If I may compare and contrast:<\/p>\n
In The 50s<\/span>, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned that “we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence … by the military-industrial complex.\u00a0 The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”<\/p>\n In My 50s, President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney proved him right.<\/p>\n In The 50s, Americans turned on their televisions to watch the white-bread family fantasy “Leave It To Beaver” and the barely-repressed domestic violence of “The Honeymooners.”<\/p>\n In My 50s, Americans turned on their computers to watch television, and most of it was just as bad.\u00a0 Kim Kardashian, get off my lawn.<\/p>\n In The 50s, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash and Ray Charles launched successful careers with hit records and hard touring schedules.<\/p>\n In My 50s, musicians couldn’t make a living selling easily copied digital recordings and so they relied on heavy promotion and extravaganza tours.\u00a0 Top 40?\u00a0 What’s that?<\/p>\n In The 50s, my father shot home movies of my childhood antics on Kodak 8mm film.<\/p>\n In My 50s, Kodak went bankrupt.<\/p>\n In The 50s, “colored people” often lived in a part of town that white people avoided and, to a large extent, vice versa.<\/p>\n In My 50s, not much changed other than the names.\u00a0 At least we were fortunate enough to see Barack Obama move into that white house down the street from the Capitol.<\/p>\n In The 50s, I colored with crayons, played with toy cars, read World Book encyclopedias, and was often cared for by my kind and fun-loving Great Aunt Pearl, who would use her paring knife to slice off crescents of apples, calling out each slice by a dog-food name like “Alpo” so that I (pretending to be a dog) could crawl up to her knees and beg for the treat.<\/p>\n On this last day of My 50s, I remember Aunt Pearl, who shaped me, like a crescent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If I may compare and contrast: In The 50s, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned that “we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence … by the military-industrial complex.\u00a0 The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and … Continue reading