The Beginning is Near

Not proud, wanting to be, just not feeling it. That sums up the mood of young adults in America these days. The numbers don’t lie, the youngest two generations are significantly less likely than older ones to say they are proud to be an American.

The moral failings of today’s America—the self-absorption, cold-heartedness, the mean streak, fear and loathing of foreigners, intolerance of difference, indifference to suffering—are plainly visible to all who choose to look. The youngest among us see it clearly while many of the rest of us divert our gaze.

Perhaps the aged are not as wide-eyed as their children and grandchildren, less anxious to see what’s in front of them, nostalgic for the way things used to be, longing to go back. The youngest generations have only ever known America as it is right now or was very recently, leaving them greatly disillusioned by what they are inheriting.

Maybe affluence dulls the senses of those with more yesterdays behind them. The U.S. economy keeps chuggi…