{"id":8089,"date":"2018-10-19T09:15:27","date_gmt":"2018-10-19T14:15:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bestofswla.com\/?p=8089"},"modified":"2018-10-19T08:59:11","modified_gmt":"2018-10-19T13:59:11","slug":"the-1950s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bestofswla.com\/2018\/10\/19\/the-1950s\/","title":{"rendered":"The 1950s"},"content":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump\u2019s campaign slogan was Make America Great Again.\u00a0 <\/span>Again like when, he was asked.\u00a0 <\/span>The good ole \u201880\u2019s Reagan years?\u00a0 <\/span>Nope, Trump was thinking about the \u201850\u2019s.<\/p>\n

A Trip To The WWII Museum \u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the things that I\u2019ve never tired of knowing more about is WWII.\u00a0 <\/span>On a recent trip to the museum in New Orleans I was open to an ah-hah moment, some loose dots connecting.<\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t want any part of that war.\u00a0 <\/span>Europe, all those little countries, they\u2019ve been warring since the fall of the Roman Empire, and just can\u2019t seem to get it solved.\u00a0 <\/span>Not only were we resistant to being pulled in but we were unprepared.\u00a0 <\/span>A tank war was coming, and we still had horse cavalry.\u00a0 <\/span>In 1939 our military was smaller than Portugal, a country about as big as Indiana.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Cover of Life Magazine, 1953, move in day in a new subdivision.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Pearl Harbor was the Great Unifier.\u00a0 <\/span>That\u2019s one of the things about WWII, it\u2019s just soooooo plain \u2018n simple, about right \u2018n wrong.\u00a0 <\/span>I can\u2019t think of a single war that had less gray (even the Civil War).\u00a0 <\/span>It started with a sucker punch, at Pearl Harbor, and if there was any doubt we were on God\u2019s good guy side, that was all resolved the minute we started finding the concentration camps\u2026<\/p>\n

There was a clear goal – now that you\u2019ve started it, we\u2019re not stopping until we win.\u00a0 <\/span>Complete, unconditional surrender \u2013 we\u2019ll just keep coming until we peel the onion to the layer says No More.\u00a0 <\/span>(We have not had that, in neither war nor conflict, since then\u2026) \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Indeed it was Total War.\u00a0 <\/span>The tip of the spear was Over There, but the great mass of citizens Over Here were either a hive of bees or a mound of ants (pick your favorite), in unified motion.\u00a0 <\/span>Whether you were making a bullet or punching rivets on a plane, you were part of the Great Purpose, and whatever you were doing was For Someone, making a bullet for a hometown boy, sewing a blanket for your brother the paratrooper, skimping on driving so there\u2019d be more fuel for Patton\u2019s tanks to shorten the war.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And Then Its Over<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tombstones, wheelchairs, and minds never right again\u2026but on the other hand\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026we didn\u2019t ask for it, but we finished it\u2026we didn\u2019t know we had it in us, but we proved out, indeed We (yes capital letters!) saved the civilized world, our little baby country, we hicks from the sticks, we had it in us, and when the test came, we were More Than Enough\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026and that\u2019s the psychology of America in the post war 1950\u2019s\u2026it\u2019s: 1) self respect; 2) a shared giant feat; 3) confidence, as individuals, as a People and; 4) unity\u2026 we fought as one, we won as one, let\u2019s get back to regular life and living, as one\u2026\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The 1950\u2019s And They\u2019re Calling Us A Superpower<\/p>\n

Imagine what being a \u201csuperpower\u201d does to the self image of the citizenry.\u00a0 <\/span>We were a young country, grandchildren of our Founding Fathers were still alive!, all we farmers, and laborers, all we outhouser\u2019s and barefoot-ers\u2026a country of mules, been plowing a row for all these generations, and suddenly \u2013 the world looks upon us like we\u2019re Kentucky Derby winners, Man O\u2019 War!<\/p>\n

We wanted no more of war.\u00a0 <\/span>A great, healthy, undamaged America (no battles here, no bombings here) welcomed us back to regular life, families and jobs, and the American Dream\u2026now bigger\u2026<\/p>\n

Ford built its last car in 1942.\u00a0 <\/span>From then on, it only built materiel for the war.\u00a0 <\/span>The war now over, factories undamaged, jobs plentiful, wages good\u2026 marry a sweetheart, buy a first home, make some babies, get old together, die and go to heaven\u2026<\/p>\n

Patriarch\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

There may be mythology about Amazon women, but in the history of mankind, even pre-history, we\u2019ve been aligned on a patriarchal social model.\u00a0 <\/span>We want a Father in heaven; we want a father in our house; and we want a father in charge of the nation.\u00a0 <\/span>That\u2019s just the way it is.<\/p>\n

Our most divisive president was Lincoln.\u00a0 <\/span>In my lifetime the two most divisive presidents are This one and the Last one.\u00a0 <\/span>That\u2019s just the way it\u2019s played out.<\/p>\n

But\u2026imagine America in the 50\u2019s\u2026 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We have order, prosperity, and running the whole shebang is the safest, most trusted president since Washington, Eisenhower.<\/p>\n

He was the Father of the military, and now he was the Father of America, proven, trusted, watching out for the boogie man, so all over America, parents tucked their children to sleep, and then went to sleep themselves, tucked in by the notion that real competence was on duty in the White House.<\/p>\n

The Wheel Keeps Turning<\/strong><\/p>\n

The 50\u2019s are long gone.\u00a0 <\/span>They weren\u2019t perfect (civil rights, minorities, McCarthyism, conformity) but where they got it right, was a fine flavor of right.\u00a0 <\/span>There must be a certain blessing \u2018n curse to have lived it, and now lived long enough to see America become the red hot mess it is today.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all part of the mysterious cycle, growth and change, decay and change, change for the sake of change, but for one blink of a decade, in one blessed country on this blue planet, there were a people who saw a garden bloom, one country putting on a great spring of flowers\u2026and they were part of it\u2026\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_\u00a0 <\/span>_ \u00a0 <\/span>_ \u00a0 <\/span>_<\/p>\n

This edition of Uncle P\u2019s Bedtime Stories is brought to you by Eighty-one, where we like our living to be like our footsteps, one from where we were, one to where we\u2019re going.<\/i><\/p>\n

Other Bedtime Stories can be found on the Eighty-one Facebook page.\u00a0 <\/span>Uncle P can be reached at 81creativity@gmail.com.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump\u2019s campaign slogan was Make America Great Again.\u00a0 Again like when, he was asked.\u00a0 The good ole \u201880\u2019s Reagan years?\u00a0 Nope, Trump was thinking about the \u201850\u2019s. A Trip To The WWII Museum \u00a0 One of the things that I\u2019ve never tired of knowing more about is WWII.\u00a0 On a recent trip to the [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":279,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[59,894],"yoast_head":"\nThe 1950s - BestOfSwla<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/bestofswla.com\/2018\/10\/19\/the-1950s\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The 1950s - BestOfSwla\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Donald Trump\u2019s campaign slogan was Make America Great Again.\u00a0 Again like when, he was asked.\u00a0 The good ole \u201880\u2019s Reagan years?\u00a0 Nope, Trump was thinking about the \u201850\u2019s. 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