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Thread: Save Us, Millennials?

  1. #1

    Default Save Us, Millennials?

    Save Us, Millennials

    By TIMOTHY EGAN


    When an electorate is red-faced and fist-clenched, when the collective national blood pressure is 160 over 100, when the big issues of the day are mired in tired minds, it’s time to turn to the great, renewable resource of any vibrant democracy: the kids.

    The millennials, that echo boomer generation born after 1982, have not been heard from of late, ever since proving that they could pull away from their Facebook pages long enough to help elect a president.

    The young were Barack Obama’s strongest supporters, and still are, though there’s been some slippage. They were wise beyond their years and ahead of every other generation on the major issues — from offshore oil drilling (not so fast), to gays in the military (duh), to tolerance of the new American ethnic stew (you mean that’s still a problem?).


    But having done their part for history, and now facing a job market that is forcing many of them to become reacquainted with their childhood bedrooms, the generation born to all those baby boomers has become somewhat invisible.

    We’ve been led to believe that the grumpy, the cranky and the bitter will drive the midterm elections in the fall. You would never know, with nightly images of jowly Tea Partiers and their inchoate discontents, that people ages 18 to 29 years old made up a larger percentage of the 2008 electorate than those over 65.

    Because they gave their hearts to Obama, by an overwhelming margin, the young have a proprietary interest in this president. And now, at Obama’s moment of peril, when people who are losing their heads want him to lose his, we need the cooler minds of a generation that grew up with endless wars and color-coded terrorist alerts.

    If anyone should be complaining about deficits, it should be the 20-somethings who will have to pay for all those meds-popping boomers moving into the comfort of Medicare and Social Security.

    If anyone should be upset over two long wars that were put on the credit card, it should be the generation shedding the most blood in those conflicts.

    And if anyone should take personally the poisoning of a vast ecosystem in the Gulf of Mexico, it should be the one cohort of the electorate that showed the most skepticism of oil companies and the strongest desire for a new green economy.

    Instead, at a time when most Americans described themselves as “angry,” the generation now entering adulthood is keeping their trademark optimism. A recent, detailed survey of their attitudes done by the Pew Research Center was headlined: “The Millennials: Confident. Connected. Open to Change.”

    Those are precisely the character traits needed for this age, and all the more reason why Obama should engage these voters for the upcoming election.

    For starters, consider what it would be like to have Mitch McConnell, the dyspeptic Republican from Kentucky who emerges from his turtle shell every two weeks to say no, as the next Senate majority leader. Or John Boehner, who called expansion of health care for 32 million Americans “Armageddon”— running the House.

    Let Boehner take away from millions of fresh-minted adults the provision in the new law that allows dependent children to stay on their parents’ health insurance until age 26.

    Or look at the exhausted fight over gays in the military. More than any other generation, millennials see this as a nonissue. But a week ago Senator John McCain threatened a filibuster to keep gay men and lesbians from being able to openly serve their country in uniform. He is a man of his age.

    Can we just press the fast-forward button a decade or so into the future, or have McCain debate his eminently more sensible daughter, Meghan?

    Nor are the millennials afraid of immigration — in part because it’s a family issue. Nearly one in four Americans under the age of 18 have at least one immigrant parent, according to a recent national portrait put out by the Brookings Institution.

    “This is the most diverse generation in history,” said Heather Smith, the president of Rock the Vote, a nonpartisan youth political advocacy group. “They’re also optimistic, and don’t participate in all the fear-mongering.”

    Obama could rouse this generation to help save the oil-choked gulf, much the way Franklin Roosevelt did with his youthful Civilian Conservation Corps. While still holding BP accountable, the president could set up a millennial corps of workers, calling on their sense of service, their desire for change, their youthful belief in restoration.

    Besides, with news that George W. Bush is now on Facebook, what better time to leave the digital den?
    http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com...illennials/?hp

  2. #2
    The article was not well-researched, but it has a glimmer of truth.

    -------------------------

    we need the cooler minds of a generation that grew up with endless wars and color-coded terrorist alerts.
    ORLY? Very poor writing here. I would say Vietnam was an endless war.

    More than any other generation, millennials see this as a nonissue.
    They are too uneducated and/or unwilling to understand the pros and cons.


    Nor are the millennials afraid of immigration — in part because it’s a family issue. Nearly one in four Americans under the age of 18 have at least one immigrant parent, according to a recent national portrait put out by the Brookings Institution.
    And how many of those immigrant parents are hopelessly uneducated from Central / South America? How many are illegals? How many of those children are actually under 10?

