ELECTION/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “The last time the unemployment rate was this low, the Beatles were still together. Woodstock was right around the corner. There was a new President named Richard Nixon and Donald Trump was just a recent college grad. That’s how long it’s been. The unemployment rate was at or under 4%, as it is now, from December of 1965 until January of 1970, according to data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. It was a pivotal time in US history — but now it is not remembered for the unemployment rate. They were not quiet years. Those were the years in which Medicare was passed into law and the Civil Rights movement was in full swing. They also saw most of the US casualties in Vietnam. Things were so bad that Lyndon B. Johnson decided not to run for reelection in 1968, which ultimately led to violence at the Democratic convention that year and gave Nixon an opening to return from his political wilderness. So what’s the lesson?… Today there is no war like Vietnam, although Trump does his best to make things seem uncertain with his trade wars and his tweets and his complaints about the Russia investigation. But there is vigorous debate about social change and progress, particularly for minorities and women.”
–Zachary B. Wolf, “This is not the ’60s and Donald Trump is not Richard Nixon,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, May 3, 2019 1:12 am