That's not question I answered.
I had to re-read what you'd posted and what I'd subsequently written.
Your response was (apparently) to my tongue-in-cheek statement, "We once showed much promise as a nation." Your subject line read, "You did? When?"
That's what my subsequent posts were about. We showed promise when we came to fight the Nazis. Japan had attacked us, we *could* have fought the war in the Pacific first, but we didn't. We came to *your* aid first, you ungrateful prat. Were we perfect then? Nope, never claimed that. Did we do the right thing then? Yep. Showed promise. We also showed promise when (before that war) we gave women the right to vote. After the war, we showed promised with the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Union movement, the creation of the EPA, Clean Water Act (yeah, I know who is responsible for those) and so on.
But, you did ask me, "To which former golden age of promise do you wish to return?" and my answer is "None." Going backward is not progress. It is, however, what we've been doing since 1980. While there was no "golden age" there was a protracted period of time (spanning from the abolition of slavery through at least the time when President Jimmy Carter got the Camp David Peace Accords completed and put solar panels on the White House roof) when we were getting better as a nation.
I want us to get back to the process of improvement, of making a more just society. The Reagan Revolution derailed that. I want us to get back on the tracks.
Your response was (apparently) to my tongue-in-cheek statement, "We once showed much promise as a nation." Your subject line read, "You did? When?"
That's what my subsequent posts were about. We showed promise when we came to fight the Nazis. Japan had attacked us, we *could* have fought the war in the Pacific first, but we didn't. We came to *your* aid first, you ungrateful prat. Were we perfect then? Nope, never claimed that. Did we do the right thing then? Yep. Showed promise. We also showed promise when (before that war) we gave women the right to vote. After the war, we showed promised with the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Union movement, the creation of the EPA, Clean Water Act (yeah, I know who is responsible for those) and so on.
But, you did ask me, "To which former golden age of promise do you wish to return?" and my answer is "None." Going backward is not progress. It is, however, what we've been doing since 1980. While there was no "golden age" there was a protracted period of time (spanning from the abolition of slavery through at least the time when President Jimmy Carter got the Camp David Peace Accords completed and put solar panels on the White House roof) when we were getting better as a nation.
I want us to get back to the process of improvement, of making a more just society. The Reagan Revolution derailed that. I want us to get back on the tracks.
