January 1 is the day the first Baby Boomers - U.S. citizens born between 1946 and 1964 - turn 60. Which means the days and weeks leading up to this momentous, ah, news peg, are filled with befuddling bloviations.

Such as those from boomer Alex Beam, who protests "No! No! I'm Not A Baby Boomer" in the International Herald Tribune.

Their parents fought the big wars, their parents created the most prosperous nation on earth, now here come the graying spongers, bent on retiring early, living forever and enjoying the "good life." That means bleeding entitlement payments out of their own children, consequences be damned. Never forget the boomers' mantra: I've got mine, and the devil take the hindmost.

Alex, Alex: Remember what Felix Unger said about the word A-S-S-U-M-E. Myself (and yes I'm a boomer too, born in '58), I don't plan on retiring early. It'd bore the living hell out of me. And despite what I've paid into Social Security, I'm not too keen on pretending we can prop up our nation's collapsing Ponzi Scheme of government entitlements for the aging. Something's gonna have to give - and that better include Medicare and Medicaid benefits. I'd like to get back what I've pitched in, but we're rather beyond that, now. Maybe they could just give me a National Parks admission pass, or something. I think there'll be room in my wallet, where an AARP membership card will never be taking up space.

The first baby boomers start turning 60 next month, and of course there is a rush to analyze What It All Means. Newsweek arrived early to the prattle-fest, blathering in a cover story about the boomers' "existential journey" and how they have "leveled the decades-old walls between the races... and the genders." Will someone please inform women and black people?

Yes Alex, exactly right. Poor oppressed blacks are still writhing under the jackboot of white boomer-controlled institutions, and one cruel manifestation of this is "disproportionality," the brilliant social justice theory which holds that a racial group's percentage of the population must be closely correlated with that same racial group's share of, well, everything else, from college graduates, to high-earners, to teachers to diabetes patients, and so forth. A close cousin of "disproportionality" is "racial disparities," which holds that all outcomes should be (wouldn't ya just know it?) racially proportional. If the numbers are misaligned, why, there you go: institutional racism, ipso facto! Nothing to do with choices people, especially parents, make. Nah.

Seriously tho, Alex: I guess it kinda depends which black person you ask, as indicated by some of the more than 200 comments on this Bill Cosby-related post of mine.

Maybe, Alex, you've got black people confused with the NAACP.

And actually Alex, with respect to your remark about women, maybe you just don't know any of the right couples, because in quite a few boomer marriages, the dads actually are pulling a lot of weight at home. Myself, I just got done reading a story aloud, putting the kids to bed, changing a light fixture, and scrubbing mold. This after fixing dinner and loading the dishwasher. Some of my heartless neo-con buddies here in Seattle pitch in the same way. From what you write, I'm guessing maybe your wife isn't so fortunate.

Alex continues, and finally hits the mark. Almost.

Here's what it all means to me: The continuing cultural hegemony of the boomers means that for the rest of my life, every time I turn on a radio, I run the risk of hearing the song "A Horse With No Name." Now there's a reason to move to Canada.

Awful song, you're right, Alex. Right down there with "In The Year 2525," by Zager and Evans. But, about moving to Canada: easy goin' there, Hoss. You don't even want to joke about that. First off, in Canada there's actually a family restaurant chain called The White Spot. Second, read what this gal has to say about Canada. Then, to avoid crappy boomer anthems, ante up for satellite radio. I hear there are some 70s stations playing really great tunes.

TECHNORATI TAGS: BABY BOOMERS, MEDICARE, MEDICAID, BLACKS, WOMEN, RACISM, SEXISM, BAD MUSIC, CANADA, WHITE SPOT, ALEX BEAM, INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE

Posted by Matt Rosenberg at December 22, 2005 09:57 PM

---