Was Tim Russert the Un-Baby Boomer?

[hedgehog]

I was reading the article about Russert in Time Magazine, and it mentioned Father Sturm, the Dean of Discipline at Canisius High School. My brothers used to talk about Father Sturm. The more I read the article, the more I realized that Tim Russert was like me and unlike the stereotypical baby boomer in so many ways. He loved his family and made his family the center of his life. He valued education and hard work. He was seriously religious without being a fundamentalist. Obviously, he wasn't svelte. He wasn't cool.

In theory, I am a Baby Boomer. I grew up in a Buffalo suburb 4 years behind TIm Russert. I don't know much about the music of that era because I never had money for records or much time for the radio. My first inkling of Woodstock was the report that the Thruway was closed! Drugs? Who had the time or the money? Summer of Love? I was working babysitting and cleaning houses.

I think Tim represented an entire sub-set of Baby boomers which has been more or less ignored. To me, the standard image of a Baby Boomer is the epitome of selfishness. The Un-Baby Boomer is dedicated to others, to the commmunity. We were the children and grandchildren of immigrants who worked hard and tried to live the American Dream. We're still out here. I think that to me, Obama also represents the Un-Baby Boomer.

[JoFerret]

1. No

.

[iamahaingttta]

2. What the hell are you talking about?

There is just so much wrong with this OP, I wouldn't know where to begin.

George Walker Bush, born on July 6, 1946, is the Un-Baby Boomer. Russert was ultimately more like him than like me. So maybe you're right. Sick and twisted, but right.

So... Baby Boomers don't love their families? Fuck you! Baby boomers don't like brain-dead assholes!

[skooooo]

4. Why be so nasty about it?

can't you disagree without saying "fuck you!"?????

:wtf:

[SeaLyons]

8. ....

:rofl:

[endarkenment]

12. The OP runs up a huge broad brush smear, and gets insulted in kind.

Oh well...

It is hard to disagree nicely with somebody who starts out by saying 'all you boomers are a bunch of assholes, unlike St. Timmeh'.

Also, as a boomer, it is my opinion based on my own life experience that any theory that working class kids of my generation growing up in buffalo or thousands of other rust belt towns were not growing their hair smoking pot fucking their brains out and generally participating in the festivities is total bullshit. I'm sure there were exceptions, but not a whole lot. Most of the after the fact claims of 'not me' are in the category of what I call selective amnesia. 40 years later lots of my generation have gone and edited their memories.

[skooooo]

20. No it's quite easy to disagree nicely....

Boomer or not - you don't have to be so rude.

[JoFerret]

28. Agreed. Just say; NO (politely)

but firmly.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

5. ......

:spray:

[PoliticalAmazon]

ITA....It's insulting...

to imply that Baby Boomers aren't hard workers, don't value education, and don't value their family.

Once again, Tim Russert was not the Baby Jesus. Not every freaking thing he ever did was so freaking special.

One quality of Baby Boomers he seemed to lack, however, was the intense concern for the planet and ohers who live on it. His leading the MSNBC D.C. bureau in their media lemming endorsement of Bush's lies getting us into Iraq, and his leadership of his stable of journalists who mostly failed to challenge the Bush administration on their lies, fraud and failures, put his own security and future ahead of the rest of us.

Well, Tim Russert got his fame and fortune, and we are the ones suffering for it.

[Cha]

18. Good post..

Baby Boomers have a lot goin' on. I'm not even a Boomer..I think they call me a War Baby.

[skooooo]

22. Nothing more going on..

...than any other age group. Nothing more nothing less.

[Cha]

24. Whatever.

I was sticking up for them.

[skooooo]

29. ..np...

I just think you find pretty much the same types of people no matter what generation you look at. No offense.


:hi:

[Cha]

30. Right..good and

bad and in-betweeners. :hi:

[democrat2thecore]

11. "Fuck You"???? ......Here's a link you need to read

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x6380979

[iamahaingttta]

19. Appreciated...

Sometimes, however, one just has to be disagreeable.

Particularly when some random person on an internet discussion forum implies that you and just about everyone you know does not love his family, does not value education and hard work, and is the epitome of drug and music addled selfishness, even though we were also "the children and grandchildren of immigrants who worked hard and tried to live the American Dream."

Sometimes, you just gotta come right out and say it...

[skooooo]

21. Not appreciated.

You don't appreciate anything except lashing out at someone who has offended you. Maybe with a different approach, you could get your point across. Probably you just reinforced whatever stereotypes the person brought to the discussion.


Mission accomplished!!!!!

[iamahaingttta]

23. Yeah, whatever...

I think I'll go away from DU now, and listen to Blonde on Blonde. Again.

[JoFerret]

31. True

This kind of generational dispagement is such crap. It's like when we (if we were foolish) were to begin some sweeping sentences with some of the following:

1. Black women are...
2. Gay men prefer...
3. Older white men are...
4. Obama supporters all...
5. GOP voters do not support...
6. DU posters have no...

[JoFerret]

27. Yep. Time for that crap to die

Intergenerational generalizations are for the (very) ignorant.

[mix]

3. enough with the sentimentality

he worshiped the powerful and helped them lie; i'll take some anonymous drug addled hippie baby boomer any day over someone who helped bring shame and suffering to our country due to his own inflated righteousness

how was he dedicated to "others" or the "community"?

