Sunday, November 23, 2008

The best next generation?

My generation gave the world Bill Clinton and George Bush.

The first was, and is, a brilliant man with deep flaws. The second is flawed to the bone.

Obama is effectively post-boomer. It couldn't happen soon enough. It's time for us boomers to quietly shuffle off onto our icebergs.

That's good news, but maybe there's even better news ahead (emphases mine) ...
Candace Gingrich: A Letter to My Brother Newt Gingrich

... Welcome to the 21st century, big bro. I can understand why you're so afraid of the energy that has been unleashed after gay and lesbian couples had their rights stripped away from them by a hateful campaign. I can see why you're sounding the alarm against the activists who use all the latest tech tools to build these rallies from the ground up in cities across the country.

This unstoppable progress has at its core a group we at HRC call Generation Equality. They are the most supportive of full LGBT equality than any American generation ever -- and when it comes to the politics of division, well, they don't roll that way. 18-24 year olds voted overwhelmingly against Prop 8 and overwhelmingly for Barack Obama. And the numbers of young progressive voters will only continue to grow. According to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning, about 23 million 18-29 year olds voted on Nov. 4, 2008 -- the most young voters ever to cast a ballot in a presidential election. That's an increase of 3 million more voters compared to 2004.

These are the same people who helped elect Barack Obama and sent a decisive message to your party. These young people are the future and their energy will continue to drive our country forward....
To borrow a very tired phrase, Generation Equality has skin in the game. If civilization endures they have a reasonable shot at a 100 year lifespan.

They'll see the arctic melt, they'll live with rising sea levels, they'll see the end of oil, they'll see human genetic modification and post-modern eugenics, they'll see America become a normal nation (we hope), they'll live in a world of ubiquitous machine translation of English, Chinese, Sanskrit, Spanish and a dozen other languages, they'll see the salvation of Africa (or else).

I sure hope they don't see artificial sentience, but they could.

It's all yours GenE. I'll help however I can, but probably the most I can achieve is to neutralize the more harmful members of my generation.

Enlightenment 2.0 is up to you.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Obama is not a Boomer. As many prominent experts have said: Obama is a member of Generation Jones. Jonesers were born 1954 to 1965--in between the Baby Boomers and Generation X. Google or go to GenerationJones.com or Wikipedia and you'll see that a consensus is emerging that Obama is part of Generation Jones.