Part 1: The 1978 Midterms did not go so well either
The country had yet to find itself in the gutter, but it would soon enough
Much was predicted for the midterms last month. It was not as good as some hoped for…ok, that stunk, but suck it up. The American electorate has always had a problem with admitting electoral mistakes. 1978 was a year was such a year.
December 20, 1977.
The bus dropped me off around the corner and all the kids stepped out ready to face the hellish and filthy wind we had endured for two recesses. Some had to walk into it, leaning forward, others had the wind on their backs and could barely stand. That morning, we had dressed for Bakersfield winter, but were now gritty and sweaty from the Mexican wind that howled northward over the mountains at 190 miles-per-hour sandblasting windows and cars down to bare metal. We would endure it for another two days.
No one was home yet. The house was locked, so I went around the side and into the garage where I could hide until the folks got home. Beams of sunlight, for there was still sun the first day, made the brown fog in the garage twinkle. Silica. I was steeped in the Okie lore of the Dustbowl. Grandma was waiting out the same wind a few miles away, wisely covering her face with a moist towel. Dust pneumonia kills. Every horizontal surface was was mounded with dust. Our giant chest freezer, which held half a beef, dozens of fish, etc. (an inflation hedge), was a mattress of brown powder. Smaller surfaces, like the cables to my 10-speed, were stacked with dust to the angle of repose.
This was the kind of storm Grandma told me about, one that brought the apocalypse to mind. Bakersfield became a Mordor with oil fields and several good Basque restaurants. Thus 1977 ended ominously, a frightful start of those annos horribilis 1978 and 1979.
1977 didn’t start off so bad. Star Wars was released that spring and we all loved it. The nation was still still coming down from the sugar high of the 1976 bicentennial and the election of the totally different type of President; which seemed warranted after the trauma of Watergate, the 1973 oil crisis and the fall of Saigon. With Jimmy Carter the country thought it had elected a southern Mr. Rogers; sincere, redeeming and low energy. A few bright spots appeared. Atari released its video game system and NASA started practicing with the space shuttle Enterprise. Maybe things were getting better?
They weren’t. They got worse. A LOT WORSE.
INFLATION: 1978 was the year inflation launched again, but this time with gusto into the wild brown mists of the shit-o-sphere. The country entered 1978 with about 7.5 percent inflation and 6.5 percent interest rates. Inflation would reach over 11 percent by year’s and kept going.
After so many years of inflation, the American people expected inflation as normal, and “expectation” of inflation along with a loose monetary policy, is a tough thing to beat. Remember that giant dust covered freezer I mentioned? THAT was the expectation of inflation…which makes more inflation.
Murder: 1978 was the year of the serial killer. The serial killings of Richard Chase, Ted Bundy and the Hillside stranglers all ended in the first months of that cold winter. The details of their horrors would amplify the horrors to come. David Berkowitz, the Son of Sam caught in 1977, plead guilty. Jeffery Dahmer claimed his first victim.
Shortly after the 1978 midterm election, both John Wayne Gacy and Jim Jones had to end their careers in Democrat politics, mass murder being frowned upon and all. Poor Rosalynn Carter blundered into photos with them both.
Jones and Gacy were not mere groupies, but active and respected Democrat commissars. Especially Jones, whose People’s Temple could mobilize over 5,000 members and toss considerable money into local and state races. Governor Moonbeam himself paid homage to the Reverend. Jones’ message of religious Marxism was highly respected by San Francisco City Councilman Harvey Milk. Milk and Mayor George Moscone would themselves be coldly murdered only nine days after the Jonestown mass suicide in their own offices by a disgruntled former councilman.
The horrors of the year were eroding the American psyche. Slasher movies came into their own in 1978.
The infamous Star Wars Holiday special aired 17 November the day before Jonestown (the worst timing EVER). George Lucas has never lived it down. I was shocked at how bad it was as a 13-year-old…until the next day of course, when things got a little more real. Think twice before watching it. If you can’t gut-out an MST3000 movie, you won’t get through this steaming pile of cringe turds. Here is the link: Star Wars Holiday Turd.
Laws of consequence: Two important laws were passed in 1978, one that shook the nation from California and the other no one remembers but still affects us today. The voters of California were sick of being run out of their coastal homes by increasing property taxes, which were based on estimated value and could double or triple in a year: a tax on an unrealized gain. Howard Jarvis and his Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association promoted a state referendum called Proposition 13 which held property taxes to a small 1 percent per year increase. The referendum passed with 75 percent of the vote and remains the gold standard tax revolt.
The other law is less well known, but perhaps more consequential in both the short and long term. President Carter signed the Humphrey–Hawkins Full Employment Act just before the November election. The intent was to blunt the surging conservatives in the Republican Party. The act was a last Keynesian gasp to WILL the demand side into reducing inflation. It didn’t work just like the 20 or so times before. The market saw it for what it was and inflation soared. One provision of the act, which is with us today, is that the Chairman of the Federal Reserve is required to connect monetary policy with the President’s economic policy. In other words, the Fed Chairman, since 1978, has been and is still beholden to the President.
The Election: The Republicans only made modest gains in the midterm election. However, nearly all the gains were by conservatives, who were still fighting the old Nixon-Rockefeller types. Carter was especially shaken by the Republicans gaining 6 new governorships. Something was happening in the states; the peasants were not watching their PBS. The one Democrat who did win a gubernatorial race was Bill Clinton. The election compelled Carter, already a deficit hawk, to move to the center triggering an epic fight with the Democrat Left and the Kennedy wing.
How are the 2022 midterms related to 1978 midterms? The 1978 American electorate, though dismayed by Carter’s lackluster presidency, inflation and grisly events, was not ready to disown the Democrat Party. That would take two more years. The public still distrusted Republicans after Watergate it remained naive about detente, disarmament and the Soviets. 1979 would be worse than 1978. The nation would find itself in the gutter, demoralized, humiliated, cheated of its strength and inherent magnanimity.
The 2022 midterms were not so bad, they were just not a populist spasm that, somehow, we have come to think is normal. We will likely endure a recession in the coming year and certainly more international embarrassment. If 2002 is 1978, will 2024 be our 1980?
Part 2 will be about 1979….hooo boy, whatta year! I may write Part 2 after Christmas because it will be a downer for sure.
Post-crap: The Sex Pistols played their last show at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco in January 1978. The poor UK was worse off than us, so ugly music for ugly times by ugly people. But I quit caring about nihilism a long time ago.
Salve!
Great read. Thanks Harry.