Our Health Care history of reform for the past 60+ years has always carried with it the mantra of Socialized Medicine, screamed so loudly it drowns out talk of anything else. The fear of anything other than the status quo is always met with the most dire of consequences and usually it's enough to kill any further discussion.

That we've come this far in our quest for Health Care reform is a miracle, since it's been so furiously shot down so viciously for so long.

Take for example this Lincoln Day address from February 10, 1949, given by Isolationist/Republican Senator Arthur Vandenberg when talk of Health Care reform comes around:

Sen. Vandenberg: “There is a vast propaganda today for Socialized Medicine. I think it would destroy precious personal relationships in the American way of life. That it would produce wholesale mediocrity in the skills which serve the sick. And saddle us with a new and appalling bureaucracy. But this does require me to blind my eyes to the existence of a crushing and well neigh universal sick problem in lives of millions of our citizens. It is a problem that must be met but we have a choice of methods; one is voluntary and therefore typically American. The other is involuntary and therefore typically bureaucratic. The latter is socialized Medicine. The former is cooperative Medicine. I expect the American people and the Republican Party to choose the former. I want my party to look at the great humanitarian cooperative efforts of the Blue Cross for example, which represents cooperation and not compulsion.”

That the argument, even in 1949, is so filled with fear and falsehoods that any reasonable person would question the speakers motives. That he speaks so highly of Blue Cross is an indication. This was during a time Blue Cross didn't have the strangle hold over the Health Care Industry they do now. Yet then, as now the blatant fear and dire consuequences is the same.

The stranglehold however, is a lot firmer.

News for this day in 1964 (via radio station WXYZ in Detroit) started off with word on the upcoming Oregon Presidential Primary that had Ambassador to Saigon and GOP Presidential hopeful Henry Cabot Lodge leading the pack, with Nelson Rockefeller running a close second. Both the Oregon and upcoming California Primaries were considered something of a free-for-all with grumblings of a Stop Barry Goldwater Movement among the GOP's Moderates.

In other news - From Capitol Hill, the Senate GOP pledged to keep the Scandal Probe into former Democratic Aide Bobby Baker going. President Johnson and Defense Sec. Robert McNamara were holding talks over the situation in Vietnam.

Speaking of Vietnam, it was reported that 51 South Vietnamese troops were killed in an ambush by Vietcong guerrillas just north of Saigon the previous day.

Civil Rights Leader Bayard Rustin pledged some 50,000 demonstrators to picket the upcoming Democratic Convention in Atlantic City. When asked if the same would be true for the GOP Convention, Bayard said there would be pickets, but the GOP wasn't so important.

In Michigan news - the friction between Governor George Romney and Attorney General Frank Kelly heated up again. This time over the issue of Legislative Reapportionment.

And GM said it would try and hold the line on new car prices in 1965, saying that 1964 car sales would likely hit 8 million, marking the first time in history the car maker did so well.

And that was how it rolled, this May 15th 1964 as broadcast over Detroit Radio station WXYZ via their Morning Report.

The last few years of the 70's signaled a huge explosion in music genres. One of them was the introduction of Techno, or Synthpop. Mostly relegated to Disco and soft-Jazz in the early 70's, Techno branched out and crossed paths with Experimental and turned what was formerly a dance genre into something new.

Human League were at the forefront of the movement. Along with bands like OMD and Ultravox!, Human League embraced a cool and detached approach - stripped down and basic. Initially their was more akin to the German techno of Kraftwerk, rather than Tangerine Dream and it eventually paved the way for the New Wave and New Romantic genres.

Tonight it's a session Human League did for the BBC, recorded on August 8, 1978 when they were relatively new and finding their musical voice.

Here's what they perform:

1. Being Boiled
2. No Time
3. You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling (yes, THAT one).
4. Blind Youth

It's interesting, the inclusion of a song made famous by The Righteous Brothers and iconic in its production by Phil Spector. Done by Human League the warmth is stripped away and the message seems sinister in comparison, becoming almost an anti-love song. Which, considering the times, was probably the intention.

Further evidence the playing field was up for grabs and it was open season for everything.

First day of Spring, this March 20th in 1964, and the news was only slightly skewed.

Beginning with word that Soviet Foreign Minister Andre Gromyko informed interested parties that the three U.S. fliers shot down over East Germany were something for the East Germans and the U.S. to work out, Russia was sitting this dance out.

Meanwhile, in Cambodia - reports that a Cambodian fighter plane shot down a Vietnamese Spotter plane was running the risk of damaging U.S.-Cambodian relations, even though Cambodia was adamant the plane was over their territory. The fun and games in South East Asia were continuing.

