Unit VI- U.S. Cultural History 1970

1
Unit VI- U.S. Cultural History 1970s, 80s and
90s

• Chapter 36
• Sections 1, 2 and 3

2
National World War II Memorial

• That generation who brought us through the Great
  Depression then on the very heels of one
  calamity, the bloodiest war in our nations
  history, truly they were our greatest generation.
  The National World War II Memorial, the first
  national memorial dedicated to all who served
  during World War II, will honor all military
  veterans of the war as well as the citizens on
  the home front, the nation at large, and the high
  moral purpose and idealism that motivated the
  nation's call to arms. It was a war of such scope
  and high importance, as Gore Vidal called it --
  The Good War.
• The World War II Memorial will be located on the
  National Mall in Washington, D.C. at the Rainbow
  Pool site at the east end of the Reflecting Pool.
  This is between the Lincoln Memorial and the
  Washington Monument, and is a prominent location
  that is commensurate with the historical
  importance and lasting significance of World War
  II to America and the world.

3
Korean War Veterans Memorial

• From 1950 to 1953, the United States joined with
  United Nations forces in Korea to take a stand
  against what was deemed a threat to democratic
  nations worldwide. At war's end, a million and a
  half American veterans returned to a peacetime
  world of families, homes, and jobs - and to a
  country long reluctant to view the Korean War as
  something to memorialize. But to the men and
  women who served, the Korean War could never be a
  forgotten war.
• The passing of more than four decades has brought
  a new perspective to the war and its aftermath.
  The time has come, in the eyes of the Nation, to
  set aside a place of remembrance for the people
  who served in this hard-fought war half a world
  away. The Korean War Veterans Memorial honors
  those Americans who answered the call, those who
  worked and fought under the trying of
  circumstances, and those who gave their lives for
  the cause of freedom.

4
Korean War Veterans Memorial

• As you approach the memorial, the first things
  you see are the nineteen soldiers on patrol
  heading up hill. The use of Juniper bushes in the
  field is to show the rugged terrain they met. The
  ponchos that each is wearing can only give you a
  hint as to the miserable weather they faced. The
  soldiers at the front of the patrol represent the
  first soldiers sent to the Korean peninsula. Many
  of the first soldiers were ill equipped and ill
  trained yet they persevered. American soldiers
  faced foul weather, rugged terrain, poor
  equipment, not to mention 54 divisions of
  communist Chinese soldiers but in the end they
  were able to overcome all these obstacles.
• The soldiers represent a unit on patrol. There is
  much to see in the field, most of which is not
  readily apparent to the average visitor. The
  original design of the memorial was to have 38
  statues to represent the 38th parallel. Most of
  the fighting occurred along this line but due to
  space limitations the number of statues had to be
  cut in half.
• The highly polished surface of the wall of faces
  reflects all nineteen soldiers producing a total
  thirty-eight figures. It is not just the Army
  represented in the field. All four branches of
  the United States Military have representatives.

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Korean War Veterans Memorial

• .
• If you look in to the faces of the soldiers you
  will notice that they represent all different
  races. Even though the United States had a very
  segregated society, the armed forces had begun to
  integrate units. Visitors to the memorial are so
  awe struck by the soldiers, that before they know
  it they have missed the other parts of the
  memorial. Along the north side of the memorial is
  a low stone wall, on which are engraved the 22
  countries that made up the United Nations forces
  in Korea. Not all the nations participated
  militarily. Several contributed much needed
  medical supplies and personnel. These 22 nations
  felt strongly that their freedom was also being
  threatened, and was willing to help in whatever
  way they could.
• Along the south side of the memorial is the wall
  of faces. When the wall is viewed from a
  distance, the faces form the outline of the
  rugged hills that are a dominant part of the
  Korean landscape. The images depicted on the wall
  were taken from actual photographs of soldiers,
  sailors, marines and airmen who participated in
  the conflict. The faces along the wall represent
  the support troops it took to keep our foot
  soldier in the field. We do not often think about
  those who are behind the front lines. It is
  somewhat ironic that one of the best-known TV
  shows about war, MASH, takes place in Korea and
  is about doctors and nurses in the Korean War.

