Is the American Dream vanishing or can we save it?

"I need to get personal here. Given the Senate hearings last week, I am trying not to spiral down through hopelessness and bitter cynicism about the end of the dream that was America. It is exhausting to keep your heart beating with the hope and trust that most Americans understand or care about how things stand today and realize what is slipping away.

"If you did not see a lot of the Senate 'trial,' consider yourself fortunate, as one feels fortunate when not looking at a gory car wreck. If you did, can you help me just not give up on this country right here and now? You can criticize me all you want for this post, or give me the usual platitudes and attitudes, but there has to be someone who understands and perhaps still has a lifeline to hope that they can share?"

***

One of my closest friends in the world posted this on Facebook Sunday morning, and I have literally been sitting here for an hour looking at her post and searching for an answer.

I've thought about Mencken and his 100 years that I've quoted so often, or about Sinclair Lewis and his character Buzz Windrip. But what I keep returning to is Benjamin Franklin and his answer to the person who asked what kind of government we were going to have.

"A republic ... if you can keep it."

When it comes down to it, there are really only two different types of governments -- authoritarian and non-authoritarian. It has always been a lot easier to be a citizen of the first type. You don't really have to think. You just follow the rules.

You obey.

That's all that is expected of you in that sort of society.

The shocking thing is that in many ways, we have been living in that sort of society for the last 35-40 years.

Maybe a lot longer.

I'm not sure there was ever a Golden Age. You look at things a lot differently if you're a white male of a certain age. I do know that during World War II, folks who ran companies made 14 times as much per hour as the average employee in those companies.

I know that in the 1950s, the top income tax rate for the biggest wage earners was 91 percent and that even after a major tax cut in the early '60s, the rate was 70 percent.


I know that at peak, roughly a third of American workers belonged to labor unions, including most of those in good manufacturing jobs. Unions made it possible for someone with a high school diploma to buy a house, support a family, buy a new car every few years, take yearly vacations and send their kids to college.

Back when we made things for the world.

We made things the world needed. Cars, appliances, steel, and workers from Michigan to New Jersey worked damned hard and took great pride in what they did. As long as they worked hard and followed the rules, they didn't have to worry about arbitrary firings or layoffs.

They didn't have to worry -- at least they thought they didn't -- about health insurance or retirement. Their unions negotiated those things for them as part of their contracts.

The problem was, though, that while working class people might tend to see their gains as a sort of new normal, the megarich tend to see things like that only as temporary setbacks. They're always looking to claw back some of what they lost.

And if there is one thing they don't want, it's employees who feel secure in their jobs and in their lives. The big bosses want to see their minions sweating when they walk into the room. When they say jump, there are only two appropriate responses.

You can jump.

Or you can ask how high.

Of course the entire world isn't like that. In the free countries of Western Europe, folks pay more in taxes and get far more in return. They get health care, retirement and at least four weeks vacation a year. If you look at it, life in France and Germany for working people is a lot like it was here in the '50s and '60s.

I have a feeling America is basically finished for the baby boomers. I've got three close friends who are past traditional retirement age and are all still working. Not so much because they want to, but because they need to. Two of them have had life-threatening illnesses.

They may end up working till they drop. Nearly half of all boomers have little savings and will have little to live on other than Social Security.

My friend Christine, who lives in Florida, actually had a pretty good idea. She suggested that four or five friends who were alone in the world could get together and rent a house together. Splitting expenses five ways could enable folks to live a lot better.

Will America get past all this?

Maybe, but our children and our grandchildren will have to work damn hard -- and fight even harder -- to get this country back to a place where everyone is in it together.

I don't know about your kids, but I'm betting mine can be a big part of the solution.