I was bitching all day yesterday because I slept so well that I woke up with a stiff back and figured it was just one of those things you’ll get used to ass you age. Later on in the day, last night, actually, I watched Real Time with Bill Maher, and Gloria Steinem was on as a guest interviewee.
First things first. She has aged very well. She looks better than most 50 years olds around here. So whatever she is doing to take care of herself, it is working. Second, she said two things, one of which I thought made no sense and was kind of regrettable, the second I found to be interesting. Here is the quote:
“Women are more for [Clinton] than men are. …First of all, women get more radical as we get older, because we experience. …Not to over-generalize, but … men tend to get more conservative because they gain power as they age, women get more radical because they lose power as they age.
And, when you’re young, you’re thinking, where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie…”
I honestly don’t know what she was thinking or means with the second part, and I will let others deal with that. Bill tried to let her backtrack, but she never really cleared up her point. Whatever, she’s old, and sometimes older people say silly shit. I’m much younger and I say silly shit all the time.
But to the other point, about men getting older and men getting more conservative, I suppose that is true. But then I thought about it, and just the opposite is happening with me. I suppose I have more power, but I never really think I wield it. I guess what I don’t understand why people would get more conservative as they amass power unless it is just out of simple self-interest and greed. I think I am getting more and more liberal with every day. I still have traces of a well discussed (here, at least) authoritarian streak, but I think if you ask the other writers here, that’s certainly not evident with our dealings regarding the website. I basically just say write what you want, whatever blows your trumpet, just don’t break things. I honestly can’t think of maybe more than a few instances when I said no to something (other than rating or up/down voting comments).
I guess I just don’t know why people WOULD get more conservative. Every day I learn a little bit more, and I see more bullshit. Every single day, you can watch the news and watch someone getting shafted economically, someone getting hosed by a corporation or insurance agency. Every day you can watch the cops beat or shoot someone in the street. Every single day some motherfucker like Martin Shkreli comes up with a scheme to fuck someone over- and more often than not, gets away with it. Every day I see someone around here hosting a spaghetti dinner or something to pay for someone’s CANCER treatment. I watch companies and governments pollute and no one gets punished. Every day you can read about someone robbing someone’s pension or fucking people out of their medical insurance or ripping people off- legally. It just doesn’t make sense to me why someone wouldn’t get more liberal, more reactionary as they age. You literally have to go through life with your eyes closed to think the status quo is working.
Maybe people are under the illusion it’s just going to happen to the others. They’re protected. That makes no sense to me. If people are going to have the giant brass balls to pollute an entire fucking city’s water to save a few bucks and then not have the decency to kill themselves or at the very least resign and show up at the courthouse and plead guilty to something, anything, trust me, they are going to have no problem doing it to you, too. Out of control cops aren’t just shooting black people. The justice system will fuck you over no matter what color you are. God isn’t going to help you. You may think you are financially secure or maybe even rich, but that’s not real money. Real money and real power is killing 30+ people in a mining accident that you made sure happen, and then getting maybe probation.
I don’t know how to end this. I guess I just don’t understand how people could get more conservative as they age unless they are a scumbag greedhead, part of the 1% and know they are safe from whatever, really damned stupid, or a sociopath. Or some combination of them all. I just don’t get it. How are they winning?
Baud
Change is harder to adjust to.
New things are confusing.
People become obsessed with not losing whatever they have.
Fear of being dependent on others.
Jerzy Russian
I am roughly the same age as you, and I also woke up with a stiff back. At least waking up beats the alternative of not waking up.
jl
@Baud:
And:
Your options become more limited and you have to live off of currently accumulated assets.
Edit: I think this is a very inspiring youth pitch for Baud! 2016! campaign, as long as you distribute the free doobies first.
tybee
about the time i hit 45 or so, i noted that i was a LOT more liberal than i was at 25.
and the trend continues…
Linda Featheringill
I came from a very conservative, authoritarian family. I usually say they stood a little to the left of Himmler.
However, the oldest boy became more liberal after the age of 70 and was edging towards being radical closer to the end.
As the baby of the family, and now into my 70s, I’m the only one of that group still kicking. But you never know how people will change as they get older.
Baud
@tybee:
I have become more liberal as I age also. I attribute it to gaining more experience and knowledge.
Baud
@jl: I thought I had the youth at death panels.
Parmenides
People don’t get more conservative as they age. They were always conservative, in the particular american conservative tradition of what my childhood was, shall be always. Non curious people don’t have an antidote to that. If all you see on the front cover of the newspaper is crime this crime that, there must be an ass ton of crime out there. No matter that there isn’t. If yahoo news shows you that the world is going to crap cause the refugees from Syria have raped 1000 white german women and continue to do so daily then by god there must be something wrong with those people. Most people are incurious and believe that the world they had when they were 5 was the worlds most perfect world. Thus conservatism.
Suzanne
WRT Steinem’s thing about young women liking Sanders because “the boys are with Bernie”, I don’t know exactly what she means, but I do remember in my early 20s, I spent just a ridiculous amount of mental energy thinking about what others, especially men, thought of me. What I said, how I looked, who I associated with, and yes, what my political views were. I wanted to be feminist, but not THAT KIND of feminist. Which is bullshit, of course. I think this is the kind of thinking Steinem is referring to. Of course there are lots of legitimate reasons for supporting Sanders, but there are also tribal reasons beyond rational enlightened self-interest, and IME young people often fall into that mode of thinking.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
I recently did one of those ideology quizzes and came out to the left of the U.K. Green Party.
At the same time, I’m an enthusiastic Hill supporter because I’m big on consolidating and holding gains prior to the next move, which always involves establishing consensus.
Juju
Sleep injuries suck. I tend to have sleep injuries with my neck. It’s something that started around age 40.
mellowjohn
i think you just answered your own question. i just don’t understand how people start out being conservative – except out of ignorance.
