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Donald Trump and his supporters may be waging battles against the press, immigrants, voting rights, the environment, science,social welfare programs, Planned Parenthood and what they label political correctness and the deep state.

But to them these are mere skirmishes in a muchlarger conflict. The president has essentially declared an all-out waron the American 1960s.

What he and his followers hope to do is not necessarilyturn back the clock to the 1950s, but rather restore a socialorder, value system and real America that they believe was hijacked by the liberal culture,politics, thought leaders and policy priorities that emerged from the 60s.

An October 2016PRRI surveyfound close to three-fourths ofTrump voters and white evangelical Christians bemoaning anAmerican society and way of lifethat to themhaschanged for the worse since the 1950s. Donald Trump has become their cultural and political reset button.

To be sure, no immigration policy orinsistence on saying Merry Christmaswill reinstate the 1950s in America. A nation that was87 percent non-Hispanicwhite in 1950will be 47 percent in 2050.Seven in 10 Americans claimed church membershipduring the 50s, butnow just20 percent of millennialssay churchgoing is important andalmost40 percent say they have no religious affiliationat all.

But while the president and his supporters cant reverse demography, they are trying through rhetoric, symbolism, policy and politicsto resurrect an iconic post-World War IINorman Rockwellversion of what itmeans to be authentically American.

To them, the 60s undermined what was good and virtuous in America. In their sepia-toned view of our history, it was atriumphant military,a white working class and aconceptionof nuclear families, moral values andsuburban bliss that made America great.

In this America wesaluted the flag, revered the police, attended church, trusted authority, respected traditionand veneratedsturdy, stoic,upstanding lunch pailheroeswho earned theirAmerican dreamwithout griping or government assistance.

Its not that religious and ethnic minorities are absentfrom this history they gave America character, after all and we all need to show our melting pot tolerance. But how nice it was that they knew their place, didnt get too uppity and honored the primacy of Christians and whites who, the story goes, steadied and builtthe United States.

America was much more of a community before the agitatorscaused all the problems, wasnt it?

Then came the 1960s.And it was then that the so-calledagitators pointed out that those charming Levittown havens just like theTrump apartment complexes had no welcome mat for blacksand thosegood middle-class occupations excluded women.

It was a generation that questioned God, fled the church, disparaged conformity, upended gender roles, asserted black powerandcriticized the military for Vietnam and thepolice for brutalizing civil rights workers, killingAfrican-Americans and bullyingantiwar protesters.

It also was a singular moment in our historythat codified into lawpersonal privacy rights and a womans rightto control her own fate. It would begin our long cultural march to rethink masculinity andlift the taboo from same sex relations. It also launched an environmental movement that said yes to the Earth and no to thesmokestack.

In the 60sour moral compass pivotedfrom judgmental scrutiny of ourprivate lives to an examination of our collective and individual capacity for prejudice, bigotry and discrimination. Minorities, previously considered Americas outliers, became central to our historical narrative. We passed civil rights and immigration laws that changed the complexion of mainstream America and who showed upto vote.White men would no longer control Americas storyline.

For many, the 60s redefined patriotism away from flag waving and military mightto the pursuit of equality and justicefor all. It was an era that celebrated an unbowedpress forrooting out corruption, uncovering secrets and pointing out where our democracy had fallen short.

Whereas the 1950ssanctifiedunfettered capitalism as a rebuke to communism and symbol of freedom, in the 1960s many began to eyeitwith a new skepticism as corporations pumped pollution into riversand produced carsunsafe at any speed.The economic and cultural fulcrum also began its shift from the factory floor to the college campus and with it camethe realization that brains and not brawn would define our future and builda stronger America.

The 60s also challenged a shibboleth of the 50s: that if you worked hard you could succeed, but if you didnt succeed it was because you didnt work hard. Liberals led byMartin Luther King Jr. and Lyndon Johnson argued thateven the hardest of work didnt free millions from the chains of history, and so they turned to government to level the playing field and cushion the hard blows of misfortune.

To many white men who saw their own sweat and labor yield suburban happiness and middle-class fruits and seemingly unconcerned that the same opportunities werent available to all government elites werecreating a protected class at their expense.

The 60s bent the river of American history and now Donald Trump and his own silent majority are doing everything in their power to bend it back.

On immigration, race, voting rights, womens rights, religion, cultural issues, public schools, higher education, social programs, business, labor, coal, the environment, the news media, the white working class,themilitary and the police,virtually all of his policies, pronouncements and tweetsare aimed at restoring what Steve Bannon has called thevery kind of 1950s valuesthat made America great.

Perhaps that is what President Trump meant in hisJuly 2017 speech in Warsaw, Poland, when he dedicated his presidency to counter forces . . . that threaten over time to undermine these values and to erase the bonds of culture, faith and tradition that make us who we are.

Its often said that Trump is fixated on undoing everythingPresident Obama accomplished. But in truth its not the Obama legacy hes undoing. Its the 1960s.

See more here:
Donald Trump's war on the 1960s - Salon