Bloc became the strategy that eventually led to the destruction of the Evil Empire without a world war.

Yes and no. Surely, the policy of containment sought to avoid direct confrontation with the Soviet Union. But it also envisioned actively resisting Soviet aggression by proxy. Korea was one such proxy war.

What the American people did not understand at the time the Korean War began, was that Truman would not seek to achieve victory over a communist puppet. We also did not understand that Johnson did not seek to achieve victory in Vietnam. In the 1964 election, for example, Johnson never answered Senator Barry Goldwater's essential question: "What is our objective in Vietnam?" Had they known that Johnson was willing to put American troops into a meat-grinder campaign without allowing for example, hot pursuit of the enemy across the border into Cambodia or the bombing of strategic targets in both the North and in Cambodia, the American people would never have supported Johnson. He lied to American people. He told our troops in Vietnam to lie to the American people. Our troops were forbidden to tell the press that the North enemies were staging out of Cambodia and that Johnson had ordered our troops not to pursue the fleeing North Vietnamese troops into Cambodia.

Containment?

This kind of containment has to be utterly condemned by every American. Truman in the end was a killer. He was a killer not of the enemy, but of the American troops sent to do his bidding.

Johnson was also a killer, a liar and a killer. He was the worst president in the history of the United States. He was evil. May he rot in hell.

[Starchild]

As che said, 50 years ago I would have been sent to an asylum and had electrodes strapped to me. Today I'm free, out of the closet, and shopping for a new designer coat while drinking an iced mochafrappaccino.

Honey, life today is fabulous.