Bob In Portland
Anyone remember Steinem’s dog whistle op-ed for the NY Times right before the New Hampshire primary in 2008? Or this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HRUEqyZ7p8 Once you’re in you don’t get out.
Renie
I don’t think most people get more conservative as they age – most of them were always conservative. I’m going to be 59 this week (and can’t believe where the years have gone) and have found among my group that people become more unguarded on how they feel. They age and feel they can say what they want. I also do it to a point cuz I’m not so involved in what people think of me. Most people’s personalities don’t change during their life. Cranky old people were probably cranky young people but maybe they hid it more. Why people have certain political views are probably either tribal or based on life experience.
now get off my lawn
bin Lurkin'
OK, now that’s what I keep putting up with all the other annoyances (FYWP) around here to read from time to time.
Your Iraq War retrospective solidified my respect for you years and years ago, kudos for being a stand up guy.
raven
Damn, Dan Hick of Dan Hicks and HIs Hot Licks. . . you got it, 74.
Suzanne
@Renie: I have seen some people get this sort of hindsight judginess as they age that is such bullshit. Like, “Why is that young man goofing around and wearing saggy pants instead of working hard at college?!?! GRUMBLE GRUMBLE,” then if you press them, and ask, “Did you ever goof around when you were young? Or were you always task-oriented and hardworking and never made questionable fashion choices?”, they back down. But there is something inherently conservative about any argument that starts with THESE DAMN KIDZ TODAY.
Having said that, I have become more leftist the older I get. I just turned 36, so I look forward to what happens.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
When I was in my 20s, my political opinions were my own. I didn’t care what the guys around me thought.
Also, am I the only one who found it funny that in a post about Gloria Steinem, “first things first” was an assessment of her looks? Yeah, I know it’s within the context of her aging vs. John’s own aging, and he’s not gauging whether he’d sleep with her. But women are still judged on looks a hell of a lot more than men are, especially as we age, so I laughed to see it here.
jl
After some swerves into glibertarian territory in my foolish youth, I am getting more liberal. In economics, that is where the evidence leads.
I think I mentioned back in econ grad school in the 90s, was last time I was tempted by glibertarian thoughts. But, I couldn’t see how it could be connected to reality. But, I figured, hey, maybe some mysterious sense I don’t understand, glibertarian BS might have some relationship to reality. We will see. And, yes we did see. Dub’s economic experiments put a fork in it, as far as I was concerned. And it was already doubtful in my mind after the reality of the Reagan years became apparent.
But, need to keep in mind that reading Cole makes me feel like a young man again, even though in calendar human years, I think I am almost ten years older. Not sure what that is Cole years, or BJ years.
raven
I’m an Old Cowhand From the Rio Grand ~ Dan Hicks & the Hot Licks
It was about this time I faded from rock and roll and trying to smash the state.
OzarkHillbilly
Can’t really help you John except to say they are pining for the fjords. Seriously, they remember a time when everything made sense, Mommy and Daddy always protected them, food was on the table, clothes on their back, a roof over their head, and they knew where they fit in… That last part is the biggie. Everything else made them feel safe and secure, but it was the knowing where one belongs, that tied it all together.
With this I think I can help you: No, it doesn’t get better. In fact it gets worse. Soon you will not be able to sleep for more than 2 hours at a time (if you can call it that) because pain accumulates. In other words, you are fvcked.
Hope that helps, tom
schrodinger's cat
I have always been pretty liberal and anti god-botherers, I think I have become more pragmatic and less ideological as I have grown older. So Bernie’s talk of revolution leaves me cold and his fantasy math bothers me a lot.
raven
And just for continuity, Dan and Jorma I Scare Myself.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: Come on man, there’s good times left.
WereBear
I spent 10 formative years in Florida. For some things, for me, it sucked, but one of the good things was exposure to olds. Lots and lots of old people, moseying along the Tamiami Trail with that blinker going.
What I concluded was that, with few exceptions, people did not change.
The cranky whiners told stories of their youth, when they were cranky whiners. The ones who were still adventuring told me stories of adventures they did decades ago. The fearful were more so and the happy, still so.
There are exceptions, those few exceptions, but honestly, I think the hardest thing EVER is a person accepting, even reaching for, change. Our esteemed blog host kept on thinking, and he changed.
Me? Betty Crocker’s Picture Cookbook made me a feminist when I was eight. I figured out racism was stupid when I was twelve. I became radicalized by Harlan Ellison’s The Glass Teat when I was fourteen.
I haven’t changed.
NotMax
If we’re talking the classical definition of conservative, it’s at least understandable.
If we’re talking the present day American definition of conservative, there’s no excuse for treading that path.
Anoniminous
I haven’t gotten more Conservative over the years. Nobody I knew in the 60s or 70s have gotten more conservative over the years. But my social group was distinctly Left wing and radical compared to other Boomers.
Pogonip
I think many people are still under the misapprehension that we have a functional government. 9 times out of 10 when an outrage, e.g. The water in Flint, MI, comes on the news, some adorably innocent American will say, “Oh, they can’t do that.”. They have not yet noticed that the Farengi have taken over.
When we do get a functional government I want those bastards in Michigan to go to real prisons for a long, long time.
bin Lurkin'
@OzarkHillbilly:
Which is why those of us who never ~quite~ fit often turn out to be liberal.
raven
@Anoniminous: Ding
bin Lurkin'
@Pogonip: Ferengi would be an upgrade…
superpredators4hillary
Progressivism called into question…then feminism? I don’t think so. Ain’t no 81-year-old neck gonna spend the rest of days looking behind its back.
Richard Shindledecker
When youth and luck has made a person powerful in any way the fact that things change attacks that status.
