Fred Sneesby - Observations on Culture, Faith and Politics

Peace Now

July 27, 2008

An old friend is dying of cancer. At 58 years of age, she has jumped to the front of the Baby Boomer line and, for those of us in that age cohort, that is reason to pause. It is a stark reminder to those who grew up in the fifties and sixties that the journey of life has proceeded for the flower children. It is also an unsought opportunity to reflect on the decades that have passed since the days of cultural upheaval that we shaped and that shaped us. The world is different and so are we.

I don’t see that peace symbol that was so ubiquitous in the sixties around much anymore except when a Mercedes-Benz passes by. How many homemade placards that symbol adorned is hard to calculate, but the demonstrations alone were in the thousands through those years when a faraway war consumed more and more of the children of World War II veterans.

World War II was, of course, the Baby Boomers’ first impression of war. A noble fight against a great evil, a fight that was never much talked about by our fathers. My father, who jumped out of a plane behind enemy lines before dawn on D-Day rarely mentioned anything about what had probably been the most terrifying and significant experience of his life. Even with that silence, they were dubbed the “Greatest Generation” and their children learned the meaning of war however deep it was buried in their fathers’ psyche: that wars were horrors ordinary people would endure if the cause matched the sacrifice.

Maybe that was why Korea and then, our own war, Vietnam, never rang true. Maybe that was why millions of my generation protested against that conflict even while hundreds of thousands of my generation served their country in Southeast Asia. I don’t really know where my friend stood on the war issue in those years. A woman of great faith, kindness, and generosity, she is, I’m sure, reflecting about more sublime realities than her political development right now.

There was tremendous political struggle and challenge for every American during the years of the Vietnam War. It was a war far more unpopular than the war we are fighting now and it spawned powerful political movements that pushed a President to retirement and nominated an anti-war candidate, George McGovern, for whom I voted in my first vote in a presidential election. I was joined by a few others on the wrong end of a landslide victory by a singularly unimpressive politician who would soon resign in shame.

Many of those Baby Boomers will be voting again this year. I’m wondering how the Iraq War sits with them. I’m wondering what wisdom, if any, they carry with them from the Vietnam Years as seen through 35 years of reflection and experience. I wonder if they’ll be voting for George McGovern again.

If the enormous anti-war fervor of 1972 could not propel George McGovern into office, the comparatively puny anti-war sentiment of 2008 may not be much fuel for Barack Obama’s bid. He will need much more. In terms of waging war, John McCain may be fair more aligned with Boomers’ notions than Barack Obama. At a time of war, he has actually fought in a war. He will fight this war to win, but he will not fight it for nothing and Boomers know that. He will not waste lives and resources just to cling stubbornly to a foreign policy without an outcome. He and we lived through that sort of thing forty years ago. His staying in Iraq is not the same as Bush’s staying in Iraq.

The war, of course, will not be the deciding issue in November. It will, as in most elections, be the scary U.S. economy, an economy that is probably most scary to Boomers. I don’t know, yet, who has the advantage there.

The young and the new voters will be an exciting part of Election 2008. They will not be the deciding factor. The aging voters will. To the dismay of every other age group, the baby Boomers will dominate as always. My guess is that they will trend to John McCain regardless of how many times they shouted, “Peace Now,” forty years ago. My guess is that in risky times they will not take another risk.

That being said, the cynic in me sees the amount of money Barack Obama may have at his disposal following the breaking of his word on financing his campaign. The money advantage means a lot, a lot more, unfortunately, than principle or character or experience or leadership skills. Something for Boomers to think about as they rock on their porches this summer.