As pointed out "And the nation is in far better shape than it was between 1967 and 1974, when the Vietnam War was raging with far more intensity than the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, the economy was poor, hard drug use was skyrocketing,leaders were assassinated, and riots swept every major U.S. city."

And yet I recall the 60s as a time of great hope (that's from the other side of the Atlantic, but a lot of the same things applied, and that's the impression I have always got from American contemporaries).

So the question is, is it just a question of age, and of how getting older can bring you down, and that being young today still hopeful in the same way - or is it somethimg about the times themselves?