For those of us dispassionate observers, the 2024 election of Donald J. Trump as president was like watching lighting occur in a bottle; all of the right circumstances came together to elect a man that many considered to be plowed under the political permafrost.
As proof that lightning can strike the same place twice, a very similar situation already occurred in American politics and we all know what they say about ignoring history.
Of course, I am referring to the 1968 presidential election and the downfall of “counterculture.”
Some historians argue that the cultural experiment that was the 1960s ended in August 1969 with the murders of actress Sharon Tate and countless others at the hands of the Manson “family”; however, a closer look at history shows that the “Summer of Love” was waning long before the season of ’67 had begun.
America was at a cultural crossroads as the Eisenhower administration came to a close. The giant economic boom that reigned supreme for most of the decade had cooled, the nation had fought a war that only paused in a stalemate and, for many, John F. Kennedy had emerged as a young, fresh glimmer of hope.
That glimmer of hope tragically became an eternal flame of remembrance of what could have been with the events in Dealey Plaza on Nov. 22, 1963.
Another major change in society occurred shortly after World War II, and that was when a record number of young people began going to college. According to Inside Higher Ed, thanks primarily to the G.I. Bill and other initiatives, undergraduate enrollments increased 45 percent between 1945 and l960.
Both on the heels of and concurrent with the Civil Rights Movement, people began noticing what they determined to be the ills of the society at large. Many began to see America as an inherently bad place.
Young people took to the streets in protest; men grew their hair to what was considered inappropriate lengths and burned their draft cards. Women burned their bras, and homosexuals began holding hands in public all to the disdain of “the establishment.”
All of this took place to a soundtrack provided by The Beatles, Jefferson Airplane, Crosby, Stills and Nash, as well as The Velvet Underground and The Who.
“If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair,” the song goes.
However, it did not take long for a minority of ne’er-do-wells to hijack the various movements until the younger generations of society began to fall victim to their own good intentions.
What started as righteous indignation over an unjust Vietnam War turned into a country filled with people aiming to destroy it by any means necessary because of its own set of “original sins.”
Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds turned into Happiness is a Warm Gun, peaceful protests turned to riots, political assurances turned to political assassinations and even the so-called peace loving liberal wing of the Democratic party had to be escorted through police barricades to gain access to the 1968 convention.
Drug abuse soared to the degree that the once heralded Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco had free drug clinics on nearly every street corner. According to the National Institutes of Health, the “free love” movement gave way to a significant rise in the rates of sexually transmitted disease, particularly syphilis and gonorrhea. Roughly 10 years later, due to the long incubation time of the disease, the HIV/AIDS epidemic ravaged the gay community.
Some of the musicians and Hollywood types pushing the “anything goes” agendas also fell victim, leading to the term, the “27 year club.” Only recently was it disclosed by her surviving daughter that Mama Cass Elliot did not die from choking on a sandwich but by a drug overdose. Jim Morrison fled the famed Laurel Canyon scene, but still succumbed to drugs.
Fast forward 50 years later, and we have seen the same type of ultra-liberal cultural agenda crash and burn; while it was not the chief reason for the red wave that swept the nation in the last election, there is no doubt of its influence.
What started as the reasonable movement in advocacy for gay marriage, equal protection under the law for all colors and creeds, and overall diversity and tolerance very quickly devolved into intolerance, riots, political violence and streets filled with drugged out zombies; all the while, the liberal leaders of the cities involved poured out the taxpayer’s money into what was becoming a diversified hole of despair.
A cottage industry arose with companies paying big money to hire consultants to preach the ideology of “White privilege” as well as “institutional racism” when neither can reliably be found to exist. They spent billions more on ad campaigns to prove just how woke they were. Like the 1960s counterculture, the battleground started with college aged kids, but quickly moved on to even younger, more impressionable minds.
Like the “hippies” of 1966 who grew their hair and wore roach clips to show their “individuality,” a good faction of the youth of today do the same with their rainbow hair and “bull-bling” nose rings; and for both crowds, those seeming fads are no longer fashion statements, but the “uniforms” of what many consider a descent into degeneracy.
“Influencers” on social media tell these impressionable young minds to break their family bonds if necessary, claiming, “We’re your family now.” Sound familiar? Charles Manson stated multiple times, “Your children X-ed themselves out of your reality and came to mine. They became my children.”
The hippies of the 1960s became known as “slippies,” and the “woke” of today is following suit by going “broke.”
It is interesting to me that for conservatives and even some liberals, the combative and often crude Trump became the voice of sanity in a world where people were beginning to make up their own pronouns, identify themselves as being animals and consider body mutilation as the manifestation of a well-balanced mind.
Meanwhile, in the highest halls of power, the people who were really in control seemed to believe themselves when they stated that the clearly incapacitated president was in full control of his mental faculties as he attempted to shake hands with thin air and gave Joe Biden’s son a full pass on his alleged criminal activities because he was somehow a victim of his own drug abuse and others’ institutional hatred.
While I, as a classic liberal, believe in diversity and equality, I have to go with the “old fogies” when it comes to an “anything goes” mentality of “equity.” There is a way to be inclusive, but keeping in mind that some things are taboo for a reason.
As for this past election, I sincerely hope that Mr. Trump has learned the lessons of history, particularly that of his own; we don’t want a repeat of Nixon’s final term.
Scott Hudson is the Senior Investigative Reporter and Editorial Page Editor for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
