culture

On January 20, like more than a million of my fellow citizens, I journeyed to the core of Washington, DC to witness the inauguration of President Barack Obama.  Unfortunately, the color of my ticket meant I would spend that frigid morning on a massive line in the Third Street Tunnel of I-395 -- the now-infamous "Purple Tunnel of Doom."

The crowd's initial excitement and esprit gave way to anxiety and confusion as the historic hour approached. 9 o'clock... 10 o'clock... 10:30... the time ticked by, and the line barely budged.  Finally, a once-orderly double- or triple-file queue became a mass of people streaming toward daylight-only to find that the Purple Gate had apparently been closed for hours, shutting out thousands of ticketed spectators.

I still do not know what exactly went wrong that day.  Unmistakable, however, were the looks of disappointment and dismay on the faces that streaked by as I ran to catch Obama's speech on TV in a nearby bar.  Although the occupants of the tunnel were a diverse lot, many were young people who had worked and volunteered for the Obama campaign and were therefore especially eager to witness the fruits of their labor.  It was sadly ironic that these Millennials -- the rising under-25 generation that proved so integral to Obama's electoral success and the groundbreaking nature of his campaign-were the ones being shut out.

In true blogger fashion, I've brought my laptop along to a conference we are co-hosting today on Confronting the Debt Culture.

It is a pretty compelling gathering for a couple of reasons. First off, the idea behind the conference is to raise the profile of the concept of thrift and all of the anti-thrift institutions that now prevade our culture. Secondly, the conference is sponsored by a really diverse set of organizations. It has been spreaheaded by the Institute for American Values, a group lead by David Blackenhorn which has mainly been known for its work promoting marriage. In recent years David has become a champion of thrift and has teamed up with other groups such as Demos, Consumer Federation of America, Public Agenda, and others.