Rating: 
Summary: The birth of the America of today
Review: Frum's book covers areas not covered by the Bruce Shulman book, The Great Shift. Like the Shulman book, Frum points to Vietnam, in particular My Lai, as a milestone, when we discovered we weren't infallible, morally and otherwise. Was it any wonder that a high rate of AWOLers, deserters, and dishonourable discharges ran rampant during the 1970's? And like Shulman's book, Frum argues that it was the 1970's that made the America of today, not the 1960's.The sobering disillusionment of the law is covered in "The Law Is Crazy" section. The crime rate skyrocketed with the influx of poor blacks from the South to the urban North. Crime was named as the biggest fear Americans faced in the 1970's. The thing was, people who became victims didn't bother reporting it because they figured the law wouldn't do anything about it. Frum lists pride, guilt, and laxity in policing as the diseases that bred disrespect for law in that decade. The Dirty Harry and Death Wish movies were clearly responses to the crisis on hand, and it wasn't surprising, now that I come to think of it, of the many cop shows that aired, such as Columbo, the Rockford Files, Kojak, CHIPS, Hawaii Five-O, and The Streets Of San Francisco, during that decade. It was a cry for law and order, to use Richard Nixon's slogan for 1968. We got into a buying binge with the credit card from the 1970's, where despite being socked by the Great Depression, Americans figured as long as post-war prosperity continued, splurging was in. People could gain more material possessions and boost their status, and with inflation eliminating a little percentage of one's debt, why not spend now? "Self-denial was becoming downright irrational," according to Frum. The Energy Crisis: ah yes, in 1973 and later in 1978. We became more aware of our dependence on foreign oil and the realization that we only had a finite amount of natural resources, and that we would have to cut back or find some efficient method of fuel.
It was also that time that the Arabs were seen as the new masters of the world, as they controlled the oil spigot. The story of the detainment and release in France of one of the masterminds of the Munich Olympics massacre testifies to that. And along with the Arabs, came hijacking incidents, especially Entebbe. However, let's not forget liberation. There was also a sense of easing authoritarian institutions. In the case of law enforcement, it was bad, but in terms of religion, maybe that's what was needed to counterract the desertion of pews in both Catholic and Protestant churches. And sex? That was the most positive aspect of the 1970's right there. The mouthful of words POSSLQ (person of opposite sex sharing living quarters) has fortunately been changed to "significant other" of today. The taboo of living together out of wedlock was shattered. "Nice girls do" and "The day may come when we regard chastity as no more a virtue than malnutrition" were two quotes typifying that era. Too bad AIDS nipped that in the bud. Frum's book is a needed companion to Bruce Shulman's work. If I had a time machine, the Me-Decade is one place high on my place to visit.
Rating: 
Summary: Witty and irreverent, but not scholarly
Review: I read this book as part of a graduate school class in recent American history. When compared to the works of professional scholarship we read for class, this book lacks much. It is not written in a scholarly tone, based mostly on secondary sources, and has quite a few rather obvious grammatical and typographical errors (who proofread this thing!?!?) That said, however, I did enjoy reading this book. It is at times laugh-out-loud funny and its point-of-view is definitely different from most works of history, which tend to be left of center. I would recommend it for the layman who is looking for a good overview of Seventies history from a conservative viewpoint. Professional historians or students of history should probably look elsewhere.
| 
