bad economy of the 1970s and the "me decade"

One more reason to disrespect the work of Presidents Johnson, Nixon and Carter-- from Rich Karlgaard of Forbes.com as quoted in the WSJ...

Moreover, if he's correct at all about cause-and-effect, the Bush/Obama years could result in an even sadder turn of events-- in a time when we have less moral capital in many areas.

How did ordinary Americans cope in the 1970s? Many turned inward. Writer Tom Wolfe captured the decade's mood in a 1976 essay called "The Me Decade and the Third Great Awakening." Wolfe used the term "awakening" as satire....a national plunge into self-absorption.

These were the years of psychological analysis, self-therapy, the jogging craze and cults....The 1960s sexual revolution hit Main Street in the 1970s, and divorces exploded. So did sexually transmitted diseases.

What happened during the 1970s was that the first wonder of the world, human energy and creativity, got diverted from serious economic pursuits to trivial pleasure pursuits. Tax, regulatory and inflation hurdles made economic pursuits, on balance, too bothersome for too many during the 1970s.