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[Martin Eden]

44. The Vietnam War alienated a generation eager to ask what they could do for their country.

Despite the Cold War, America was on top of the world in 1963 with a young president who inspired a new generation with the spirit of progress for an even better future.

The war in Vietnam transformed that spirit into distrust, anger, and rebellion. The counterculture produced some amazing things and broke down barriers that needed to go, but ultimately the bright promise was lost. Drugs, disillusion, and a disconnect from our own government laid the foundation for what has followed.

FDR was the last of the New Deal Democrats. His Great Society and his presidency were casualties of his own poor judgment getting us mired in a war that claimed more than the lives that were destroyed.

I was 6 years old when JFK was assassinated, and 10 when MLK was taken. Vietnam and Civil Rights were the two issues that defined the awakening of my political consciousness. We've made progress on Civil Rights and still have a long way to go, but the military industrial complex Eisenhower warned us about has strengthened its grip.

Very little of the progress we still hope to achieve will happen as long as our treasury is drained to finance a military machine and a foreign policy that only serves to perpetuate war for the benefit of arms merchants, multinational corporations, and the politicians who serve them.

This is now the biggest issue that defines my political consciousness. It is imperative that we take back the Democratic Party from those who will serve to perpetuate the status quo.