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The '80's: The Politics, What We Miss, & What We Don't Miss · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Three Martini Lunch. Grab a stool next
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: to Greg Karambas of Radio America and Jim Garrity of
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: National Review. Three Martini's coming up.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the last call of the week for the
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: Three Martini Lunch. Normally, we are looking at the biggest
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: stories of the week, but today a very special edition
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: of Last Call. You might remember several weeks ago on
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: the Three Martini Lunch, one of our chasers was when
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Ryan Reynolds, the actor, was promoting a new movie. that
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: dealt with 80s nostalgia. He was basically trashing the 80s
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: as a brutal and terrible time, and Jim and I
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: took great exception to that. And after we finished that episode,
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Jim and I said, you know, we should do a
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: whole episode on the 80s. So today is that day.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: We are doing an episode entirely on the 80s, and
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: we are going to be looking at the politics, of course,
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: of the 1980s. We are going to be looking at
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: things we miss a lot from the 1980s, and we
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: are going to be looking at things we don't miss
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: from the 1980s. So the first thing, 80s politics, Jim,
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: of course, that's the age of Ronald Reagan. 1980s, the
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: first presidential election I remember. I'm sure it's the first
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: one you remember as well. Ronald Reagan won twice, of course,
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: in the 1980s. 44 states to six in 1980 over
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: the incumbent president of the United States. 489 to 49
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: in the Electoral College. And then 49 to one, of course,
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: over Walter Mondale. And then over those eight years, I
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: think you and I were probably tracking a little bit
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: more and more as time went on of what was happening.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: But he gets shot within his first couple of months
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: on the job, but bounces back with good humor. And
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: I think that definitely helped him with the American people.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: Big tax cuts in that first term. That was huge.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: But of course, the big thing in the Reagan years
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: was the Cold War. And we go from evil empire
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: to thawed relations with Gorbachev to some extent by the
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: end of that year. And Within less than a year
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: of Reagan leaving office, the Berlin Wall is coming down.
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: And of course, the tear down this wall speech from
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: 1987 was epic as well. There's certainly more that you
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: could say about the Reagan years. You got Rehnquist as
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: chief justice. You got Antonin Scalia added to the court.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: The other two justices, I would say, were probably a
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: disappointment with O'Connor. Not terrible, but could have been more conservative.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: And then thanks to Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden and
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: the borking of Justice Bork and the dawn of really
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: ugly confirmation politics. We ended up with Justice Kennedy, who
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: also could have been worse, but he was pretty bad.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: And we could have done a lot better if the
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Democrats hadn't gotten so bad about it. So when it
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: comes to 80s politics, what stands out to you?
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: So, Greg, rarely have we done an episode where I've
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: wished we had more of a visual component than this one.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: People who tune in regularly will see my bedtime for
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Brezhnev Fake movie poster over my shoulder. I see the
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: Reagan on the shelf behind you. There's a reason that
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: Generation X, I would say conservative men, but I think
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: Generation X just in general, have such astoundingly fond memories
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: of Ronald Reagan. He was president from when I was
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: about five to about 13. And boy, you want to
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: talk about just the, you know, I thought all presidents
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: were that good. And boy, have I been in a
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: disappointment ever since that, you know, just... You know, utterly
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: gifted communicator. I know his critics called him the Teflon
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: and all that stuff. But just there was this sense
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: of having a president who always seemed to know the
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: right thing to say, both in his prepared speeches, whether
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: it was by Peggy Noonan or my former mentor, the
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: late Tony Dolan, or just off the cuff remarks. You know,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: shortly after the assassination attempt, a balloon pops behind him.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Everybody's kind of startled. And he says, missed me. You know,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: just you can't buy that kind of charisma. Right. You know,
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: they're rolling him in on the gurney. I hope you're
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: all Republicans. You know, like just, you know, like the
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: ability to make people laugh and feel at ease, even
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: in just the worst circumstances. Not just a generational talent,
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: maybe a once in a century political talent. And but
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: I also I just kind of miss the degree to
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: which he could, you know, whether it's a challenger explosion
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: or tense moments of the Cold War. hostage crises. We're
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: not going to mention Iran-Contra. You mentioned all this kind
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: of stuff. He just made people feel better. And I
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: just feel like it was a huge part of the
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: optimism and positive, the good vibes, shall we say, all
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: across America during so much of that decade. So the
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: two other things I was thinking about, I feel like
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: we had more, besides Reagan himself, I feel like we
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: had a more serious governing class back then, maybe a
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: little less entertaining, maybe a little more boring. In 1962,
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Cuban Missile Crisis is probably the closest the world has
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: ever come to ending, to nuclear war, to civilizational collapse.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: And there's reports of Americans rushing into churches and digging
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: bomb shelters in their backyards. October 1962, people are not
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: sure the world is going to be there a month
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: from now, six months from now, a year from now.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: And I feel like you look at every subsequent presidential
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: election for the remainder of the Cold War, that even
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: if you and I are not big fans of Jimmy Carter,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: you and I are not big fans of Lyndon Johnson.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: But there was a seriousness to those men, that there
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: was a recognition that this was the person who had
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: their hand on the button. And the single most important
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: responsibility of the president of the United States, whichever party,
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: keep civilization going. Don't let the world end. These are
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: the highest stakes imaginable. 1989, Berlin Wall comes down. By
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: the early 1990s, the Cold War is over. And like that,
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: Bill Clinton is playing the saxophone on Arsenio Hall. And
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: there's this like, suddenly things are lighter and it's tabloidy.
