Decade of Nightmares

[Dave Monroe]

Jenkins, Philip.  Decade of Nightmares:
   The End of the Sixties and the Making of Eighties America.
   New York: Oxford UP, 2008.

Why did the youthful optimism and openness of the sixties give way to
Ronald Reagan and the spirit of conservative reaction--a spirit that
remains ascendant today?

Drawing on a wide array of sources--including tabloid journalism,
popular fiction, movies, and television shows--Philip Jenkins argues
that a remarkable confluence of panics, scares, and a few genuine
threats created a climate of fear that led to the conservative
reaction. He identifies 1975 to 1986 as the watershed years. During
this time, he says, there was a sharp increase in perceived threats to
our security at home and abroad. At home, America seemed to be
threatened by monstrous criminals--serial killers, child abusers,
Satanic cults, and predatory drug dealers, to name just a few. On the
international scene, we were confronted by the Soviet Union and its
evil empire, by OPEC with its stranglehold on global oil, by the
Ayatollahs who made hostages of our diplomats in Iran. Increasingly,
these dangers began to be described in terms of moral evil. Rejecting
the radicalism of the '60s, which many saw as the source of the
crisis, Americans adopted a more pessimistic interpretation of human
behavior, which harked back to much older themes in American culture.
This simpler but darker vision ultimately brought us Ronald Reagan and
the ascendancy of the political Right, which more than two decades
later shows no sign of loosening its grip.

Writing in his usual crisp and witty prose, Jenkins offers a truly
original and persuasive account of a period that continues to
fascinate the American public. It is bound to captivate anyone who
lived through this period, as well as all those who want to understand
the forces that transformed--and continue to define--the American
political landscape.

http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/HistoryAmerican/Since1945/?view=usa&ci=9780195341584