  3. #3
    God, I forgot what a bad writer Timothy Egan was. He starts out one article saying that deficits should concern 20-somethings, then says 20-somethings should hate Republicans for not wanting to increase deficits to give them free healthcare.

  4. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    God, I forgot what a bad writer Timothy Egan was. He starts out one article saying that deficits should concern 20-somethings, then says 20-somethings should hate Republicans for not wanting to increase deficits to give them free healthcare.
    You seem to be the only person here who thinks anybody is suggesting free healthcare for everyone. Fair healthcare is not free.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  5. #5
    Indeed, it's not free. You need to tax-away a chunk of the economy, and borrow against another chunk of the economy until it goes pop.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    Indeed, it's not free. You need to tax-away a chunk of the economy, and borrow against another chunk of the economy until it goes pop.
    So when do you expect the UK or Canada to burst under the weight of healthcare?
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  7. #7
    I was a senior when 9/11 happened ('84). Didn't grow up with endless wars and color coded terrorism levels, we grew up without the TSA, and the terrorists were made out to be home grown insane wackos (Oklahoma, unibomber, Columbine)
    We were already grown up. The generational gap was our elders screaming for the blood of an enemy few people could pin point, much less understand. We grew up without war, the shock came when the old farts wanted so badly to make war.

    It shows too.

  8. #8
    Let Boehner take away from millions of fresh-minted adults the provision in the new law that allows dependent children to stay on their parents’ health insurance until age 26.
    They are also the biggest entitlement generation. TWENTY SIX IS EIGHT YEARS AFTER THE AGE OF MAJORITY! You mean you can't find a job in eight years? Graduate when your 18. Degree takes four years (not needed for health insurance btw, I have plenty of co-workers who have great benefits who have never completed a college degree) And your out at 22. The majority of full time jobs provide a benefits package with health insurance.

    I laughed at my friend who is 27 (still living with mom, still hasn't gotten a degree) saying at least the Obamacare bill didn't help him any.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    They are also the biggest entitlement generation. TWENTY SIX IS EIGHT YEARS AFTER THE AGE OF MAJORITY! You mean you can't find a job in eight years? Graduate when your 18. Degree takes four years (not needed for health insurance btw, I have plenty of co-workers who have great benefits who have never completed a college degree) And your out at 22. The majority of full time jobs provide a benefits package with health insurance.

    I laughed at my friend who is 27 (still living with mom, still hasn't gotten a degree) saying at least the Obamacare bill didn't help him any.
    I can't wait for you to get laid off. Then maybe you'll have a reason to consider how much Jesus really loves you.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  10. #10
    Interesting. Digs at the author, the article, war, immigrants, healthcare, insurance....but no Millennials commenting how they see their role in the future, or if there's optimism?



    I think your idea that we're all optimistic is not quite right though. Many of us are seriously scared of how much damage will be inflicted on us before we have the ability to take charge and fix things. We're concerned that when we do finally acquire some economic stability and enough political clout to really control things, we will be at war with half the world, in debt well past our ability to do anything other than default, and so affected by global warming and other environmental damage that the other problems won't matter.
    Comments are closed now, with only six chosen highlights.

  11. #11
    I am fundamentally optimistic as long as people like people like Timothy Egan and other large chunks of the NYT editorial board lose many intellectual debates. Otherwise, we're doomed to be sclerotic nation.

  12. #12
    This wasn't intended to be about the NYT's editorial boards, or who wins/loses intellectual debates.

    Look who's grumpy and cranky.

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by GGT View Post
    Interesting. Digs at the author, the article, war, immigrants, healthcare, insurance....but no Millennials commenting how they see their role in the future, or if there's optimism?
    I'm curious on how the political landscape will look in 10, maybe 20, years. Younger people are more likely to be more liberal, and thus fall more in line with democrats. Considering the shit economy, how few of them are likely to evolve into a more republican line?
    Is this conservative, glenn beck type of, landscape something we only have to wait out? You know they see it, its why Texas went full retard with their textbook direction; they are losing recruits at a pace like never before.
    Last edited by Ominous Gamer; 06-05-2010 at 05:00 PM.

  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    I am fundamentally optimistic
    And that is why you will always be wrong.
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    I'm curious on how the political landscape will look in 10, maybe 20, years. Younger people are more likely to be more liberal, and thus fall more in line with democrats. Considering the shit economy, how few of them are likely to evolve into a more republican line?
    Is this conservative, glenn beck type of, landscape something we only have to wait out? You know they see it, its why Texas went full retard with their textbook direction; they are losing recruits at a pace like never before.
    Well hopefully as they age and get more wisdom they will realize the folly of big government.