Therefore as time moves on they seek to protect that status. alas.
raven
Dear Quote Investigator: Some individuals change their political orientation as they grow older. There is a family of sayings that present a mordant judgment on this ideological evolution. Here are three examples:
Not to be a républicain at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head.
If you’re not a socialist before you’re twenty-five, you have no heart; if you are a socialist after twenty-five, you have no head.
If you aren’t a liberal when you’re young, you have no heart, but if you aren’t a middle-aged conservative, you have no head.
Political terminology has changed over time, and it differs in distinct locales. Within the context of these sayings the terms “républicain”, “socialist”, and “liberal” were all on the left of the political spectrum. Would you please explore this complex topic?
Quote Investigator: The earliest evidence located by QI appeared in an 1875 French book of contemporary biographical portraits by Jules Claretie. A section about a prominent jurist and academic named Anselme Polycarpe Batbie included the following passage. Boldface has been added to excerpts: 1
M. Batbie, dans une lettre trop célèbre, citait un jour, pour expliquer ses variations personnelles et bizarres, ce paradoxe de Burke: « Celui qui n’est pas républicain à vingt ans fait douter de la générosité de son âme; mais celui qui, après trente ans, persévère, fait douter de la rectitude de son esprit. »
Here is one possible translation to English.
Mr. Batbie, in a much-celebrated letter, once quoted the Burke paradox in order to account for his bizarre political shifts: “He who is not a républicain at twenty compels one to doubt the generosity of his heart; but he who, after thirty, persists, compels one to doubt the soundness of his mind.”
Anoniminous
@raven:
The Youngs have some odd ideas about the realities of the 60s.
Pogonip
@WereBear: What’s the cookbook have to do with feminism?
My mom never went in for Betty Crocker. She had the Farm Journal and Good Housekeeping cookbooks. I can’t speak for the current edition, but the 1948 edition of the Good Housekeeping cookbook is excellent. It’s the only one I ever use.
Starfish
@Linda Featheringill: Wow! You look a lot younger than your age on the internet. (I always thought you were maybe five years older than me.)
raven
@Anoniminous:
As easy it was to tell black from white
It was all that easy to tell wrong from right
And our choices were few and the thought never hit
That the one road we traveled would ever shatter and split
How many a year has passed and gone
And many a gamble has been lost and won
And many a road taken by many a friend
And each one I’ve never seen again
Bob Dylans Dream
Pandemoniac
“The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.”
–John Kenneth Galbraith
Morat20
You don’t get more conservative as you age, not in general. At some point, you just stop keeping up with the times.
I’m not going to be suddenly anti-gay marriage in my sixties, or decide the upper 1% really needs a huge tax cut.
But I can already see some of the folks my age really struggling with the changes of how we perceive gender, and assign it. Folks that would happily consider themselves liberal, pushing for gay marriage before it became popular — but making jokes about Caitlynn Jenner that speak of personal discomfort with the idea.
Happy with drag queens, but deeply discomforted by transgender folks in general — because they can’t quite make the leap to realize something like gender is more fluid than they thought.
They’re still “good” on the subject — despite the jokes, they use the proper pronouns and wouldn’t dream of policing bathrooms. But there’s a discomfort there they can’t overcome, and that’ll only grow as they continue to age.
Or, I suppose to make it simpler — we’re hitting the “Kids these days” area and starting to sound like our parents. We’re on top of the world, as it were, but we can already feel it moving under out feet — passing us by. And adapting to that, constantly readjusting worldviews, gets exhausting. And people drop out. They stop. It just goes “kids these days” and you start voting for politicians who seem to signal “Hey, wait, stop the train while we still understand where it is”.
Which is…not really a comfort to modern conservatives, since they don’t want to stop the train so much as put it in reverse until it hits the 1890s.
WereBear
My mother’s wedding present was a great cookbook. I learned a lot from it. It had many recipes with a person’s name on them, since they contributed, or were a Bake-Off winner with it.
There was only ONE woman’s name in the whole thing. Everyone else was Mrs. Malename Lastname. It was absolutely Stepford and gave me nightmares.
And I decided that this would not be my fate.
Brachiator
I think that Steinem is largely full of shit here. She is right about other stuff, but here she is blowing it out her arse.
Also, if some girls are thinking, where are the boys, there are also boys thinking, where are the girls. That’s part of the fun of youth, to do even honorable stuff for dumbass reasons.
And some folks get more liberal with age. Others get more conservative. Very few get more wisdom, which is another thing entirely.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Juju:
Apologies to Cole then. I was just thinking that only he could injure himself in his sleep.
Conservatism: As you get older you have more to lose, and feel more powerless to hang on to it. Hence getting kinda reactionary about change.
Mrs. Thunder and I are conservative people: get married, buy a house, work at a job (any job if you have to), pay your taxes, stay out of debt, save your money when you can, be involved in local government, support charities, support law enforcement, etc.
But not at all aligned with modern political conservatism. And you know how far what is now called political conservatism has moved from the description above.
So there’s conservative and then there’s conservative.
zzyzx
@Morat20: I was about to make a similar point, specifically with trans people. I don’t have an issue per se, but I feel differently about that than I do with same sex couples and I know it’s precisely because one was an issue when I was growing up and one is a newer concern.
p.a.
I think among people who have become economically ‘comfortable’ there’s a trend to conservatism; preserve their gains for the next generations. IGMFY. The idea that a more egalitarian society is also stronger economically for their kids and grandkids seems to be a bridge too far.
Also too, bigots. As the visible underclass becomes less white. Not many Appalachia/Ozarks poverty documentaries any more.
Just Some Fuckhead
I don’t think it’s a matter of people becoming more conservative as they get older but rather that people stay where they are while society progresses past them which makes them look conservative in relation.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
@Morat20: I’m in my late 40s, and I know people who started on the “kids these days” kick in their 20s. They grew up in authoritarian families, and couldn’t wait to sound like authority figures themselves.
