David Hoffman: 'This Ordinary Man Didn't Get The Sexual Revolution'

Source:David Hoffman- I'm sure this man has a name, but I don't know who he is.

"My subscribers have been asking me to, on occasion, post a complete interview without edits. This is one. The person asking the questions is my co-executive producer on my television series on the 1960s. The interview was conducted in 1989 as part of 180 interviews we did for that series. My idea was to talk with ordinary people from all political and social stripes about their experiences of that time."

From David Hoffman

Not surprising that anyone who is older than the Silent Generation ( Americans born in the 1930s, generally ) and in some cases members of the Silent Generation didn't get the 1960s Sexual Revolution.

Pre-1963 or so, America was a Phyllis Schlafly, Beaver Cleaver, Ozzie and Harriet Utopia: "hi honey, "I'm home" wasn't just a popular 1950s sitcom phrase, but what most of America was about as far as relationships between American men and women: man worked and paid the bills: woman stayed home and raised their kids. Of course Americans were having sex pre-marriage back in the 1950s and even before that, but they didn't talk about that. They didn't live with each other pre-marriage. They didn't have kids pre-marriage. Americans tended not to talk about their sex lives in public.

Starting in the 1960s, America started changing dramatically because you had all of these Baby Boomers ( Americans born in the 1940s and 50s ) entering, graduating high school, entering college, and graduating college. These Americans were tired and bored with their parents and grandparents America and wanted to live their own lives. Listen to their own music, watch their own movies and TV, party with their own people and go to their own parties. And perhaps the most divisive aspect of the 1960s having to do with military service where you had all of these Baby Boomers who didn't feel the need to enter the military and didn't believe America should be involved in other countries civil wars. Which is what the divide about the Vietnam War was.

So of course if you came of age in the 1950s and you're weren't a Beatnik, ( 1950s Hippies ) you grew up in an America that looked almost like a different country than what America looked like by 1965 or so. It looked like two different large, developed countries where one America looks more like Saudi Arabia and the other America looks like a free society where everyone is essentially free to be themselves and live their own lives, to do their own thing and not feel the need to be like people who are older than them, just because that's how American life was before.  

You can also see this post on WordPress.

David Hoffman: 'The 60s Hurt America- Says This Brilliant Conservative'

Source:David Hoffman- Unknown man, but looks like Robert Kuttner from The American Prospect: who would never be confused with any actual Conservative.

"This is another clip from interviews that I conducted for my PBS television series, Making Sense Of The Sixties. It was recorded in 1989. The speaker was a professor and writer."

Source:David Hoffman

I think we need to careful about throwing out political labels when we get into the discussions in these debates and perhaps first figure out what we're talking about here and then see if the label conservative or liberal fits here. Instead of labeling everyone on the Right as a Conservative. And everyone on the Left as a Liberal.

Because as the guy in the video said: "liberal today, doesn't mean what it use to mean and even what it meant in the 1960s." And the same thing with conservative, as the guy said: "a Conservative use to be about protecting the free market and being a cold warrior against communism." And I would add to that not someone who believes that everyone should be the same and live the same lifestyle and even use big government to force a certain way of life onto everyone. That America is a republic and free society, not some theocracy or monarchy where everyone is supposed to be the same.

As far as the 1960s: like every day decade the 60s had its ups and downs. What I liked about it was the individualism and America finally saying goodbye to Ozzie and Harriet and Beaver Cleaver's 1950s America ( thanks to the Baby Boom Generation ) and Americans were finally free to be Americans. Whether you're on the Far-Right or Far-Left in America, or somewhere in between just about every American wants the freedom to be themselves and to make their own decisions in life. Instead of Big Government or some national cultural authority telling us what it means to be a real American and Patriot and what it means to be moral. That instead our morality should be judged by how we treat each other. Not about how we live our own personal lives and personal decisions that we make.

Being an American to me as a Liberal, is about being an individual and respecting not just my own freedom, but the freedom of every other American just as long as we're not hurting innocent people. Instead of judging people's morality and patriotism based on how often they go to church. Or whether they had sex before they got married. Did they live with their partner before they got married and did they even have kids before they got married. Do they gamble, drink alcohol, smoke, that sort of thing. And instead we should judge people's morality and patriotism by how we treat each other. Not just the people we say we like and love, but how we treat people in general and we do respect their rights and freedom as mush as our own, or not.

And for me at least the positive aspect of the 1960s along with the civil rights movement, women's rights, and gay rights the new individualism that came about for all Americans regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, or religion was what was great about that decade. Along with music and movies that came out during that decade. What wasn't good about that decade and the negative aspects of the 1960s was all the violence including the War in Vietnam, but all the violence and what at times at least looked like anarchy in this country with big, great cities like Detroit, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles all blowing up because of rioting.

Some have argued that there were justifiable reasons for all the violence in that decade because of high poverty, crime, and racism: but people who argue that should understand that all of that anarchy from that decade is how Richard Nixon becomes President in 1969 and how we get Watergate just a few years after that. And my question for them would be was all the violence from the 60s worth having President Richard Nixon, and escalation of the Vietnam War, and Watergate?

So what was great about the 60s was all the freedom and individualism of that decade where social movements that looked radical just 5-10 years earlier and even Un-American with people on the right-wing believing that these movements were started by Communists and other radicals, now becoming mainstream in America just 5-10 years later: the civil rights movement, antiwar movement, the music and movies, the hippie movement from that decade. With all the violence from that decade being the broccoli for dessert and giving the country a real sour taste in their mouths.