  16. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    the folly
    Is that one of dem dar college wurds? We dun' take kindly to book lurnin' round these here parts, boy, them's be aye-lee-tist speak
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    Well hopefully as they age and get more wisdom they will realize the folly of big government.
    ...have you, or any people like yourself, in fact ever voted for a President that has reduced the size or influence of the government overall* in the last 25 - 50 years?

    *Note that this is key. Removing one government program or shrinking it in size during your Presidency is not making government smaller or reducing its influence if you also institute additional programs that expand its size and power.
    . . .

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    I'm curious on how the political landscape will look in 5, maybe 10, years. Younger illegals are more likely to be more stupid, and thus fall more in line with socialists.
    Fixed.

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by agamemnus View Post
    Fixed.
    Illegal aliens can't vote genius.
    . . .

  20. #20
    He's been listening to Rand Paul, no biggie
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  21. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    I'm curious on how the political landscape will look in 10, maybe 20, years. Younger people are more likely to be more liberal, and thus fall more in line with democrats. Considering the shit economy, how few of them are likely to evolve into a more republican line?
    Is this conservative, glenn beck type of, landscape something we only have to wait out? You know they see it, its why Texas went full retard with their textbook direction; they are losing recruits at a pace like never before.
    Actually, I suspect more will become conservative. The Republican line will change, and many people in their 20s will get less liberal. It's a pendulum; this generation of 20somethings is already getting aware (and sick) or the rampant government spending and intrusion into a variety of activities. That said, the Republican antipathy towards things like gay rights and immigration will have to evaporate to get the next generation of voters.

    Glenn Beck is a spark for some people, but the fire goes in different directions. He's just the blowhard who stirs things up in the debate.

    PS- Slow mo nation failure:

    JUNE 5, 2010, 5:00 AM ET

    Number of the Week: U.S. Debt Nears Key Threshold

    88%: Gross U.S. public debt as a share of annual economic output.

    There’s little doubt that the U.S. needs to get its mounting debts under control. But at what point do they become a clear and present danger?

    By some measures, we’re reaching that point about now. As of Friday, our total national debt – the sum of all outstanding IOUs issued by the U.S. Treasury – stood at a bit more than $13 trillion, or almost 90% of our projected gross domestic product for 2010.

    The 90% level is significant, because recent research by economists Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff suggests that once a developed nation’s debt crosses it, its annual economic growth tends to be about one percentage point lower. At a time when economists are saying it could take years for the U.S. to bring unemployment back down to pre-recession levels, that percentage point could make a big difference.

    To be sure, the concept of the 90% threshold isn’t without its critics. Princeton University economist Paul Krugman, for example, notes the U.S. last crossed the threshold after World War II and did experience slow growth, but the problem wasn’t so much the debt burden as millions of women leaving the paid workforce. And in many cases, such as Japan, slow growth could be the cause of the debt burdens, not the other way around.

    Thresholds aside, there’s no reason to be sanguine. Back in the 1950s, we had a good excuse to be indebted: We’d just fought to save the world from fascism. And a large chunk of our debt was held by our own citizens, much like Japan now — one reason economists think that country has managed to survive with a gross-debt-to-GDP ratio of more than 200%.

    This time around, the roots of our indebtedness are very different. We’re borrowing to bail out consumers who took on too much credit and couldn’t pay, and to support social-security and Medicare systems we can’t really afford. We’re able to do this because financial markets have maintained a surprising faith that we will eventually get our spending under control, and because the dollar’s role as a global reserve currency has kept our borrowing rates unusually low.

    The travails of Greece demonstrate the hazard such easy borrowing terms can create. After Greece adopted the euro, markets began to treat it more like any other European economy, allowing it to borrow at interest rates nearly the same as Germany or France. That, in turn, helped Greece get into much deeper debt trouble than it would have otherwise. As a result, it now has to implement austerity measures that will likely yield much deeper economic pain.

    So far, markets have given the U.S. a longer leash. The danger is that we’ll hang ourselves on it.

    http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2010/...key-threshold/
    Last edited by Dreadnaught; 06-05-2010 at 11:24 PM.