(On a somewhat related note, I wonder how much passionate political involvement is just a reaction to (or against) one’s own parenting.)
Redshift
Contrary to the famous assertion attributed to Churchill, the research I’ve read debunks the idea that people generally get more conservative as they get older. I think a lot of people get more conservative as they get richer, because they worry more about losing what they have, and higher taxes become less abstract. But in general, there’s no universal shift.
The one thing that occurs to me is that there is research showing that fear makes people more conservative, and older people are often easier to scare. (This is why I don’t agree with calls for us to use tactics more like conservatives — the psyche isn’t symmetrical.)
raven
@zzyzx: It’s different for me because one of my best buddies son began his life as his daughter and I watched him go through the transition up close and personal. Maybe when you have a real connection if’s different.
Here’s a documentary made about him a number of years back. He graduated from college and a social worker now. I know there was some grumbling about how his mom and grandmother referred to him in the film but, overall, his folks were great and obviously their support mattered.
raven
@WereBear: Let us not talk falsely now
PhoenixRising
Cole, I’m your age. When we were both 25, I was often perceived to be male. That doesn’t happen as much anymore, but it does happen. I’ve aged into being a woman, in that respect, and Gloria has a good point.
Women tend to become more radical as we move into the life stage in which men don’t see/hear us too well. I’ve had 2 financial disasters develop in my business in the last year which were 99% attributable to the young men (25-34) involved at the other end of the deal simply *not listening* to things they needed to know. They couldn’t hear me, because I now come across as ‘mom nagging’. If I had a job, and needed those boys to approve my bonus, I’d be setting fire to the lobby. And I think a lot of women have that same experience.
You are the exceptional case for a man–as you see more of life, you notice that the people who are getting rogered are just less lucky than you, not less than you. That’s a marker of intelligence.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Redshift:
There’s research on that. Millionaires tend to back Republicans in greater proportions than billionaires. If you have a million (or 10 million) you’re afraid of losing it and becoming a boring normal person. A billionaire feels relatively untouchable. They have ‘fvck you’ money and can follow the politics they feel rather than what will keep them in an exclusive class.
Pandemoniac
Interesting graph comparing attitudes about capitalism (me, me, me) versus socialism (us, us, us)
From the Wapost
Spoiler: Age is a factor
raven
@Pandemoniac: Can you find one with bigger text??? I can’t see it!
WereBear
@PhoenixRising: Word. I think this is why women become more blunt and assertive as they age; they have to. And they don’t care what “the boys” think the way they used to.
Pandemoniac
@raven: Here’s the full story (instead of the twitter preview)
Millennials have a higher opinion of socialism than of capitalism
Pandemoniac
@raven: If you are on a computer click on the graph to see a bigger image. It’s still kinda fuzzy; but it’s bigger too. If you’re on a phone or tablet, I don’t know if it is possible to embiggen the image.
Germy
Our day will come (Amy Winehouse)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLwccfUjdUk
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Pandemoniac:
I read that three times as ‘minerals’ rather than millennials. Time for a nap.
Suzanne
@WereBear: I also think that, as women age, most become more secure in themselves. We find meaningful relationships, be they romantic or familial or friendship or collegial, we move forward with careers or hobbies, and spend less time worrying about Stupid Shit like social position or our looks. Obviously, this is not universal, but most of the women I know get significantly more secure and run out of fucks as they age.
John Revolta
It’ll happen to YOU!!
WereBear
@Suzanne: I agree. Instead of a man’s situation, where they are socialized to butt heads like sheep in a meadow, women have been working the levers for quite some time, and have some wicked moves they can use, just as the men around them are starting to figure out that machismo has its limits.
raven
@Pandemoniac: I was sort of joking around based in being old but thanks!
Joel
Ben Franklin, notably, became more liberal with age, adopting such radical positions as abolitionism, believe it or not.
laura
@Juju: what’s your bed, bedding and pillow configuration?
I can’t help but believe that much of our collective sleep and body heath issues stem from poor bed health.
NobodySpecial
Well, let’s face it, Cole. You come from a very conservative location, and went into the military, a very authoritarian org that’s chock full of conservatives at the top. Simple tribalism probably accounts for most of your conservatism. Now you’ve gone the other way, so you’re becoming more liberal. The key reason most people become conservative in my mind is because a conservative lifestyle is pushed 24/7/365 by churches, your media, and the oceans of opinion paid for and provided by fascists with money. Add in the hotbuttons of old fashioned racism and classism and there ya go.
J R in WV
@Pogonip:
Joy of Cooking is great,
and anything by Julia Child is great. I have two huge cookbooks by her, and everything is great. She also explains why she is telling you to do it her way, rather than just listing the rules.
I must confess that I often Google a recipe and read 5 or 6, and then just go and cook without regard to quantities in those recipes, because they were3 all different, and all evidently would produce an edible and enjoyable meal.
divF
@WereBear:
Years ago, I was watching a nature show with a friend, which at some point was showing rams butting heads during mating season. My friend turned to me and said, “wouldn’t it be easier if they just flipped a coin?”
This is an insight I have found useful on many occasions (not for mating, but for resolving other male conflicts).
Germy
@J R in WV: I remember reading the Joy Of Cooking at a very young age, just out of boredom for something to read. Two things I remember: The joke about tequila being called “the gulp of mexico” and the recipe for turtle.
Harold Samson
Fear. More of it. Losing your facilities, worried about not being able to deal with the world.
Liberalism requires confidence. Conservatism is a reaction to fear.
Germy
@divF:
Like the Iowa caucus!
Barbara
@Anoniminous:
I think this is something that isn’t appreciated about the 60’s — long-haired peace marchers were in the minority in our generation. There were an awful lot of narrow-minded jerks — and when they grew older, they stayed narrow-minded jerks. All the liberals I knew when I was young are still liberals; in fact, I think some of us have become more radicalized. So just because some boomers are rightwing that doesn’t mean they started out any different.
