Make no mistake, I think things are bad now…scary bad. Financial institutions crashing, the entire economy plus we as indivduals reeling from exploding gasoline prices, the lousy dollar, incredible personal and Federal debt, so much of Federal debt held outside the US…oh, and the Middle East situation.
But recently I watched a documovie about the 1980 US hockey team miracle and was reminded of some of the malaise of that period. It caused me to wonder if now is really as bad, or worse, than then. Here are a few events from about 1979-1980:
[ul]
[li]Shah Pahlavi overthrown in the Iranian revolution, US embassy seized and hostages taken. America is reminded every evening of this.[/li]
[li]Saddam Hussein becomes President of Iraq.[/li]
[li]Five-to-ten percent inflation (said by some to be America’s only peacetime inflation).[/li]
[li]Mortgage interest rates that hit 18% (I remember trying to afford my first house; county bond issues helped by lowering the rate to “only” 11%).[/li]
[li]Three Mile Island nuclear accident (partial meltdown) in Pennsylvania.[/li]
[li]Soviet Union invades Afghanistan.[/li]
[li]Gas shortages, with hours-long lines at the pumps; some states implement rationing.[/li]
[li]Skylab falls from the sky, debris scattered.[/li]
[li]Iran-Iraq war begins.[/li]
[li]US boycotts Summer Olympics.[/li]
[li]John Lennon assassinated.[/li]
[li]Mt. St. Helen erupts, killing dozens.[/li]
[li]Coup in Turkey.[/li]
[li]The comic strip Garfield debuts.[/li][/ul]
I was a young adult in that time-frame, and likely not very politically- and world-aware enough to grasp the impact of some of these events at the time. In reflection, it scares the caca out of me. I mean, our arch-enemy USSR invades, without any provocation at all, Afghanistan. The equivalent today (I don’t know, maybe Iran invading Turkmenistan, but Iran certainly doesn’t have the capabilities that the USSR did) would be catastrophic.
I certainly think the potential for our current situation to worsen to a truly historic disaster definitely exists, but I’m not sure that overall it is worse than 1979-80. Your thoughts?
The current day-to-day life of the overwhelming majority of U.S. citizens is currently better, economically. Stagflation was a true and heavy biurden on most people.
Beyond that, I suspect that we could pick just about any two year period since WWII and come up with a list of troubling or scary things. (I mean, I wish Lennon had not been murdered, but how is the random act of one nut against an artist a scary trauma or burden to society?)
The Soviets had much more provocation to invade their own client state that was seeking to follow a different path than we had to invade Iraq. In the subsequent years, we went on to an unnecessary invasion of Grenada and the murderous invasion of Panama.
There are scary things in our time. China’s need for petroleum (to satisfy the economy we nudged them to create) may put a burden on both fuel availability and the economy for which we will suffer tremendously–or it may not. However, comparing to compare the relative badness of different periods–particularly a period limited to one or two years–is never going to produce a consensus.
Was watching The Real Charley Wilson’s War on History last night and according to that show they were also a hell of a lot more murderous and destructive than the US has been in Iraq. I mean, we aren’t even in the same league.
As to them having more justification…I guess that’s a matter of perspective. Both invasions were wrong so it’s really degrees of badness.
Well, not to crash this vewy scawy assessment of the times, but IMHO most of the scaredom is hype. There are some very potentially troubling things out there, and certainly we aren’t all in beer and skittles, but I don’t think we are in the same ball park as during the 70’s stagflation era. Having lived through both it’s really no contest, even with the Iraq/Afghanistan war tossed in. Certainly not economically…our economy is light years ahead of what it was then, even looking at the average American and their realistic lifestyle, buying power, etc.
Well, that’s easy to say…we know exactly how bad that era was after all (it’s history, no? ) where as we have no idea how bad the current situation might get. There is potential for a partial or even complete collapse of our financial system, fire and brimstone falling from the sky, dogs and cats living together, etc etc…but realistically it’s probably not going to happen. I’m worried about some of the big lending institutes going tits up and this having a cascading effect on our economy…but again, it’s probably not going to happen.