President Johnson, while stumping for campaign support, offered the "Better Deal" promise at a DNC fundraiser - a sort of echo of the FDR New Deal. Meanwhile, Republican front runner Barry Goldwater kept blasting away at LBJ at an RNC fundraiser with heaping helpings of paranoia to go along with dinner.

White House Press Secretary Pierre Salinger, resigned his post in order to toss his hat in the ring for the Senate from California where he set up shop on this day.

The news switches from the ABC Radio Network to WXYZ in Detroit to offer some local tidbits. The Detroit Teachers Union was up in arms over a City Council proposal for an Anti-Strike clause in their upcoming contract. The UAW Convention was getting underway with talk about upcoming Union contracts with Detroit. The Minimum Wage law passed in Michigan. Governor Romney (yes, the one responsible for the fruit falling very far from the tree, son-wise) proposed May 1st as the deadline to set up 6 half-way houses in the Detroit area for troubled youth. This in addition to many others proposed around Michigan for the same purpose. And Governor Romney blasted his Lieutenant Governor for poo-poo'ing the Governor's proposal to strengthen the Chemical test law for Drunk Drivers.

And despite the fact there were three major winter-type storms milling around, it was the first day of Spring!

All this and a lot more via ABC Radio News and WXYZ radio in Detroit Michigan for this March 20th, 1964.

Sometimes we take for granted the voting age has always been 18. But no. We talk about the elusive Youth Vote, but in 1950 it was non-existent. There was talk about lowering the voting age to 18, but nothing ever really came of it until 1970 - twenty years after this address to the people of Michigan by Governor G. Mennen "Soapy" Williams. Logic dictated that, if you were could be drafted into the Military and fight a war, you should be able to vote. But that concept was a stretch for some. Many people thought if you lowered the age of voting to 18, you had to lower the age of drinking to 18 as well. Many states did lower the age of drinking to 18, but voting was still a ways off.

G. Mennen Williams: “My proposal to lower the voting age from 21 to 18. This idea has been discussed widely during the last ten years. Many prominent leaders and citizens of both political parties have endorsed it. But no action has ever been taken. I think it is time to submit this very important question to the people. And because it will require a vote of the people at the election next November, I decided to recommend it at this special session of the Legislature.”

It's interesting to consider that now, since the 18 year old vote has been in place for 40 years, most politicians rely so heavily on it. The lower voting age has meant a more progressive leaning anyways. Something about being young and seeing possibilities and having the power of change at your fingertips is intoxicating to those seeking power. But that enthusiasm is sometimes fickle. As was quickly evidenced in 1968 with assassinations, the Vietnam War and the general disillusion with our country's leaders. I remember very vividly the overwhelming Youth movement embracing Robert Kennedy (at that time it was still 21) and how it evaporated within days of his assassination. Rather than maintaining eyes on the prize, there was a massive disconnect, a general apathy that made the Presidency of Richard Nixon possible. Granted, the Democratic Party was in a state of chaos after RFK's death, and it was that chaos coupled with the disconnect that served a shift to the right in 1968 possible.

I'm afraid we're faced with a similar situation now; the very real notion of a disconnect with the Youth Vote. Principles and ideals have changed considerably since 1968, as they were in 1950 . Ironically, during both periods there were wars being waged (three months after this broadcast the Korean War got started) and 18 year olds were fighting them and dying from them. But today I think the disconnect is the loss of optimism that change, any sort of change, is not an instantaneous thing. Perhaps that's the syndrome of youth. Then as now, we saw change as something achieved instantaneously - the snap of a finger, as it were. The constant with Youth, no matter during what period of time in history, is that all things are possible and can happen if you want them to. Cynicism comes along with grey hair and lowered expectations, it seems.

Yes, we have politicians who, in lieu of being in one party, could just as easily be in the opposite party - they are professional and malleable and are devoid of moral fiber. This back-bending urge to be Socratic and "Let us reason together" becomes so much placating to the rants of spoiled children that it almost mocks the concept of leadership and steering the Ship of State anywhere but on the rocks.

The anger of the Youth Vote to "throw everyone out and start over" sounds good, sounds dramatic and has righteous indignation written all over it - but as history has also proven, it throws out numerous babies with the purge of putrid bathwater. We have to realize the problems of our government are deep-seated and go back as far as January 1969. We just assume it's been eight years because, well . . we just don't think back that far.

And where will that Youth Vote be, come this November?

But at least in 1950 they were trying to think ahead.