Germy
@laura:
I suffered from neck pain for quite awhile until I figured out my pillow was too firm. I bought a fluffier one, and it seemed to help.
Lately, I’ve been seeing ads for the “miracle bamboo pillow” and frankly I’m intrigued. I saw it at R1te A1de, in the “as seen on TV” aisle. Has anyone bought one?
WereBear
I have found that waking up with an achey body part means I have poor posture during the day. As these over-stressed muscles try to relax during sleep, they often cannot, and then tense up other muscles.
We are supposed to walk with both feet pointing forward. Our thumbs should point to the front, not the backs of our hands. Are we holding our shoulders back and our heads high?
I’m working out an old hip problem with Egoscue and Zero balancing. Others might use yoga or strategic weight lifting. It doesn’t matter how we fix our posture, what matters is that we do it, or we will keep on paying in pain.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator:
I get the impression that there are some boys who become ersatz “feminists” because they think it will get them laid, then turn into bitter howling MRAs when this doesn’t work.
raven
@Barbara: Hell yes there were. The Hard Hat Riots are a case in point. In Nixonland, Perlstein writes about the Minute Men in Central Illinois send “The Crosshairs are on Your Back” letters to rads at the U of I. I know firsthand it was true.
raven
@Matt McIrvin: See “The Weather Underground”.
Hungry Joe
@raven: I saw Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks at the Family Dog in San Francisco in late ’71 or early ’72. The next day I bought “Original Music” and “Where’s the Money?”, and they pretty much became the soundtrack to my senior year of college; they should have been the soundtrack to my life. Great, great music.
WereBear
My comments are vanishing. Even, maybe, this one.
Ohio Mom
@Germy: Don’t know anything about bamboo pillows but do know my back aches went away when we finally sprung for a new mattress. Maybe Cole should try that.
Mattresses don’t last as long as they used to, you can’t flip a pillow top. It’s a scam.
raven
@Hungry Joe: People have no idea. Glad you got to go to that. I was on my way home from Vietnam my buddy from the city took me to see Santana at Winterland. I’d never heard of him in that fall of 69!
Germy
Dedicated to You
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-u9RRhq35Y
The Mills Brothers make it sound like an instrumental combo behind her, using only their vocal effects.
Germy
Rare photos of the vietnam war, from the winning side:
http://mashable.com/2016/02/05/another-vietnam-photography/#mMI99Pdaukqm
Ruckus
@Germy:
Wonder if that comes from the same company that has a store a block from me. They recently changed the signs in the windows about the organic coconut beds they sold to something a little less silly. Many of the stores around me are aimed at the locals with too much money, like the Bang and Olufsen store across the street from them.
Matt McIrvin
Anyway, I think the world moves past a lot of people. The attitudes of my childhood era about racial and sexual stereotypes, even among people who were trying hard to be non-bigoted, seem antique now. If you learned how to behave in that time, you might feel as if all the rules have changed in a way you don’t know how to adapt to, and you might well feel resentful about that and respond sympathetically to complaints about how everything is weirdly politically correct now.
divF
@Hungry Joe:
Seeing the news about Dan Hicks is a real heart-breaker. He and Commander Cody have been a large part of the sound track running through my head for the last 45+ years.
(Hungry: see comment 68 above).
Ajabu
I guess my situation is not typical. West Indian upbringing, don’t personally know any “conservatives”,(certainly not in my own family).My formative years were the 60’s (and the Black Power movement) and, if anything, I’ve gotten more liberal as I get older. I’m 75 – and definitely sick of seeing younger people dying – but I plan to end life as a very old radical leftist.
My mentor and hero, Randy Weston (AKA the world’s greatest living jazz pianist) is 89 and currently on the road with his trio. And looks to be about 60. Something to be said for good genes.
I DO find that I have far less patience for idiots & imbeciles politically and – as a old guy – have no qualms about calling their moronic asses out. Frequently gets their full attention.
realbtl
@Hungry Joe: I saw Dan 3 or 4 times in the Denver/Boulder area, always in small clubs. One of my favorites. RIP
raven
@divF: Have you read Star Making Machinery about the Commander? Great book.
raven
@Germy: Nice shots, I’ve see the one of the hospital in the swamp. The punji pit is awesome but the didn’t mention that they rubbed water buffalo dung on them to give you blood poisoning. We also spent millions developing the jungle boot with a steel insole ti protect against them. What did they do, the angled the punji’s so they went in the side of the boot.
WereBear
@raven: That is a great book. And has so much about the recording industry, too.
divF
@raven:
Yes, I own a copy – great book.
One of life’s pleasures is the fact that Bill Kirchen can be relied on to do a show here at least once a year. Sometimes they will open the dance floor for him, and I will take Madame out for a twirl (we courted in 1976 by going out dancing at a club where Kirchen’s band The Moonlighters were featured every Wednesday).
raven
@WereBear: Sure does, I also recommend “So You Want To Be A Rock and Roll Star” about Semisonic. Great book by a one hit wonder!
Pogonip
@raven: The hour’s getting late.
(In my case, that is literally true, because I have to get up ridiculously early tomorrow to put the roast in the crock pot.)
Question: if you put a roast in a crock pot, does it become a steam?
raven
@divF: The Commander Played this tiny joint between Athens and Atlanta about 20 years ago. We drove up to see him and I asked if he still lived in the Bay Area. He said “Nah, them smoking laws were kiloing me, I moved to Saratoga NY”!
raven
@Pogonip: I helped my bride make her beef bbq for the party by pressure cooking the shit out of the roast!
Ruckus
@Matt McIrvin:
The age old conundrum, the world changes around us while mostly we don’t.
