Read THE 1969 MIRACLE METS: THE IMPROBABLE STORY OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST UNDERDOG TEAM Online
Authors: Steven Travers
Tags: #baseball
The entire “tune in, turn on and drop out” movement
was symbolized by the “Summer of Love,” which officially lasted
from May until September of 1967 in San Francisco’s Golden Gate
Park. As an idea, a concept, it embodied most of the country –
particularly the two coasts – lasting roughly between 1966 and
1970. Sociologists differ on how big or small it really was. As an
overall societal revolution, it encompassed free speech, anti-war
protest, civil rights, gay rights, the environment, free love, the
“sexual revolution,” and women’s rights; connecting hippies,
“flower children,” Eastern religious concepts, transcendentalism,
and a host of
isms
into a melting pot called the 1960s.
All of it morphed with the rock ‘n’ roll music of
the era, resulting in enormous “love-ins” and concerts, many free.
The two most famous of these were events held on each coast, one in
California and the other in New York state. The Monterey Pop
Festival featured radical, African-American guitar impresario Jimi
Hendrix (ironically a former member of the Army’s famed “screaming
eagles’ ” 101
st
Airborne Division) “going electric.” The
second occurred in 1969, just as the New York Mets were making
their stretch run on the National League’s East Division. Woodstock
was the touchstone event of a generation. The next year, its
“death” was symbolized when The Rolling Stones tried to duplicate
Woodstock in California, only to see the Hells
African-American fan at the Altamonte Motor Speedway.
An Ivy League intellectual with a touch of Irish
wit, Daniel Patrick Moynihan was appointed by President Johnson to
study growing societal problems in the mid-1960s. Moynihan’s
controversial report was that government intervention, “affirmative
action,” social programs designed to help; along with drugs,
alcohol and relaxed social mores, had broken up the black family.
The result was that black children were increasingly growing up
without fathers. Crime, academic stultification and a host of other
bad scenarios now marked urban life. The Democrats, tied to the
policies of FDR and LBJ, did not accept Moynihan’s report even
though he was one of their own, for to do so was to tacitly admit
their greatest “contributions” - the New Deal and the Great Society
– had gone haywire. History demonstrates without question that
Moynihan was
right
. Richard Nixon and
the
Right
picked up on Moynihan’s themes and have espoused them as the Holy
Grail, albeit with much self-serving political manipulation, ever
since.
In 1964, a University of California student named
Mario Savio stood on top of a police car when cops tried to break
up a demonstration on the Berkeley campus. Thus was born the “free
speech movement.” As the Vietnam War escalated between 1964 and
1966, the free speech movement morphed into the anti-war movement,
epicentered in Berkeley – the campus and the city – with “branch
operations” fomenting into full blown riots at Columbia, Wisconsin,
and all points in between. The angst created by all of this
eventually escalated into the fatal shootings of students at Ohio’s
normally quiet Kent State University in 1970. When New York Yankees
manager Ralph Houk observed police officers on the field to break
up a typical baseball brawl at Yankee Stadium, his reaction was:
“What the hell are the cops doing on the field? They should be at
the university where they belong.”
In many ways the civil rights movement was swallowed
up by the anti-war movement, which became the dominant theme of
Time
magazine beginning in 1966. American Communists had
traditionally tried to co-opt the civil rights movement. Black
leaders such as the staunch Republican Jackie Robinson put the
kabosh
on that, but even Dr. King’s organization was
infiltrated to some extent. The Communists helped finance much of
the anti-war movement. The anti-war protest was unquestionably
genuine, and among average kids and citizens who participated, a
Communist revolution was not their agenda. However, the FBI and the
historical record proved that time after time the nuts and bolts of
the movement - actual organization, leafleting, purchase of
permits, legal shelters, and the like – came from
de facto
,
front or actual Communist groups.
The Reverend Billy Graham said as much at the time,
but the Left thought he was out of his mind. Jim Bouton called him
“dangerous” in
Ball Four
, but de-classified documents over
the years demonstrated that Graham was right as rain.
