Steinhorn appeals for veneration of his generation without providing any actual evidence for his broad claims of "silent agitation." The feel-good Candide progress of the book from birth to 2006 speaks about the adolescent approach of our elders. As a student of history, birth dates, names, places and events matter to me, and Mr. Steinhorn fails to deliver on all those counts. The book is valuable to students of current events, thus 5 stars, as I highly recommend this book for anyone interesting in studying the logic of Boomer conceptions about themselves at the height of their political and social power. They have published much about themselves and for themselves, no one can argue differently, however this book is special because it covers nearly every intellectual habit of the generation. In that sense, it is a one stop shop opportunity. That is was produced by a liberal academic and political pundit for CBS and Fox News makes it particularly instructive. Mr. Steinhorn has indeed had a privileged position on the events of his lifetime.
Steinhorn posits a world where his generation brought the US out of the Dark Ages of GI generation tyranny. His clear bias and self congratulation for accomplishing everything is evident on nearly every page. While references for the counterculture of the 60s is drawn from GI generation contributors such as Betty Friedman, recognized as a forerunner of the Boomer's feminism in the 70s, no mention is made of Boomer feminists Catherine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin of the “porn is rape” movement of the 1990s. Friedman participated in none of the man-bashing of the Boomer feminists and this was their primary contribution to feminism in the 1990s when Boomers were firmly established in business and politics. Boomers ignored such growing problems as actual domestic violence and sexual abuse in our military and high-level politics and this narrative ignores these developments as well. There is no review of Clinton's Protection of Marriage Act or the Don't Ask Don't Tell rule for gays in the military. Conservative embraces like these are viewed as right-show wing propaganda even though it was a product of a Democratic Boomer administration. Polls show how liberal Americans are so election results and legislation must be invalid measures of public opinion.
Polls of many kinds are crucial to Steinhorn's presentation of the GI's unenlightened views on race, but only once does he ponder how such a barbaric cohort could have passed landmark civil rights laws, still on the books today, before most Boomers were old enough to vote, much less hold elected office. In his creative footnotes, he references Margaret Mead who explains that sometimes groups simply don't perceive the progress they are making. Ironic in light of Mead's own inability to know the difference between when children are playing games with a foreign visitor, and when she is in the presence of real anthropological data. Even writing during Bush's second presidential, Steinhorn sees conservatism in retreat. A willingness to corrupt the facts to fit the theory is one hallmark of this work and much Boomer intellectual output, but it is exactly that overt quality that makes this work important to later thinkers.
As far as the world outside the US, or after the GI/Boomer era, the foreign policy of the US is summarized as GI's got WWII, the Boomers got Vietnam, but no mention of any later wars or conflicts. Probably because this dichotomy is the only one that fits Steinhorn's model and it would not be helpful to point out that the Gis and Boomers were both devoted to violent military regime change when it suited their respective goals. The military after the Boomers is praised for their sacrifices but not for living history. Gen X and the Millennial, called Gen Y by Steinhorn, are simply historical extensions of the Boomers, or lots of little boomers. Steinhorn believes later groups simply have no “historical watersheds” through which they can be defined as anything else. Steinhorn seems to regret pointing out this observation as a self evident truth because he even notes that the exclusion causes tension between Boomers and later groups, but he resigns himself to the inevitable lack of value to youth experiences after the early 1970s. The Iran Contra Scandal, the Beruit bombing, Persian Gulf War I, Bosnia, nor 9/11 is viewed as historically significant as the events of the Sixties. Events after the Sixties did not impact later groups because the Boomers were on watch. This kind of intellectual elitism, myopia and ageism is ripe for further study. Highly recommended.
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