That’s mostly but I also think it is a matter of degrees as well. A lot of people held/hold the views that John held not that many years ago and some of that comes from, at least in my experience, Vietnam and it’s fallout. That LBJ could be very liberal and ramp up a war so much, that gave us Nixon, who couldn’t have been all that bad, he was Ike’s VP. And boy how wrong was that? It set a tone in the country for a long time and we’ve really not gotten over it yet. That wasn’t the start and no it wasn’t the end either but it did change the country.
raven
@Ruckus: Fuck LBJ.
Thank you, thank you very much!
raven
Carson won’t go on stage.
jake the antisoshul soshulist
I become more of a leftist as I age. At least my anti-authoritarianism and anti-hierarchism get stronger as I get older. I am a lot less tolerant of god-bothering than I used to be.
raven
It’s all fucked up, whoo hoo.
schrodinger's cat
@raven: What pressure cooker do you use. The ancient one husband kitteh got from India is close to giving up the ghost. I am afraid of it since it hisses.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@jake the antisoshul soshulist:
I know what you mean. Less respectful of status quo power and conventions. One day you look around and say ‘these people are only in charge because we let them. Let’s stop.’ And you go your own way. Perspective.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
For those who haven’t seen Steinem’s comments on Real Time, the ~ 10 min clip is here. She said earlier that she didn’t think that young women were any less committed than she was at their age. Clearly in parts of the interview she was trying to be funny. I don’t regard her ‘they’re chasing Bernie’s boys’ comments as some sort of attack on young women.
But it would be good to hear her explanation of what she was trying to say there. ;-)
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Hungry Joe
@raven: I interviewed Commander Cody (George Frayne) about 20 years ago; I think it was a phoner. Anyway, he told me how he became the Commander: Seems that back in Madison, Wis., before they moved to Berkeley, no one had the title. Their then-pedal steel player, the apparently aptly named West Virginia Creeper, said he’d like to be the Commander. Frayne told me, “Everybody said, ‘No. No no no no no no no! George, you are now Commander Cody.’ I think it was because I was the guy who did most of the work loading and unloading the equipment.”
The kicker is that before I ever heard Cody I had a roommate who was a terrific guitar player. He decided to take up pedal steel, and one Sunday morning I walked into the living room to find him taking a lesson from a guy he called “Creeper.” Yup.
And, yeah: “Star Making Machinery” is a great book.
schrodinger's cat
I don’t like these gender based generalizations. I know plenty of women who have become cray cray conservatives as they have aged.
Ruckus
@raven:
He did us some solids but the price we had to pay for them…….
Yeah, I’d agree on your take. Over 53,000 killed, how many more wounded or broken? And that’s just on our side. All for what? And now look at Iraq and Afghanistan. Our dead are much less but those broken folks? And the other side. All for what?
John, as I recall it was the Terri Schiavo case that took broke you. Showed you that conservatives have no concept of life and living, only power and hate. Really how different is that from Vietnam/Iraq other than being on a very personal level? And that’s why I wrote above that Vietnam was a pivotal point in our history, when politicians lost their masks they used to hide the fact that for many of them it is about the power and nothing more. Climb ahead on the backs of anyone who you can stand on. It’s a rare politician these days who doesn’t exhibit at least a small bit of this but conservatives, that is their entire rational.
Matt McIrvin
@Ruckus: I think a lot of things about American politics can be explained by the fact that many of people’s political attitudes get set by things they remember from their twenties, but they don’t vote reliably until they age into their fifties, sixties and seventies. So there’s this 30-40-50 year lag that results in us perpetually fighting the Vietnam War into the 21st century.
Pogonip
@raven: I’ve never used a pressure cooker but I love OLD crock pots. The new ones are no good, they cook too fast. As Confucius, or more likely Mrs. Confucius said, “You can’t soften up shoe leather in a fast-cooking crock pot.”
Keith G
@Suzanne:
Yeah exactly. Ms Steinem has reached a serene state where observed truth can be spoken even if it does not jibe with favored ideology.
Fuck Bill Maher. I say that with affection since as a whole, I like his show, but last Friday night he had the Blowhard Metered pegged way past the red zone. He spent half his time with Steinem trying to bully her to agree that Islam is the worst thing ever*, but she would not play.
*A bit of an over statement, but not by much.
Edit: And @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet too
PurpleGirl
@Germy:
Lately, I’ve been seeing ads for the “miracle bamboo pillow” and frankly I’m intrigued. I saw it at R1te A1de, in the “as seen on TV” aisle. Has anyone bought one?
I’ve the seen that ads for it. The cover is a bamboo fabric the filling is shredded memory foam. If you can feel the bamboo fabric you should do that before buying one. I’ve felt bamboo yarn and it makes my fingers itch so even if it’s soft I can’t use it because of the itching.
Bill E Pilgrim
Well, I guess as they say the only thing worse than aging is the alternative.
Sigh.
My favorite Dan song, by far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUPnHoqGGMA
I liked them all, I just especially loved that one.
Yow, listen to what happens precisely at 1:54, melodically and harmonically. That’s one of those million dollar notes, as Leonard Bernstein called them.
https://youtu.be/VUPnHoqGGMA?t=110
Matt McIrvin
My own attitudes have evolved in a complicated way. I was raised as the 1970s/80s version of a liberal; I think I was getting more conservative in the 1990s as a result of being exposed to a bunch of smug libertarians on the Internet, though I was always a Democrat.
A major radicalizing moment for me was getting suckered into approving of Bush’s wars (if not his economics) and then seeing how badly those and everything else turned out. The people I’d regarded as out-there radical leftists mostly called this one correctly, while the liberals mostly caved.