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: And I just got to observe, I don't think Bill
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: Clinton could have gotten elected during the Cold War. There
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: was a fundamental shift in our politics, in our culture,
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: in our way we saw the world once the Cold
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: War ended. And I think it's... I think as a
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: result of it, we have more clowns like the Marjorie
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Taylor Greene's the world, Ilhan Omar, whoever. I went back
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: and I checked. Jim Traficant, famously the Ohio very conservative
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: but Democratic congressman from Youngstown, who always looked like he
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: had a dead squirrel on his head from the way
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: he did his hair. I was famous for doing his
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: floor speeches. Beam me up, Mr. Speaker. He was elected.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: He started in office in 1985. So it's not like
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: there was nobody who was crazy. in Capitol Hill. But
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: I just feel like, on average, we had a more
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: serious one. And the other part of the visual that
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: I wish I could do, so my parents, because I
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: saved it, my parents saved it and gave it back
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: to me. This is the May 23rd, 1983 Time Magazine
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: with George Lucas on the cover because Return of the
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: Jedi was going out. And I know that people are
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: going to say, oh, Jim was really into Star Wars.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: That explains a heck of a lot, doesn't it? But
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: I looked through it the other day and there was
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: just a ton of coverage about Thatcher, And I know
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: it's going to shock you, Greg. There were riots in France.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: That never happens. It's totally different from now, you know.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: Botha in South Africa. There was just this enormous coverage
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: of the international scene. And again, this is May 1983.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: This is not necessarily a huge crisis going on. The
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: big news was Return of the Jedi was coming out.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: But you just go through the magazine. I just feel
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: like our news media coverage was a little less tabloidy,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: a little less celebrity focused, and just a little more
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: focused on the world at large. I think we were
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: a more serious country and more serious culture back then.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: And I miss it, Greg, but that's also because I'm
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: turning into a cranky old man.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: Well, you mentioned Thatcher there in passing, and I think
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: that's a big part of the 80s too, this Reagan-Thatcher alliance.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: And of course, when you talk about fighting against communism,
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Pope John Paul II as well. And, you know, whether
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: it's Nixon or Carter, you know, Ford, they had this
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: idea of detente kind of trying to keep this balancing act.
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: And Reagan comes in and goes, no, no, no, no.
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: This isn't a balancing act. We win.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: You lose.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: And so you got this major defense buildup. And he's
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: out there saying, look, you guys are an evil empire,
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: especially when the Soviets shot down that Korean airliner. I've
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: never seen Reagan angrier than he was that day. Man,
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: he was furious. And so. As time goes on, the
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: US arsenal builds up. The Soviets can't keep up. All
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: the other Soviet leaders keep dying on them until Gorbachev
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: shows up. And Gorbachev realizes that the Soviets can't keep up.
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: They can't keep up. And so he's got to try
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: to push these reforms. And ultimately, when it comes to
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: the time when the Berlin Wall comes down and Eastern
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: Europe is finally liberated from the Iron Curtain, Gorbachev, the
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: best thing he ever did was nothing at that point
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: and not trying to repress those people like so many
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: other former Soviet leaders had done in the past. And
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: so It's just an amazing time when people were calling
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: Reagan a nuclear cowboy. And, you know, he was going
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: to get us all obliterated because he didn't have that
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: same approach to detente. And ultimately, now he is credited,
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: rightly so, for striking the decisive blows in the Cold War,
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: even though the final bricks fell during the George H.W.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: Bush administration. So a consequential presidency, a good humored guy.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: My favorite joke of his about the Soviet era. was
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: that you're buying a car and it's 10 years. You've
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: got to wait for your car, but you put the
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: money down. And then they say, when would you like
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: it delivered? And they pick a date. And the guy says,
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: morning or afternoon. And the guy who's delivering the car says, well,
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: what difference does it make? It's 10 years from now.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: And the guy says, well, the plumber's coming in the morning,
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: 10 years ahead.