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Vietnam Veterans Memorial
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial consists of three
main elements. The Wall, the first part of the
memorial to be erected, was dedicated November
13, 1982. Today 58,235 names are inscribed on the
wall. The wall includes the names of deceased and
missing. The goal of the memorial was to allow
all people to reflect on the price of war and to
honor those who served.
7
Three Servicemen Statue and Vietnam Womens
Memorial

• Some initial reaction to the Wall included
  opinions that it did not appropriately honor the
  veterans of Vietnam. As result of this debate a
  compromise was reached and in the fall of 1984,
  the Three Servicemen Statue, by Fredrick Hart,
  was placed near the wall. The Vietnam Women's
  Memorial rounds out the memorial. Designed by
  Glenna Goodacre, the statue honors all women who
  served in Vietnam. The Women's Memorial was
  dedicated Veterans Day, 1993.

8
Nuclear Disaster

• In the early morning hours of 26 April 1986, a
  testing error caused an explosion at the
  Chernobyl nuclear power station in northern
  Ukraine. During a radioactive fire that burned
  for 10 days, 190 tons of toxic materials were
  expelled into the atmosphere. The wind blew 70
  of the radioactive material into the neighboring
  country of Belarus. Almost 20 years later, the
  people of Belarus continue to suffer medically,
  economically, environmentally and socially from
  the effects of the disaster. These are the facts
  The Accident The Chernobyl power plant is
  located on the border area between Ukraine and
  Belarus. The explosion of the reactor at
  Chernobyl released 100 times more radiation than
  the atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
  (1) At the time of the accident, about 7
  million people lived in contaminated territories,
  including 3 million children. About 5.5
  million people - including more than a million
  children - continue to live in contaminated
  zones. (2)Thyroid cancer, Leukemia, Childhood
  diseases, Cancers, Birth Defects, Genetic
  mutations and Heart disease.

9
Space Shuttle Program and Challenger

• Missions
• STS-1 4/12/81 - 4/14/81Shuttle
  ColumbiaFirst Voyage into SpaceThe first space
  shuttle mission was designed to test the vehicle
  by sending it to orbit and landing safely. The
  mission was a success, and started a new era in
  the U.S. space program.
• 11/12/81 - 11/14/81Shuttle ColumbiaFirst
  Scientific PayloadThe second shuttle mission was
  the first to carry a scientific payload, a number
  of Earth sensing devices. It was also the first
  time the Remote Manipulator Arm (seen in the
  photo) was successfully used.
• STS-7 6/18/83-6/24/83Shuttle
  ChallengerFirst U.S. Woman in SpaceSally Ride
  (pictured) became the first American woman to fly
  in space. This was also the first shuttle mission
  to fly with a five-person crew.

John Glenn
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Accidents

• 1/28/86Shuttle ChallengerThe Challenger
  TragedyTragedy struck when the Challenger
  shuttle exploded 73 seconds after liftoff. The
  explosion claimed the lives of the entire
  seven-person crew, including Christa McAulliffe,
  who would have been the first teacher in space.
  The explosion was later determined to be caused
  by an O-ring failure in the right solid booster
  rocket. The accident forced an immediate
  suspension of the shuttle program.
• 2/1/03Shuttle ColumbiaLost Space Shuttle
  ColumbiaMinutes before touching down in Florida,
  the shuttle Columbia broke apart some 200,000
  feet over Texas, killing all seven onboard,
  including the first Israeli astronaut. The oldest
  orbiter in the fleet, Columbia had just completed
  an extra-long 16-day science mission.

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Terrorism- 1980s - 2000

• Lebanon-
• American kidnapped
• Hijackings
• Achille Lauro
• Palestinian terrorists- PLA and Abu Abbas
• Leon Klinghoffer
• Bombs in Airports
• Vienna and Rome
• Libya and Qaddafi
• U.S. Fleet and Gulf of Sidra
• Libya fires missiles
• U.S. Attacks.

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• The National Strategy for Homeland Security and
  the Homeland Security Act of 2002 served to
  mobilize and organize our nation to secure the
  homeland from terrorist attacks.
• Critical Mission Areas
• Intelligence and warning
• Border and Transportation Security
• Domestic Counterterrorism
• Protecting Critical Infrastructures and Key
  Assets.
• Defending against Catastrophic Threats.
• Emergency Preparedness and Response.