You can also see this post on WordPress.

David Hoffman: Video: What The 1960s Did To America

This post was originally posted at The New Democrat on WordPress

The 1960s was truly a revolution for American culture and politics. We go from a very conservative collectivist period from the 1940s and 50s to a period where all sorts of groups of Americans were standing up and demanding their freedom. And the freedom to live their own lives for the very first time in their lives. And from that sense at least the 1960s was a very positive time with so many new Americans now wanting and obtaining freedom over their own lives. And a bad time for the conservative establishment that wanted to keep things as is.

The 1960s you have the civil rights movement which was very positive. And not just for African-Americans, but for Latin-Americans, women of all races and ethnicities, as well as gays. And for Americans of all backgrounds now being able to live their own lives the way they want to. And no longer feeling the need or having to live the lives of their parents and grandparents. The 1960s you also have the anti-war movement which led to America finally seeing that the Vietnam War was wrong and that we couldn’t win it.

The negative aspects of the 1960s was of course the violence. We lost two great political leaders in John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. We lost two great civil rights leaders in Martin L. King and Malcolm X. The rise of crime in that decade, the rioting and division of that decade. Things fifty-years later we’re still going through and haven’t recovered from. But revolutions tend not to be all peaceful. There tends to be some casualties in revolutions and the 1960s was no exception to that.

We go from a very stagnant and status quo decade of the 1950s to a revolutionary decade of the 1960s. Where not a lot of new things seemed extreme, except to the establishment that again wanted to keep things as is. Because they benefited most from that America and also believed that was the way for all Americans to live. And if America had to do all over again I believe it would and that it would’ve needed to be done. Because of all the Americans who were denied freedom in America simply because of who they were.

David Hoffman: 'Hippies Remember The Glory Days'

Source:The New Democrat

If you are familiar with leftist publications like Salon, The Nation, The American Prospect, AlterNet, TruthOut and I’m sure I’ve left some other out and the Occupy Wall Street movement and what is left of it today, go back to the 1960s and you’ll see where the members of that movement come from today. Students For A Democratic Society, the counter-culture movement and the anti-war movement and even anti-capitalist and wealth movement of the 1960s are the parents and grandparents of the Occupy today.

They were called the New Left back and people with this really far-leftist mindset at least in America are still the New Left today. People who were not only against the Vietnam War which a lot of the country who was a lot more politically mainstream back then was also against. But they were against the liberal democratic establishment in general. Not the Democratic Party necessarily, but the liberal values that govern America then and today and what the country was founded on. Mostly as it related to our military, law enforcement and foreign policy, but also our economic and political systems.

The New Left coming of age in college in the 1960s decided they didn’t like America at least how the country was governed and founded. And put together a movement to not only get us out of the Vietnam War, which I would’ve been against back then as well as today. But they wanted to destroy our system and how our country is governed. And replace it with something a lot more social democratic, that is the democrats who were in this group. I mean if you look at Occupy today and then look at the New Left of the 1960s, they are the same people ideologically and culturally and believe in the same things.

Joe Pyne: Joe Pyne Interviews Jack Anderson- April, 6, 1969

Source:Richard Remembers Joe Pyne- investigative journalist Jack Anderson, talking to Joe Pyne in 1969.

"JACK ANDERSON is the author of Washington Expose, and has some startling things to say about politics and politicians." is the description on the film can, courtesy of Hartwest Productions, Inc.  Dated April 6, 1969. Joe Pyne." 

From Richard Remembers Joe Pyne

Jack Anderson was a Washington columnist and a watchdog of Congress and wrote columns and did investigations with his partner Drew Pearson about what they saw as potential Congressional corruption. And I guess Senator Thomas Dodd of Connecticut was one of Mr. Anderson's victims. Senator Dodd was accused of political corruption, by using his own campaign funds for his personal use. As Joe Pyne said in the video Senator Dodd claimed poverty, but as Anderson said "the man lived like a millionaire". And the Senate agreed with that and censured the Senator in 1967.

You can also see this post at The Daily Times, on Blogger.

My Footage: This is Adlai Stevenson

Source:The Daily Journal

Adlai Stevenson running on what would later be known as the Great Society in the LBJ Administration. He wanted to expand the safety net in America and perhaps even go further than the Great Society and social insurance and even create America's first welfare state. Where the Federal Government would become primarily responsible for taking care of the welfare and well-being of the people. Which is what the New-Left of the late 1960s and early 1970s wanted to create in America. But when Adlai ran for president in 1952 and 56, he was basically running on what would be called the Great Society. Government guaranteed health insurance for the elderly and the poor. And more Welfare for people who were struggling in America.

There wasn't ever any real shot of Adlai defeating a very popular Army General in Dwight Eisenhower who commanded allied forces in Europe and defeat General Eisenhower for president in 1952. Or much of an opportunity for Adlai to defeat a popular president in Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. What I believe was the real motivation for Adlai running for president in 1952 was to expand the progressive movement and to give Progressives real issues and policies to run on against then Vice President Richard Nixon in 1960. And in that case Adlai's 1956 presidential campaign was pretty successful. Because then Senator Jack Kennedy ran on those social insurance and economic issues when he ran for president in 1960 and defeated Vice President Nixon.