ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, December 2, 1996 TAG: 9612030042
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ERIK RANBERG
IN RESPONSE to Christopher Slone's Nov. 17 commentary, ``Clinton, Dole and the Madonna factor'':
Mommy syndrome, despicable. What America needs is a swift kick in the hind quarters. Leave the maternal instinct in all of us just there. Keep it out of politics.
You boomers are the cause of this whiny foulness. When Richard Nixon called you bums, he was right. When Japan's prime minister called Americans lazy, he was right. Your generation cost Lyndon B. Johnson a second term, cost this country Vietnam, and caused a moral decline and a massive bankruptcy in the responsibility department.
No other generation in America has spat upon its brothers as badly as you boomers. While your brothers were fighting for freedom and their country in Vietnam, the rest of you were draft-dodging, college-deferring protesters. You boomers took your freedom way too far in the 1960s and 1970s - freedom a majority of you will never appreciate the cost of. Yet, you still spat on your veteran brothers.
Bob Dole was right: Never has a generation been given so much and returned so little. Your self-indulgent, whiny and irresponsible behavior over the years has provided probably the worst example for young America to follow.
The offspring of you boomers is a fine example. Most 20- to 23-year-olds are still living with you. Why? Because they are listless and aimless, just like their drifting parents of the 1960s and 1970s.
You rebelled and whined, started careers and whined, then had kids and whined, acted irresponsibly and whined. When you couldn't get what you wanted, you whined, formed more unions, and whined some more. You have taught an entire generation of children - your children, the future of America - to pout and whine when they don't get their own way. You have taught them not to work hard, to look for the free ride. Form a union so you can get a grossly higher wage than you're worth. If life gets too hard, become a liberal and plead for government support. If you don't get the support, then blame Reaganomics.
You laugh? You did it. You started your careers, you financed and financed and financed, ran your credit far beyond your limits, divorced each other, and filed more bankruptcies than all other generations combined. When the economy went into recession, why? You overextended-credit boomers stopped spending. You overinsured and overlitigious boomers made it difficult for an honest, responsible person to get ahead. Then you went on strike, whined that you had to work two jobs, whined that $25 per hour wasn't enough. No wonder American industries went overseas. It cost too much to pay all you whiners, buy all your insurance, and pay all your whiny lawsuits.
America doesn't need a bridge to the future. We need a revitalization of the old work ethic, of faith and trust. If you had tightened your belts, dusted off your trousers or skirts and worked like your parents, we wouldn't need a national mommy.
Now those of us in the category of Generation X have difficulty getting ahead because you boomers screwed things up. Whatever happened to basic trust and the spirit of working together in faith and truth? Because of your overinsured and far too litigious nature, if a young person wants to start a business, that person needs a team of lawyers and insurance agents, and a bloody Equal Employment Opportunity Commission membership.
You can't find a work force worth a damn because your kids learned all your irresponsible boomer ways. The majority of them are undisciplined whiners who want a free ride. Most of them have a major identity crisis. I can't wait for you boomers to get to be 70 years old, have a bankrupt Social Security, and die in the streets.
The younger generations will not be able to help you because you forgot to teach the discipline that you rebelled against so well. The decline of America is entirely on your shoulders. It will take decades for us to recover.
We don't need a mother, we need a kick in the boomer.
Erik Ranberg of Roanoke is owner of a mapping company.
LENGTH: Medium: 73 linesby CNB