It's amazing that over the span of two decades, America went from this...

[RobinA]

117. My Benchmark

for decline is Apollo 13. I remember it well and followed it fairly closely, even though I was in elementary school at the time and had no particular interest in space. That thing was in dire trouble that stretched for days and we got it back safely. From space. To me as a youngster that meant there wasn't a problem the US couldn't solve. That was obviously naive as a generalization. Apollo 13 was happening at the same time as one of our greatest FUBARs, Vietnam.

But look what we have now. Rightly or wrongly, the impression one gets these days is that we couldn't save ourselves if trapped in a wet paper bag. On earth. It's all FUBAR with no Apollo 13 moments. Maybe it's what comes from being raised in the most optimistic of times in America. The optimism seems normal and the opposite seems a malaise. Maybe it was a blip that those of us born at a certain time thought was just the way things were.