Probably be a while before it’s beer and skittles all around, but I think people are over hyping exactly how bad the current economy is, as they are over freaking out about the current price of gas at the pump.
My CU offers up to 5% on checking now- just have to have direct deposit, use your Visa check/debit card 10/month, and check you account online 5/month.
So it’s OK to take over a country in two steps–first by making it your “client state” and then by invading–but skipping directly to the invasion is a no-no?
We had a somewhat similar situation in 1979. ABC News ran the 15-minute * America Held Hostage* at 10:30 p.m. which morphed into Nightline The cheap satellite technology lengthened the news cycle. Night after night we saw the Death to America! coverage.
And I was just thinking about it this morning. As excruciatingly embarrassing as the 444-day hostage crisis was, at least all the hostages were safely released. We are now more than 5 years “Mission Accomplished” with troops still dying weekly in Iraq. Maybe the US was viewed as “weak” under Jimmy Carter- now a lot of the world views the US as bullies- bullies tied down in wars seemingly without end.
Afghanistan was the beginning of the end of the Soviet Union.
No - I can only speak for the U.K., but things are vastly better than 79-80. Today is more like the bust of the early 90s: a bubble has burst. In 79-80 there was deap-seated depression and it took the tough medicine of Margaret Thatcher to bring us out of it. (Other medicine may have worked as well, but hers definitely did.) Interest rates and inflation are still low. The big problem here is that fuel is overtaxed which raises the cost of getting to work and of distributing goods and services.
I was young in 1980 but the Cold War alone would be a deal killer to me. I don’t want my young daughters to be told they could die at any moment (unless they hid under there desk) like I was and declassified Soviet records revealed that was very close to being true at one point in 1983. The economy sucked in 1980 as well.
No thanks, I will take now under almost any circumstances.
This is going to sound really partisan but, in my opinion, most of our current domestic problems go back to the Bush administration. Which means that the problems are localized and therefore much easier to fix. Things will improve if Obama or McCain get elected. Back in 1979, our problems were a lot more diffuse and that made them much harder to fix.
On the international front, it’s the opposite situation. Back in 1979 we had one big problem - the Soviet Union. Nowadays we have a lot of smaller problems. But (again in my opinion) that’s to our advantage. Because while I feel it’s easier to fix one big problem than a bunch of small problems in domestic affairs, I feel the opposite is true in international affairs.
Besides I don’t feel that either 1979 or 2008 is a peak year for American problems. Things were much worse in 1860, 1930, and 1968. And we survived.
Anyway, the USSR alone makes 1979 more scary than 2008, in that nuclear apocalypse was an ever-present possibility. Arguably, that tension kept rising during the first Reagan term, though, while the Soviets were playing last-man-standing with their leaders and the cracks were starting to show and KAL 007 was shot down in 1983. Not nearly as bad as 1962, of course, which I figure is the scariest time since WW2 and arguably ever.
Well, the overwhelming problem of the past several decades is the population explosion. It’s been exploding an additional generation since 1979, so we’re further along, but it’s the same continuing disaster.
One thing that was better about 1979 was that the President laid out a logical, progressive energy policy. Which we didn’t follow. Well, I guess hindsight is 20-20.
Instead of worrying about missiles coming over the pole from the USSR, we’re worrying about any of several dozen terrorist groups getting their hands on a warhead. I really don’t know which time would be scarier to be a kid in.
) where as we have no idea how bad the current situation might get. There is potential for a partial or even complete collapse of our financial system, fire and brimstone falling from the sky, dogs and cats living together, etc etc…but realistically it’s probably not going to happen. I’m worried about some of the big lending institutes going tits up and this having a cascading effect on our economy…but again, it’s probably not going to happen.