[ElsewheresDaughter]

6. exactly...he is Jack Welch's creation and the corporate wet dream...may he RIH.

[Arugula Latte]

7. I'm sorry, but this is an incredibly naive post. It sounds like a rightwinger wrote it, too.

Tim Russert -- unselfish? Yes, unselfishly doing Dick Cheney's bidding while raking in the big dough and doing what he could to push elections to the Republicans. Give me a break!

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

9. A lot of people confuse boomers with hippies.

As if everybody who came of age in the 60's was a hippie, and as if there weren't plenty of conservative young republicans in the same age group.

But I don't remember seeing somebody who claimed to be a boomer make that confusion.

[BeyondGeography]

10. He made $5 million a year, had a 6,300-square-foot vacation home and he died at his desk

I feel bad for the guy and his family, particularly his father, who now has to bury him, and he had a down-to-earth quality that was refreshing at times. But his "good works" were largely limited to his fraternity and he was a prisoner of the culture in which he participated.

[democrat2thecore]

13. You make some good points. Dan Rather was just on making many of the same points. -nt

[WinkyDink]

14. "The Un-Baby Boomer is dedicated to others"~~~Excuse me? Ever heard of the Peace Corps?

When I was in college (1967-71), sociology had more students than BusAd. Yes, "typical" boomers "valued education".
"Typical" Boomers protested the war; some of our peers were murdered by the National Guard on campus.
Sorry you were unaware of the Beatles, Doors, Stones, Led Zeppelin, and the whole British Invasion thing. I didn't think money or time was necessary to be AWARE. There were newspapers and TV, too. Work colleagues might have talked.

And my father, uncles, and grandfather worked in coal mines.

[kath]

35. and one of those injured by the National Guard died over the weekend.

where was all the mourning for him?

How many of the ignoramii know what happened on May 4, 1970?

[Captain Hilts]

15. No, like Matthews he felt guilty for dodging the draft and made up for it by slurping McCain. nt

[Captain Hilts]

16. I'm a boomer and I love my family and they're the center of my life. It's NOT UNtypical. nt

[polichick]

17. Wow, you have a very distorted view of boomers...

Not to worry ~ you can still do your homework and get up to speed. (Some of my personal favs are the many environmental and human rights orgs founded, run and supported by boomers.)

[July]

25. I grew up in South Buffalo four years behind Tim Russert.

And I can't disagree with you more.

One of the biggest myths about liberals and boomers alike is that we don't care about family, don't know how to work hard, and in general don't share the values of "real" (SARCASM) Americans.

Like most South Buffalonians, I had to work for everything I got, but unlike you I also enjoyed being a boomer -- from walking through Caz(enovia) Park with my transistor to soaking up the ideals of the civil rights movement and JFK's "ask not." I know plenty of working class South Buffalonians who worked hard, loved and still love their families, are religious (though I am not), and also (gasp) tried drugs, went to concerts, and had premarital sex. Yeah, selfish and not selfish, all at the same time. Go figure.

Tim Russert was famous, unlike most of us who lived in South Buffalo, but in all of those qualities of his that you claim make him an "Un-Boomer," he was very much like just about everyone I knew from that neck of the woods at that moment in time. We're all still proud of our immigrant roots, our experience of working to get ahead, and our love of our families, and many of us thoroughly enjoyed the times we lived in, which still shape our lives.

[hedgehog]

34. You misunderstood my OP.

The stereotypical baby boomer would not say "We're all still proud of our immigrant roots, our experience of working to get ahead, and our love of our families," Tim Russert displayed his pride for all to see, thus presenting a different image of us Boomers.

[July]

37. I don't think I did, actually.

I was responding, in fact, to the stereotype (I called it a myth).

[hedgehog]

38. Exactly - I maintain that the qualities assigned to TIm Russert

(I won't even go so far as to claim he had those qualities) are the very opposite of the qualities assigned to the stereotypical Baby Boomer. As such, he represented a lot of people born in that cohort who have nothing to do with the stereotype. Therefore, I suggested he was the "Un-Baby Boomer".

[PlanetBev]

26. I used to think that everyone my age grew up with my liberal mind-set

I am the same age as Russert was, but born and raised in Los Angeles. I'm sure it was a lot different than growing up in Buffalo, especially in the 1950's. I wouldn't necessarily say that Russert was an "Un-Boomer", as he seemed marginally hip.

Besides Chimp, the one who I really can't relate to is Sam Alito. I can't believe this guy is seven months older than me. I look at him and think, "Jesus Christ, didn't this guy ever own a roach clip?" :hippie:

[VolcanoJen]

32. Sorry you're catching so much flak, hedge.

I'm no Baby Boomer, but I found your post to be very thoughtful, introspective, and kind.

[hedgehog]

33. I had to be away for a while, but it's clear that a lot of people missed

the word "stereotypical" in the OP. Many, many many people in the baby boomer cohort worked hard, contributed to their community, loved their families. These are not values assigned to the stereotypical baby boomer (ever here the phrase "me-generation"?) I think a lot of people found Tim Russert attractive because he symbolized values that aren't often on display in the MSM.

[kath]

36. my response to this OP is

:wtf: :wtf:

welcome to my Ignorant List