So it had me resolving to pay more attention to radical leftists. But they still piss me off sometimes… especially their occasional insistence on rejecting democratic politics entirely in favor of some imaginary cataclysm, the whole heighten-the-contradictions business.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@efgoldman:
Reagan was the first (only?) president who had been head of his union (SAG) and broke the air traffic controllers’ strike. Wonder how the Teamsters felt about that.
Ruckus
@Matt McIrvin:
You may be 100% correct. We had wars before that which were about power and nothing more and yet they seemed to be more local, except for the civil war. And that changed and hardened people’s opinions for generations. I think that the news media changed that with Vietnam, it was far closer to instantaneous than anything prior. It was also less propagandized at first than any war previous, because a lot of it was almost real time. That changed of course when journalists were not allowed access unless their coverage matched the desired outcome of the government. But folks like John were kids or not even born during Vietnam but the country became more polarized for them and led to some to distrust Democrats. After all it was a Dem who was in power for WWII and a Republican in the fifties, which was a time of relative prosperity for many, whites. JFK had a lot of work and convincing to do to get elected. And that was much more open and in the news than it had been before.
Yes this was during my early life and is my experience but we didn’t have the confluence of that time at any time before that. And today is in some ways worse because now most every thing is live or close to it and we have a way to shout about things that happen thousands of miles away, while they are happening. I think this makes for greater separation of ideas. Look at the posts on BJ about Democratic politics, many are fighting about how wrong everyone else is for not agreeing with them 100% about 2 candidates who are about as close as any 2 ever get.
tallpete
@raven: @raven: I also recommend “So You Want To Be A Rock and Roll Star” about Semisonic. Great book by a one hit wonder!
I’ll have to read that. I’m from Mpls area – I really liked Wilson and Munson in Trip Shakespeare.
Felonius Monk
@raven:
Yeah, last I knew he lives up the road a little ways from me. John Tichy who played rhythm guitar lives over in Troy, NY and retired a few years ago as Head of the Mechanical Engineering Dept. at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (here).
On occasion, Bill Kirchen (he was the lead guitar in the Airmen) comes to town to play a gig at the Ale House over in Troy and he and Tichy get together and play (here).
I did my graduate work at RPI, but it was a couple of years before Tichy started teaching there, so I never had him for an instructor.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Keith G: We don’t watch Maher much any more because of issues like the ones you raise. :-/
I was suspicious of the Steinem story for a couple of reasons. 1) the source (NewRepublic) that JC linked. And 2) all of the ellipses. One of my rules of thumb that has served me well over the years is “always be suspicious of quotes with ellipses”.
Cheers,
Scott.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@efgoldman:
Yeah, Labor may be a good example of the different kinds of conservatism. Consistently taking choices to avoid change and undermining themselves in the long term. From their contract bargaining to their political support, it’s been about getting the best deal right now and no thought for the future, or anticipation of changing circumstances.
That’s my take.
I gotta make the parrot her evening chamomile tea and put her to bed.
Cheers, all.
Hillary Rettig
@Bob In Portland: yeah I was thinking about that, too. unfortunately not the hero we had thought
laura
Speaking only for me, I’ve gotten much more radical because I care not one wit one someone else thinks of me. I’m on the top of my game intellectually and professionally even though it’s still a man’s world baby.
In my family, and possibly yours, if some difficult job needed doing, it was done with your mom behind the wheel with your gramma and at least one aunt in the family car along with all the kids.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
As a 60 year old woman, I can proudly say I have NFLTG. You say something dumb, I’m going to call you on it. My husband says people are kind of afraid of me – good. Don’t say anything stupid or racist and I won’t have to kick your ass. But I am surprised at how several of my liberal friends have gotten crankier as they’ve gotten older. Also, I’m finding out how little they know about politics, and that when I mention stuff, they’ve never heard of it. That happens a lot, and it seems like the more you know about things, the more open minded you remain. Liberalism means less black and white thinking.
p.a.
@efgoldman: The first day of what turned into a 16 week strike against NYNEX a bunch of Teamsters showed up in support. “So. Who do you want us to fuck up.”
Uh, guys. It’s the first day.
raven
@schrodinger’s cat: It’s a Fagor, French I think. I’ve been using them for years and never had a problem.
Scotian
@Keith G:
I would agree. I was actually a little shocked by watching Maher last night, it felt to me like he was trying to game her appearance in that interview, not just with Islam, but also with the Dem race. Which seeing as Maher is clearly in the Sanders camp strikes me as a bit bothersome. I took her comment about the girls chasing the boys as her attempt to make a joke following making a serious point, and yet Maher acted like she said a horrific thing in all seriousness, and then it seemed like for the rest of the interview that he was almost mansplaining to Gloria Steinem! I like Maher, and up to this point I hadn’t minded his being clearly in the Sanders camp, but that interview, that interview really left a very bad taste in my mouth.
When Maher went to his panel and wanted them all to accept his claim that Sanders “deserved” to no longer be questioned as unelectable based on Iowa, again, really bothered. Until we see how well Sanders does outside of the literally whitest and most liberal States for Dems in America and see how well the Sanders message works outside his clearly core demographic that is obviously not something that can be said. It is all well and good to claim that Sanders is increasing his support in the minority/ethnic groupings, but to date he is still according to polls quite far behind Clinton in this regard, and until we see voter numbers proving otherwise it is still fair game to argue that Sanders is unelectable.
Maher is clearly politically aware and smart enough to know this, so his ignoring of this to push for his preference, well combined with the interview he had just concluded left a bad taste in my mouth. The fact that one of the next week guests happens to be one of the main Sanders representatives to the AA demographic is making this show seem more of a political sales job than I would prefer, but it is Maher’s show to do as he wishes with, but it is making my interest in continuing to watch a lot harder.