  22. #22
    Actually, I suspect more will become conservative.
    Sarah 2012, you and me buddy
    In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
    The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

  23. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    Actually, I suspect more will become conservative. The Republican line will change, and many people in their 20s will get less liberal. It's a pendulum; this generation of 20somethings is already getting aware (and sick) or the rampant government spending and intrusion into a variety of activities. That said, the Republican antipathy towards things like gay rights and immigration will have to evaporate to get the next generation of voters.
    The only person I've seen successfully fall into this description is.... you; and I think you understand the forum's collective WTF on this rather recent shift.
    and thanks to the Tea Party I don't see the current angle on gay rights and immigration changing in the Republican party soon enough to save the party in 10 or 20 years.
    Last edited by Ominous Gamer; 06-06-2010 at 02:46 AM.

  24. #24
    Millennials will be in charge one day. I hope they keep this supposed Optimism and Can-Do Spirit. And question our involvement in two wars that can't really be "won", that we can't be the world's police; how to deal with longevity and healthcare; our dependance on dirty fuel; the environment and Green Things....

    And that they don't get stuck in the Small Gov't is Best, just because it's small. Better would be great. And strive to make government more practical and effective, along with private corporations and individuals.....accountable and fair.

    At some point they might figure out the way to have their heads in the clouds but their feet on the ground. And make moderate work.

  25. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    The only person I've seen successfully fall into this description is.... you;
    How many US people do we have in that demographic on the forum right now? Dread, Loki, you, Being, and me are the ones that immediately jump to my mind, among the really frequent posters. Kane would be. Ogre. Knux I think, isn't he still in school? Decoymilk?

    Tear, Chalooobi, GGT, Lolli, Bitter and Wiggin are all definitely 30+. Ziggy, Minx, Rand, Nessus, Lor, Spawnie, Hazir, Khend, Gogo, and Crazy Ivan are all outside the US and also over 30 in a number of cases. I keep getting Termite and Timbuk confused, one or both are over 30 and one is Aussie. Lewk and wife are over 30 I think, but neither thinks in the direction that would support your claim anyway. Veldan Rath is looking into adoption atm so I think he's over 30. Ditto on age for Baltic. I think Unheard of is European.

    So, taking into account the people who are actually being referenced, the people in the first paragraph and possibly the questionable people in the second one like Lewk, you think Dread is the only one go potentially bucking the "liberal youth" trend, particularly if we assume a relaxation in the conservative lines regarding issues like immigration and gay rights?
    Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"

  26. #26
    You're off by a few decades for Being, a decade for Baltic (though he's European, surprisingly enough from the Baltic states), half a decade+ for wig, and I think half a decade for Lewk. Ogre I believe is in his 30s. So that leaves you, me, Dread, Wiggin, Lewk, and OG. Out of us six, Lewk has definitely become more right-wing, as did Dread and myself. I can't recall whether you or wig where ever more to the left, but both of you are around the center now. That leaves only OG who remained a lefty, and we all know that OG is representative of humanity.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  27. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    The only person I've seen successfully fall into this description is.... you; and I think you understand the forum's collective WTF on this rather recent shift.
    and thanks to the Tea Party I don't see the current angle on gay rights and immigration changing in the Republican party soon enough to save the party in 10 or 20 years.
    Actually, you're among those who have gotten more dogmatic with your views over the years. They have only shifted in the direction they already were.

    Among several of the friends I see day to day, I've noticed a very distinct shift in the other direction from which they came. Things are still being reconciled with the hard-left and de-facto-socialist values we were educated with, but it's very noticeable when people grunt about debt, paying for social security that we'll never benefit from, etc.
    Last edited by Dreadnaught; 06-06-2010 at 01:51 PM.

  28. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    You're off by a few decades for Being, a decade for Baltic (though he's European, surprisingly enough from the Baltic states), half a decade+ for wig, and I think half a decade for Lewk. Ogre I believe is in his 30s. So that leaves you, me, Dread, Wiggin, Lewk, and OG. Out of us six, Lewk has definitely become more right-wing, as did Dread and myself. I can't recall whether you or wig where ever more to the left, but both of you are around the center now. That leaves only OG who remained a lefty, and we all know that OG is representative of humanity.
    I see I'm gonna need to request a NDA from anyone I might have a personal conversation with from now on.
    Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
    If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?

  29. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy View Post
    Lewk and wife are over 30 I think
    Lewk is around 25 I think...
    . . .

  30. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by Being View Post
    I see I'm gonna need to request a NDA from anyone I might have a personal conversation with from now on.
    I meant you were 15.
    Hope is the denial of reality

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