I've been on this earth for many, many years and I've always been attuned to what is going on in the world. Probably,this is due to the fact that my parents were political people and active in the world around them. They came from a very small town in Ohio but were the grandchildren of Irish immigrants. My mother's family lived on a 1500 acre farm just south of London,O and my dad's dad was the town's only blacksmith. Horses were the mode of transportation in those pre automobile days so Grandpa was kept very busy. By the time I was born, both grandfathers had retired. Maybe because they were the families of immigrants they kept up with the world around them. The country was relatively new to them.
My first memories are of my mother getting a Maytag washing machine and Al Smith running for president. My dad schooled us on the events of the day and faithfully read the newspaper aloud to us each evening. I knew all about the Ku Klux Klan and Herbert Hoover and FDR, prohibition and anti-Catholic propaganda before I even went to kindergarden.
Some of the issues that were dealt with in those days are still on the agendas today and the ones that faded away have been replaced by more volatile issues. The KKK isn't heard about as much, not because of any solutions but because they just went more undercover. Prohibition was ended, not because it accomplished any good but becasue it spawned so much crime and so many gangsters that it was repealed. Anti-Catholosism is still alive and well but the rising distain and distrust of Muslims is taking over.
If you read today's paper you read articles on the very same things that were causing problems 80 years ago and will probably be with us for the next 80 years. If the country doesn't fall of its own weight in the next few years.
The media has pretty much taken over, and the internet and instant reports on everything is the rule of the day.
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