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: Yes. Yes. That legendary Soviet service. Yeah. Remember, everybody, a
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: worker's paradise is a consumer's hell. Yes.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: And remember. Most of Reagan's mistakes, because nobody's perfect, came
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: because he trusted Democrats. He did raise, after the big
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: tax cuts, there were some tax increases because Democrats, shockingly, Jim,
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: promised to cut spending, and they didn't. And then... on
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: immigration reform, Reagan unfortunately went with the amnesty in exchange
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: for promises that the border would be fully secured. And
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: guess what didn't happen out of those two? So again,
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: trusting Democrats, it's never a good idea.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm afraid I don't recall. She always said, like,
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: 140 times during the Iran-Contra testimony. But that's fine. We're cool. That's, yeah.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: That's all right.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: But it's not like America's ever going to elect another
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: president with memory or aging issues. Good heavens. Oh, man.
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 10:28
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• 10:31
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• 10:34
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• 10:38
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• 11:15
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• 11:17
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• 11:20
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• 11:46
  Speaker 2: give today. All right, Jim, second category is things we really,
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: really miss about the 80s. What's at the top of
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: your list?
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Okay, so when it's evening time, if I'm not watching
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: television or a movie or something, I will go through,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: I've spent probably way too much time on YouTube. And
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: there are these guys who have created music videos. Sometimes
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: they will do Crockett's theme from Miami Vice or some
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: other 80s music. And they will splice together like, you know,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: a couple hundred like three second snippets from 80s music videos,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: movies and TV shows. Michael Jackson, Cyndi Lauper, a lot
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: of John Hughes movies, lots of, you know, everything iconic, B.A.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: Baracus and the A-Team, right? You know, I'm pretty sure
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: Optimus Prime pops in at some point. Like, you know,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: just all these, you know, classic 80s images. And it's
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: like five minutes of pure joy. And the thing that
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: dawned on me as I was watching this is not
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: just like, oh, I'm an old man saying, ah, 80s
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: music was better, 80s movies were better, 80s TV shows
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: were better. You can say, are there some bad ones
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: in there? Sure. Is Auto Train a masterpiece? No. But
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: you look at almost all of them. There's this exuberance
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: running through the culture. I think it often aligns a
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: great deal with the election of Reagan. You could say
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: it was a hangover with the tumult of the 60s,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: the me decade of the 70s, the depressing independent film,
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: taxi driver, parallax view. By the time the 80s came along,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: We felt the need for speed with Top Gun. We
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: felt the need for, you know, the defeat of an
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: evil empire in Star Wars. Indiana Jones kicking everybody's butt. Rambo.
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: Dirty Harry. Was Dirty Harry late 70s, early 80s?
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: It was mostly 70s, but I think there were a
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: couple in the 80s.
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: By then, all the knockoffs of Dirty Harry, like every
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: other guy was a tough maverick cop. We were approaching
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: Murtaugh and Riggs and Lethal Weapon and stuff like that, right?
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: The Hunt for Red October, although I believe the Soviet
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: Union collapsed by the time the film came out. But
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: there was this, there's something to be, you can make
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: great art that involves moral ambiguity and, deeply flawed heroes and,
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: you know, villains who have a point or have some
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: sort of redeeming quality. But in the 80s, our heroes
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: were heroes, our villains were villains. And, you know, it
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: was not... Nobody doubted that we were the good guys.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: And nobody doubted that other countries, whether it was Smirsch
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: and the Bond villains you'd see, or the intergalactic evil empire,
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: or the Russians and Rambo. We're not going to talk
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: too much about the Mujahideen because some of them turned
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: out to be not so great. But there was kind
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: of this... this moral clarity. And even a show like
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: Miami Vice, which is deeply sympathetic to the exasperation and
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: exhaustion of those fighting the drug war in the 1980s
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: and the sense of playing whack-a-mole. And you take out
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: one drug dealer, another one's going to take his place
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: within a couple of days on the same street corner.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: There was still a recognition that the cartels were terrible
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: people and did terrible things and were callous with people's lives.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: And there was just kind of this There was a
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: moral clarity, ironically, even in our most murky and ambiguous
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: entertainment then. So I kind of miss... And also the
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: other thing is that all of it was fun. All
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: of it was just this, you know, like, yeah, you know,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: I think that's a big driver in these Stranger Things
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: nostalgia that we saw. This depiction of how it was
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: to be a kid going to the movies and rooting
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: for your heroes and rooting against your villains. And I
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: don't know if we're... My wife laments on songs on
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: the radio that she calls wine rock. Because almost every
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: 80s movie is baby, baby, I love you, and we're
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: going to do it, and it's going to be awesome.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: That's the thrust of your typical 80s song. All of
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: them now are like depression, my life stinks. I'm not
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: saying they're not talented performers, but there's just kind of
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: this tone to all of it. I kind of wonder
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: if at some point... