Trust

A CNN poll, just in time for the 40th anniversary of Nixon's resignation, says hardly anyone trusts the government.

Just 13% of Americans say the government can be trusted to do what is right always or most of the time, with just over three-quarters saying only some of the time and one in 10 saying they never trust the government, according to the poll.

There is a mention of a generational divide with regards to Watergate, although it's marked at "older than 40" and "under 40." This is less a generational divide than a division between those who remember the time and those who do not.  Generation X would be those 53 or younger; Millennials 33 or younger. It's hardly a surprise that Boomers would consider Watergate a "very serious problem." Nixon was GI Generation, so they might have had his back, except that few are left.

A bigger question is whether the government can effectively continue with numbers like these. Go outside, find 10 people, and one of them will say never to trust the government. Not ever.  Only one of them - perhaps two - believes the government will usually do the right thing.   It makes clear that one serious possibility of this Crisis is a Jeffersonian revolution - not necessarily with as hopeful an ending as Jefferson expected.

And while trust is being discussed, take a look at Bitsy Bear. A young monkey isn't careful, and his parents lose track of him for a moment, so he naturally ends up kidnapped by a bear with a banana. Strauss & Howe mention "neurotic" as one of the negative attributes of Artist generations, and this sort of misplaced concern is probably how they end up that way.

Not that it's surprising that parents will be especially protective, even to a fault, during a Crisis.