1968

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I was three years old during convention season back in 1968.

If I watched it back then I don't really remember what was said.

But I was listening to Tom Brokaw talk about that convention.

"If we think we have problems now," he said. "We're forgetting what '68 was like."

RFK and MLK had been murdered.

The civil unrest back then makes what is happening now seem like a pillow fight.

Blacks were elbowing for their basic human rights.

Viet Nam was a confusing war.

Richard Nixon chose Spiro Agnew.

We survived.

It seems like everywhere you go these days you hear about people being angry.

1968 was even worse...or so says Brokaw.

He spoke about it being his very first convention. He wondered if it would be his last.

"And think about it. A matter of months later we were unified as Americans as man walked on the moon."

We will be unified again some day.

I do believe that.

Viet Nam is in the rearview mirror. It's a scar on America.

We did survive.

Today we have Black Lives Matter, Blue Lives Matter and All Lives Matter.

We will survive this as well.

I'm not quite sure how.

But surely we will unify in love and kindness to one another.

Won't we?

Tom Brokaw believes it to be true.

He watched us ride out the storm in '68.

He reminded us all that it was worse back then.

"I've never seen things so bad," one guy said to me the other day.

Well, we've been there.

We just forget it.

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