This has been a very interesting primary season to watch, but I am becoming increasingly disturbed by some echoes of Naderism in the calls for revolution or bust I keep reading around the Democratic/progressive part of the blogosphere, and after having seen where that went once I am hoping to not be seeing a repeat, because so far I still think Clinton is the more likely eventual winner of the primary. That of course can still change, but Sanders really needs to be making up a lot of ground outside his core demographics than he has to date, and time is running short for him to be doing so.
raven
@tallpete: Yea, it’s written by their drummer, Jacob Slichter. He’s actually from Champaign and went to Harvard major in African American Studies and he’s a gray dude! The book is very interesting including the fact that “Closing Time” is about Dan’s preemie baby and not bars!
Karen
They become conservatives because the media makes conservatives look like winners and heroes. The winners edit is an aspirational one: look what you can be if you join the winning side and look whose fault it is if you don’t.
Take it from there.
Karen
@Scotian:
I was thinking that this had some 2001 echoes and praying we learned by now. There were rumors that Nader had taken money from the GOP, not in 2001 but after that. I would not at all be surprised if it turned out that one of Sanders operatives took their money. Sanders is too much of a “true believer” to do that.
Zinsky
I think there is some truth to the observation that women get more radical as they age. I saw it in both my wife and my mother-in-law. But that isn’t always true for men, IMHO.
redshirt
The older you get, theoretically the more you have to lose. Anyone who’s a College Republican is an asshole from the start.
And John, I’m sure you won’t read this, but if you’re taking injuries from sleeping you need to re-evaluate your sleeping situation. Mattress, pillows, sleeping style, etc. You should not be getting hurt while sleeping, even if you’re getting older. OK, maybe you could, but not most normal people.
MBunge
What world is Steinem living in where men “gain power” as they age? Does she know any middle class men, let alone working class? The challenge for the vast majority of men is dealing with the loss of power, physical, social and economic, as they age.
Mike
mark
Damn John, you a one fine writer.
mark
Fear and Propaganda is how they are winning. The elimination of the Fairness Doctrine was a mortal wound. Watch the doc. “The Power of Nightmares” which explains the Republican evil con game perfectly.
mclaren
I think you mean “less reactionary,” John. Reactionary = conservative. Maybe you meant you tend to react more to injustice as you get older?
And, yes, John is a damn fine writer. Cole has a quality of no-bullshit straightforwardness that’s incredibly refreshing.
mclaren
@Parmenides:
The world I had at age 5 was a world where black Americans had separate drinking fountains and rest rooms, single women couldn’t write checks that got accepted at supermarkets, women had serious problems getting accepted into medical school or law school because “you wouldn’t want to worry your pretty little head with all that complicated stuff,” Latinos and asians were treated as people who should be seen and not heard, gays routinely got beaten up by the police because there was something wrong with those people and they needed to be taught a lesson, black people who moved into a white neighborhood got their windows smashed in and, if they didn’t get the message and move out toot sweet, got their house burned down, and it was a world in which the guy running the USSR banged his shoe on a podium while screaming “We will bury you!” and shipping nuclear missiles to Cuba so we could all run right up to the brink of World War 3.
That world fucking sucked.
2016 is so much goddamn better than the world I grew up in, there aren’t words to describe how much better it is.
When I was 5 years ago I was telling everybody we needed to wean ourselves off gasoline and oil and internal combustion engines, and we needed to get our asses in gear exploring space and stop spending on war and start spending on scientific research. Finally, 50 years later, the rest of you fuckers are finally catching up to me. It’s about goddamn time.
pacem appellant
@jl: In HS and college I was a glibertarian too. As a white male, I felt that affirmative action was wrong. The antics of the college protesters in the aftermath of CA Proposition 209 cemented my justification. Then I learned that religion was a sham. Then there was Bush v Gore. And the Internet bubble burst. And Bush’s response to 9/11. I never turned on a dime so fast. I cried real man tears when Kerry lost the election. I am so glad that who I in the 90s is not who I am now. I don’t regret anything, but damn I’m so glad that I was still malleable. I would be a much angrier lonelier man today if not for some real-life clarity. I strongly suspect that the Romneys of the world would really benefit from someone kicking the shit out of them and then denying them healthcare because they were useless at self defense. When they whined, they’d get fined $1M which would go directly to affirmative action scholarships. In my imagination, that’s the rich kid equivalent to what the rest of us deal with when we are thrown out into real world to fend for ourselves.
nancy, a/k/a nanzee
@Suzanne:
Wasn’t conditioning great?
And we had to work through how our ideas were slanted by that need for approval and validation of the male variety before we could get to where you clearly seem to be. I read your comment as a useful summation of the learning and thinking that I went through to process and choose my own direction.
nancy, a/k/a nanzee
I enjoy this John Cole guy’s writing. ;)
Chris
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class:
I’ve been taking the PoliticalCompass.org test every now and then for about ten years now, since I discovered it as a freshman in college. My basic political ideology was already formed – bottom left quadrant, i.e. more “left” than “right” and more “libertarian” than “authoritarian” – and hasn’t changed too much, but I do notice that I’ve steadily drifted further and further towards the bottom left.
I think my political attitudes haven’t changed so much as they’ve hardened. Coming out of college just in time for the Great Recession and watching the conservative movement completely lose what little was left of its fucking mind via the teabagger movement… have both made me far less patient and tolerant when it comes to politics. Ten years ago, I was still willing to sit down and talk with people across the aisle from me. Nowadays, I haven’t got the stomach for that shit.
Chris
@Pandemoniac:
I think the story behind this is entirely that for the last twenty five years, i.e. our entire lifetimes, the word “socialism” has had no meaning other than “what teabaggers and 1%ers call anything they don’t like [including, when it comes to that, other teabaggers and 1%ers].” When you define it that way, it really doesn’t sound so bad.
You know how conservatives say “you liberals stop need to calling racism on everything, because that cheapens the word”? Unfortunately for them, that’s what the word “socialism” has come to.