Even protests of the Iraq War have often been
organized (not always) by offshoots of these Communist
organizations. Since the end of the Cold War (and the exposure of
Communist body counts over the years) it became unfashionable to
use the word Communist, but a virulent sense of anti-Americanism,
with many roots, motivations and guises, has risen up in its stead.
The anti-war movement had an enormous effect on the conduct of the
Vietnam War and American life, resulting in huge fissures in
American society and politics, all profoundly felt to this day.
California always seemed to have been a place that
“got it right,” a progressive state, a trendsetter. It certainly
was when it came to societal progress on the fields of athletic
competition. A decade before Jackie Robinson broke the “color
barrier” in Brooklyn, he and his integrated UCLA teammates were
freely, openly playing football games against the integrated
University of Southern California in front of 75,000 integrated
fans at the L.A. Coliseum. The Golden State liked to pat itself on
the back because, when the rest of the country was backward, in
their minds they were elites, superior. This concept came crashing
down with a huge dose of reality during the long, hot summer of
1965. A white cop stopped a black motorist not far from the same
Coliseum where Robinson thrilled football fans. A black crowd
gathered. Enraged over long-simmering police brutality, they became
violent, sparking riots in the Watts section of Los Angeles.
The Watts riots had a profound effect on the body
politic. The conservative movement, defeated at the polls in 1964
and thought to be “too extreme,” found voice in California’s rookie
Gubernatorial candidate for 1966, Ronald Reagan. Reagan and the
Right separated from its moderate GOP counterparts, known as the
“Rockefeller wing” of the Republican Party, centered in New York
and Connecticut. This was the GOP that David Halberstam identified
the losing 1964 Yankees with. Like the Yanks, the party re-grouped
and found a new, winning formula. The political Republicans found
it faster than the baseball Republicans did, though.
Reagan and the Right were reactionaries to all that
happened in the 1960s. If the Left could ever admit to such a thing
as their version of “blowback,” a CIA term they like to point to
when finding all the world’s ills somehow flowing back to America,
they would have to acknowledge that the Reagan Revolution which
followed was in many ways caused by them. Reagan and the
conservatives appealed to mostly white, middle class homeowners
pursuing or trying to hold onto the American Dream. Many have found
hate, division and racism in its message. In truth many with those
predilections attached themselves to it, but the essential message
of patriotism, Christianity, anti-Communism, low taxes, personal
freedom, responsibility, entrepreneurial capitalism, a strong
military, courageous valor, respect for life and family (therefore
opposition to abortion) were planks of the movement.
Despite being attacked, reviled and spat upon for
decades, these remain its rock positions. Its positive messages
have enormous appeal, with visceral emotional attachment that tends
to make people willing to die upholding them. This explains why the
enormous majority of the military, both officers and enlisted
personnel identify to one extent or another with these themes. Many
argue they are the foundation of the country. It is the argument
with those who disagree with this concept in a fundamental way
where the greatest divide currently resides. In this respect the
notion that conservatism is divisive (certainly as opposed to
moderation) might not be as far off base as many wish to admit.
Reagan won in a landslide over Democrat Governor
Edmund “Pat” Brown, who only four years earlier soundly defeated
former Vice-President Richard Nixon and had some excellent
accomplishments under his belt. Reagan’s popularity came from his
opposition to anti-war protestors (therefore supporting Vietnam),
the Black Panthers (who replaced Martin Luther King’s Christian
non-violence in many quarters), the Watts rioters, the hippies, the
Summer of Love, the campus marchers, the Berkeley agitators, all
things Communist or close to Communist, atheism or religious
weirdness, a Supreme Court more concerned with criminals than
victims (
Miranda
), and socialists (high taxers “stealing”
your hard-earned money), among other hot button issues (then and
now).
After having the 1960 election stolen from him by
Kennedy, Nixon chose not to contest it “for the good of the
country.” Some historians say Nixon was involved in “dirty tricks”
of his own (the later record makes this seem plausible), but the
record is by no means as clear on the subject as the
Chicago-Texas-Daley-LBJ-Joe Kennedy “tombstone vote” scandal the
Washington Post
chose to hide in plain sight from.
