He's got a piece today in The Cook Report, and in his piece today, he's very worried that America may have lost its nerve, that days of malaise have set in, much like in the latter years of the Carter administration in the seventies. In this piece he asks, "What happens When the Nation Loses Its Bootstrap Self-Image?" And he cites some polling data. He's a pollster, and he analyzes other polling data, and he says that 63% are confident that better days for their kids will materialize.
There are people that, no matter what's happening, think it's gonna get better. I can relate to it. I've told you many times. I can't pinpoint when, I can't tell you what the impetus is gonna be or what the tipping point's gonna be, but I, too, believe that. It's partially my genuine overall optimism. Folks, I really do... This may sound loony, and I've thought this for 10 years.
I really think the day's coming where we're gonna be shocked at people we call low-information, people we think aren't paying much attention, people who aren't really that informed. I think that some point they're gonna have had enough of this. Oh, 63% say it will not be. Okay, then there's a typo. "Sixty-three percent are confident better days..." All right. Okay. I take it back.
"Sixty-three percent are not confident of better days for their kids, and 53% say life will be worse for the next generation." Okay, so Charlie doesn't agree with me. I misread this. Well, I didn't misread it. There's a typo. Despite this, it is a feeling -- I'm not gonna deny that -- and there's faith. I'm not gonna deny that. I just think that, at some point, people are going to say, "Enough of this!"
Obviously it's gonna require some kind of leadership to spur this. It's just not going to happen on its own, although I even think that might happen. But it would really facilitated if there were an inspirational, can-do leader that popped up. Right now people are peppered with nothing but pessimism, and we've got a Democrat Party which wants us to believe that our better days are behind us, that this is it and, you know, "Bunker down with us!
"We're
gonna do the best for you that we can, but days of American
exceptionalism are over." Chuck Hagel, when announcing military cuts,
said, "We're not the dominant military power anymore. It just isn't
gonna be the case." And, yeah, the new normal is 9% employed. The new
normal is 92 million, 95 million not working. I mean, people are
bombarded with this every day, and for 10 years I've been waiting for
this. Honest to God.I don't know how else to describe it. For 10 years I've been waiting for this national awakening, and it's done nothing but worsen. There is nothing close to a national awakening, and I will be the first to admit it. The closest thing to it is the Tea Party, and so to what extent the Tea Party is gonna be successful politically in winning elections and having a majority of like-minded people in elective office, that's up for grabs.
We don't know that.
We know the Democrats are gonna lose a lot of seats, but we don't know what kind of Republicans are gonna replace them. If they're anti-Tea Party Republicans, then big whoop. If they're pro-Republican establishment, who just think it's what it is, the government's gonna get bigger, stay big, and we're just gonna be in charge of it now, then big whoop.
I'll take it, getting rid of Democrats, but it could be better if Tea Party types -- conservatives is what I mean -- end up winning. So Charlie Cook: 63% are not confident of better days. Fifty-three percent say life will be harder for the next generation -- and that's, sadly, probably true. (interruption) Well, but why get out of bed? I'm talking about attitudinally. I'm not talking what's possible. I'm talking about the national attitude that's been impacted. (interruption)
We are a nation of sad sacks, but look at what the sad sacks are bombarded with every day! I mean, normal food that they eat and drink can kill 'em, and for how many years have they been hearing this stuff? Now for five years they've been hearing what a reprobate country we've always been -- what an unfair, unjust country and how we've gotta make things right and balance what's been wrong for 250 years and so forth. It's a never ending assault on people's sensibilities.
Let's add the way they're being educated, and what they're being taught from the youngest ages about this country.
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