As I tip-toe into the new year, I have a list of things I’d like to see in the next 12 months.
Here’s my list. Maybe you have one of your own.
1. A change of political heart throughout the country.
If you are my age, you lived through and remember several dark periods of American history.
There was the cold war, when people built fallout shelters and school children practiced getting under their desks in case the Russians nuked us while class was in session.
There were the 1960s. That was the decade when John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., were shot and killed.
And it was the decade of Civil Rights marches in the South, of firemen in Alabama turning their hoses on peace marchers and George Wallace advocating “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.”
It was the decade of the Vietnam War, where more than 58,000 Americans and untold thousands of Vietnamese were killed.
Then we had the 1970s, marked by Watergate, mistrust of politicians that lingers today and cynicism never before seen in America.
And, now, here we are in 2024, with regionalism and partisanship similar to what led to the Civil War. The attitude is “We disagree, therefore you’re a bad person.”
We have politics by labels, with Fox News and CNN setting the political discussion in the echo chambers of their evening broadcasts.
Haven’t we learned anything? America has existed and prospered for almost two and a half centuries because we, the people, have generally been willing to listen to each other and compromise so that most of us get some of what we want.
That attitude has flown out the window like a fleeing bird.
So, I’d like to see civility return to political and public discourse. Otherwise, we may be entering the final years of our Republic.
2. Kind of a stretch here, but work with me. OU is leaving the Big XII and going to the SEC. The Pokes are staying and might be the best team in the conference next year.
Bedlam football is no more, so how cool would it be if OU and OSU meet in the playoffs next year?
I’d like to see it happen. 3. I have been reading that Pentax is working on a new series of film cameras and may have them on the market this year.
I already have way more old film cameras than I need, but I ask you: what does ‘need’ have to do with it.
I hope Pentax goes ahead and makes the film cameras. I was a dedicated Pentax shooter for years and I would very much like to buy a new one.
It would be cool to know that part of the world has caught back up with some of us oldschoolers.