Nixon turned down the chance to become Commissioner
of Baseball in 1961, entered private law practice in Los Angeles,
and then made a failed run for Governor. Nixon was disgusted that
his home state did not bow and scrape to him in the manner he felt
a Vice-President under Dwight Eisenhower deserved. He moved to New
York to pursue the “fast track” on Wall Street; probably his
smartest political move. Between 1963 and 1967 Nixon was involved
in several important Supreme Court decisions revolving around the
issue of private rights vs. those of a public
persona
. He
had general freedom to travel, make speeches, and be political. He
was what major law firms call a “rainmaker” who brings in big bucks
clientele by virtue of reputation and contacts.
Nixon chose not to run for President in 1964 for any
number of reasons, mainly that he could not beat JFK or the man
carrying on the martyred man’s legacy, Johnson. He supported LBJ in
Vietnam (the GOP as a whole did; a decided reversal from the
actions of Democrats when placed in a similar position in the
2000s) but virulently opposed the Great Society. He was the perfect
voice to speak against the anti-war protestors and that ilk. In
1966 he traveled the nation, earning favors as he supported
Republican candidates (including Reagan in their shared home
state). The Republicans won a huge mid-term sweep.
Throughout 1966 and 1967, the general perception was
that the United States was winning the Vietnam War. There were
unnerving signs, however. American casualties were disturbingly
high, troop escalations constant, and the enemy (a combination of
Viet Cong “terrorists” and hit ‘n’ run elements of the North
Vietnamese Army) could not be crushed. Some have argued that had
Nixon been President during this crucial period, he would have
struck with enough savage force to end the conflict. This may be
true but is unlikely. The period in which the war might have been
“won” in decisive military manner was probably early, during JFK’s
term (1961-63) or 1964. By 1965-66 too many elements were working
against the U.S. to achieve a complete victory using limited means,
which was all LBJ was willing to do.
In the back of all American minds was the Korean War
after the Inchon invasion. General Douglas MacArthur had
brilliantly captured the Communist capital of Pyongyang. Victory
belonged to America again; not just victory in the Korean War but
the symbolic victory of freedom over Communism, still a relatively
nascent political concept whose full truths were only being
revealed in piecemeal fashion. Then 1 million Chinese regulars
crossed the Yalu River to join the fray. MacArthur chose to take a
stand, to defeat China and international Communism once and for
all, in North Korea followed by hot pursuit into Mainland China.
But Manhattan Project architect Robert Oppenheimer had leaked
atomic secrets to Soviet scientists, apparently because he did not
think it “fair” that America be able to wage such war without
millions of our people suffering the consequence of our actions. It
was as if Oppenheimer thought after the dropping of atomic bombs on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we should have suffered similar fates in
Wichita and San Diego just to “even things up,” not unlike the
actual ending in
Fail-Safe
.
The Russians used Oppenheimer’s technology and that
given them by American spies, including Julius and Ethel Rosenberg,
exploding their weapon in 1949. Red China and the U.S.S.R. were
tightly allied. President Harry Truman feared a nuclear World War
III, and ordered MacArthur to retreat. The war ended in stalemate,
but the essential goal of maintaining a free society in South Korea
was achieved. The chance to achieve an undivided, free Vietnam was
lost in the early stages when the U.S. did not invade the north and
conquer Hanoi, although this certainly sounds easier said than
done. The limited goal by 1967-68 was to establish a free South
Vietnam with a Communist north, as in Korea.
Everything came to a boil in 1968. In January the
Communists launched a military offensive on the eve of Tet, the
Chinese New Year. It was an abject military failure but the
American media, led by CBS’ Walter Cronkite, treated it as a
success. Cronkite just plain told his audience he thought the war
unwinnable and so we should quit. Most of the public (or at least
the Left) bought it with a fork and spoon. Right or wrong - and
mistakes have been made since then by not adhering to this premise
- when the public lost support for the war (which occurred between
January and March, 1968), achieving a difficult objective became,
and continues to be, very, very hard to do. The conservatives and
hawks clung, and still in many quarters still cling, to the notion
that the Left is overcome with cowardice, and that they alone
remain the last, best hope – the “thin red line” – between anarchy
and order, between chaos and freedom.