Every once in a while social, cultural and political events converge in a year that changes everything. 1964 was one of those years. It was the year of the Civil Rights Act that prohibited race and gender discrimination. President Johnson said it would cost the Democratic Party the South for a generation. Seeing that it’s two generations since then and the Southern Strategy still dominates electoral politics, he gave people too much credit. 1964 was the year America began bombing in Vietnam. Contrary to the stereotypical Archie Bunker, the majority of the working class was opposed to the war which was most strongly supported by economic and cultural elites – a natural byproduct of the college exemption from the draft that placed the risks of war solidly on the poor and working class, just as they shoulder the majority of the risk today.
