The Latest Generation

Thoughts on a Friday night late in October, when Homecoming should be happening, but isn't.

Concerns about corruption depend on actual instances of corruption, which the Fourth Turning encourages by its nature. (Although people won't really be concerned about it until the First Turning starts - too much else going on.)

Credit Mobilier (1872) is one of the main inspirations for this idea of corruption found during First Turnings that started in the Fourth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crédit_Mobilier_scandal

As are the Valachi hearings (1963)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valachi_hearings

At some level, the McCarthy hearings, along with other investigations into Communist influences, can be seen as concerns about corruption as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army–McCarthy_hearings

Can't really talk about Corruption without mentioning the Bloodguard, for whom the Vow was everything, and anything that was not the Vow was Corruption. 

https://unbeliever.fandom.com/wiki/Bloodguard

Big Structural Change was always going to be part of the Fourth Turning. What will election squabbles have to say about what the next big changes might be?

On the 1929 Apportionment act, which has some practical justification, but is still a source of imbalance compared to the original goals for the federal government.

https://history.house.gov/Historical-Highlights/1901-1950/The-Permanent-Apportionment-Act-of-1929/

The "dogmas of the quiet past" line is from Lincoln's second address to Congress (i.e. the State of the Union) in December 1862.

https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/second-annual-message-9

An example of plans to limit the pardon power and others. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/506894-pelosi-plans-legislation-to-limit-pardons-commutations-after-roger-stone-move

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/23/pelosi-corruption-reforms-trump-420355

Countdown is a series of short episodes on the state of the world as the 2020 Presidential Election approaches. This first one considers some similarities to the Glorious Revolution and the American Civil War, and their status as markers of major structural change.

Why is Cobra Kai one of the top shows on Netflix? Why does it resonate? What does it say about where we are in this crisis? And how do similar themes show up in The Umbrella Academy as well? 

For more on the Kids These Days thing, check out one of the earlier episodes, So You’re a Millennial, which goes into my assessment of why participation awards exist and what they mean for the Millennial and (less so) Homelander generations.)

Perry Ferrell's comments about Jane's Addiction.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/nothings-shocking-meet-l-a-s-wildest-new-band-janes-addiction-101919/

Here’s a reddit thread looking at folks who watch Cobra Kai, and their ages.

https://www.reddit.com/r/cobrakai/comments/c1r3y2/demographics_of_this_group/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Outsiders_(film)

This exchange from Entourage  - specifically the “selling auto insurance in Reseda” - came to me multiple times over the last few weeks, but couldn’t find a way to shoehorn it into the final section.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0572403/quotes/qt0368292

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/duel

The Merriam Webster website defines Duel as:

: a combat between two persons

specifically : a formal combat with weapons fought between two persons in the presence of witnesses

The combats in Cobra Kai, for the most part, are not formal. While they do not include weapons as such, the martial arts training involved makes the distinction between weapon and person insignificant: It’s of note here primarily because dueling appears to be largely a First Turning phenomenon. The duel between Hamilton and Burr and the shootout at the OK corral in 1881 are two well known duels that match this. Hamlet, which also appears set in First Turning, features a duel that's really Laertes trying to kill the title character, and Romeo & Juliet (similarly) has a bunch of kids getting into fights and making trouble. 

And by the end, like many duels in fiction and in real life, there are repercussions that go far beyond. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Tyson

As mentioned in Gen X Job Seeker the Seventh, here's a spoken-word rendition of an essay I wrote. It was in response to a complaint about what people had done, or not,  during the time of COVID.

Original LinkedIn Article is here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/just-let-you-know-pat-bowman/

If you're looking for a generational perspective on it, well, just consider that this is the start of the peak of this Crisis, the period referred to by Strauss & Howe - when they wrote Generations in 1991 - as the Crisis of 2020

It's been a couple of months, and the job searching hasn't become any easier. Some ideas on why, and what it means and what I'll be trying next.

kaggle.com has solid tutorials on SQL, Python, Machine Learning and other topics.

My post on what's been going on for the last six months: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/just-let-you-know-pat-bowman/

Coalition for Clean Air: https://www.ccair.org

And Purple Air: https://www2.purpleair.com

What the heck - here's my LinkedIn profile

https://www.linkedin.com/in/thatpatbowman/

And again, I'm @generationalize on Twitter 

A rambling look at Molly's Game, the 2017 film by Aaron Sorkin, and how it works in the generational stories model.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molly%27s_Game

Hadn’t made it clear that this was Based On A True Story, or more precisely based on an autobiographical book by Molly Bloom.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molly_Bloom_(author)

Turns out that the prosecutor was Preet Brahara….

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preet_Bharara

I said Studio 62 at one point; it is of course Studio 60

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0485842/

This won’t make as much sense unless you take a look at my generational story framework

http://stories.generationalize.com

May need to start from the start, but here works well too

http://stories.generationalize.com/2015/12/four-stories.html

A look back at the sources of our current collective anger and why it is happening and options to consider with your personal anger.

(It seemed longer in my head.)

That old apocalyptic favorite, Yeats’ “The Second Coming”

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43290/the-second-coming

Heinlein’s Future History

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_History_(Heinlein)

Future Shock 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Shock

The frequently alluded to earlier episode is “Ep. 21 - Why So Angry?,” which was posted on the last day of 2017.

This is just for fun, with no real generational connection except that both Abraham Lincoln and George Lucas are from Prophet generations. (Boom for Lucas, Transcendental for Lincoln.) And, as such, it's not surprising that a similar arrangement works for both of them. 

If you like Star Wars and Aaron Copland, you may enjoy it.

Fun fact: George Lucas' birthday is May 14, 1944, which was the two-year anniversary of the premiere of Lincoln Portrait.

Here's where I found the quotations:

The first two are from different sections of a look back at The Phantom Menace:

https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-episode-i-the-phantom-menace-oral-history)

The "barbarians" quote is from testimony before the Senate in March 1988 - here’s the text I used, from Wikisource: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1988_George_Lucas_testimony_before_United_States_Senate

It’s not clear that he every actually said the thing about the sledgehammer, but it turns out the fourth section in Lincoln Portrait isn’t well sourced either. And in both cases, it's certainly something they might have said.

I originally found the last bit here:

https://www.biography.com/news/george-lucas-star-wars-facts

But it turns out it was from a New York Times interview of George Lucas while he was FILMING Star Wars in 1976. 

https://www.nytimes.com/1976/09/12/archives/from-american-graffiti-to-outer-space.html

It's well worth the read.