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Dept. of Homeland Security

• Strategic Goals
• Awareness -- Identify and understand threats,
  assess vulnerabilities, determine potential
  impacts and disseminate timely information to our
  homeland security partners and the American
  public.
• Prevention -- Detect, deter and mitigate threats
  to our homeland.
• Protection -- Safeguard our people and their
  freedoms, critical infrastructure, property and
  the economy of our Nation from acts of terrorism,
  natural disasters, or other emergencies.
• Response -- Lead, manage and coordinate the
  national response to acts of terrorism, natural
  disasters, or other emergencies.
• Recovery -- Lead national, state, local and
  private sector efforts to restore services and
  rebuild communities after acts of terrorism,
  natural disasters, or other emergencies.
• Service -- Serve the public effectively by
  facilitating lawful trade, travel and
  immigration.
• Organizational Excellence -- Value our most
  important resource, our people. Create a culture
  that promotes a common identity, innovation,
  mutual respect, accountability and teamwork to
  achieve efficiencies, effectiveness, and
  operational synergies.

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U.S. National Debt

• The United States debt, foreign and domestic,
  was the price of
• liberty. The faith of America has been repeatedly
  pledged for it ...
• Among ourselves, the most enlightened friends of
  good government
• are those whose expectations of prompt payment
  are the highest.
• To justify and preserve their confidence to
  promote the increasing
• respectability of the American name to answer
  the calls of justice
• to restore landed property to its due value to
  furnish new
• resources, both to agriculture and commerce to
  cement more
• closely the Union of the States to add to their
  security against
• foreign attack to establish public order on the
  basis of an upright
• and liberal policy these are the great and
  invaluable ends to be
• secured by a proper and adequate provision, at
  the present period,
• for the support of public credit. Alexander
  Hamilton 1790

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U.S. National Debt

• Mission
• The mission of Public Debt is to borrow the money
  needed to operate the Federal Government and to
  account for the resulting debt.
• Authority
• Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution
  empowers the Congress to borrow money on the
  credit of the United States. This authority has
  been delegated to the Secretary of the Treasury.
  As an organizational entity within Treasury's
  Fiscal Service, the Bureau of the Public Debt is
  authorized to conduct such borrowing for the
  Federal Government.

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U.S. National Debt

• The estimated population of the United States is
  296,172,570
• Each citizen's share of this outstanding public
  debt is 26,261.69.
• The National Debt has continued to increase an
  average of 1.68 billion per day since September
  30, 2004!Concerned?

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U.S. National Debt
18
Disinformation New Tax Law

• Disinformation Program
• Planted untrue stories about Libyan leader
  Muammar el-Qaddafi
• Aim was for Libyan people to over throw Qaddafi.
• Faith in the word of America?

• 1986- Tax Reform Act
• Big cut in tax rates
• 2 brackets replace 14 brackets.
• 60 of taxpayers would pay less and corporation
  pay more.
• Freed 6 million people with lowest incomes from
  having to pay any income tax.

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Iranscam- Iran-Contra Affair

• Nicaragua and Boland Amendment
• CIA
• Reagan- No deals with Terrorists.
• Sale of Arms to Iran- by Israel.
• Enterprise and Lt. Col. Oliver North.
• Money in Swiss bank accounts.
• Money and arms to Contras.
• Presidential deniability.

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Reagan and the Supreme Court

• Sandra Day OConnor- 1st woman supreme court
  justice. Consevative
• William Rehnquist- new Supreme Court Chief
  Justice.
• Antonin Scalia- conservative republican
• Robert Bork- conservative- defeated- too
  conservative and insensitive to minorities.
• Douglas Ginsberg- rejected- smoked marijuana in
  college.
• Anthony M. Kennedy- moderate and conservative-
  confirmed without a hitch.

21
Creation Science

• Edwards v. Aguillard 1987
• Louisiana's "Creationism Act" forbids the
  teaching of the theory of evolution in public
  elementary and secondary schools unless
  accompanied by instruction in the theory of
  "creation science." The Act does not require the
  teaching of either theory unless the other is
  taught. It defines the theories as "the
  scientific evidences for creation or evolution
  and inferences from those scientific evidences."
  Appellees, who include Louisiana parents,
  teachers, and religious leaders, challenged the
  Act's constitutionality in Federal District
  Court, seeking an injunction and declaratory
  relief. The District Court granted summary
  judgment to appellees, who include parents of
  children attending Louisiana public schools,
  Louisiana teachers, and religious leaders,
  holding that the Act violated the Establishment
  Clause of the First Amendment. The Court of
  Appeals affirmed. In a vote of 7-2 the Supreme
  Court also affirmed the Court of Appeals
  Judgement.