Keith Reichel:"I find it very difficult if not impossible to be saddened by the passing of a blowhard with a penchant for putting his career above the lives of others (women drowning in cars for example). His true legacy, for anyone who bothers combining memory and... intellectual honesty, will be that of the man who created the poisonous climate of judicial politics in which we currently reside. RIP indeed."  The summer of 2009 with the death Ted Kennedy and Robert McNamera marked the end of an era.  It was an era of great hope in the end tragic irony as servant viewed himself as master and steward viewed himself as owner.  There are loaded ironies as the early 1960s are placed into context of time and history.  The word that emerges in greater clarity is hubris a belief in self a belief in man's unlimited ability.

 Technology does have an effect on culture.  As technology explodes a belief in man's ability to conquer increases.  The time period from 1933-1963 represented a stunning remake of the world.  In 1933 flying the world's great oceans was something just beyond the grasp of man.  The bridging of the Pacific by air was 2-5 years in the future in 1933.  By 1963 jet engined airplanes were making the trip averaging nearly 4 times the speed and half the stops that the very first flying boats did.  The Atlantic ocean was not bridged until 1939 by 1963 trips across the North Atlantic were occurring in under 7 hours.  The belief of man's abilities to solve almost any problem would no doubt be shaped by the experience.  For a teenager and middle school student of 1963 you witnessed the dawn of the jet age.  The folly of the era a belief in man's ability to solve problems almost becomes understandable. 

Now lets contrast the life experience of that class member 1994 on a technological standpoint.  There are variety of angles that lead to a fundamentally cynical view of technology.  A science teacher at New Braunfels high school told his freshman class 1990-1991 nothing will surprise you.  Indeed in the course of a life time the freshman saw dial phones replaced by push button, the CD, the home computer becoming an appliance and becoming 20 times more powerful in the process.  You also the shift from tangible to intangible progress.  The Pacific's final barriers were being destroyed in the early 1990s as the A330, A340, 747-400 and the MD-11 were making transpacific non stop the rule.  LAX to Sydney non stop had become the rule not the exception.  Keith Reichel's class had seared into their mind the image of a teacher's fatal space flight when they were in 4th grade.      

The life experiences of those who made Camelot and those who were enchanted by the Camelot era stand in stark contrast to the children of those teens who loved the JFK era.  The early 1960s were removed from the Titanic disaster and were marked my technological triumph even the early teething of the 707 had been tamed.  The Challenger disaster showed that despite great technology man's stupidity can have explosive and fatal consequences. 

The buildings of an era reflect the core values and reveal the flaws of the Camelot era.  LBJ Library , National Air and Space Museum and the Windowless New Braunfels high school they reflect at a visceral level the folly that would be the great society and the tragedy of the Vietnam war.  New Braunfels high its original structure in the early 1960s most notably lacked windows.  The space is grand yet dehumanizing.  The great society deprived people of work and incentive to work.  The Great Society was the most destructive thing to happen to the African American family by providing a financial incentive for women to have babies out of wed lock and the a financial disincentive for men to be around you had a radical increase in single parent households and half brothers and sisters where the financial incentive was placed on the woman to breed and have dad go out of the house for another sexual conquest.

Ted and Robert McNamera are gone.  Robert McNamera sent men to their deaths fighting a war he felt they could not win.  From Dad's fortune to Chappaquiddick  even in death hypocrisy is the operative word of the life of Ted Kennedy.  The health care reform bill that bears his name would have denied him (Had he not been a senator the Chemo therapy that extended his life) the bill he pushed through to keep Senator Kerry's seat democrat was the law that removed a 1 Democrat senator from Mass.  The law championed by Ted had to be changed in Ted's name.  Heartlessness in the end was the hallmark of the Great Society.  It removed person to person charity and pushed in government officials who do not give a rats behind what about them.  While early in their life the impression of man as master was excusable the fact of the matter is they ignored rather systemically the data that showed otherwise and never in their long lives adjusted course.  On a visceral level their passing is like the destruction of mementos from a bad experience.   

Now in response to the boomer comment about lack of idealism.  In the wake a suicide, a stabbing and murder a different form emerged in the halls of Denton high Ryan Campus.  We are members of the human race individual moral obligation to help those who do not have remains.  It is not the grand ultimately hollow vision of the great society it is a humble chastised vision because I have been given I owe.  I must produce I must give.  Person to person the right donation to the right charity the right words of caring to a person who is down.  From macro to micro the vision is shifted.  The state can not replace personal moral obligation to each other.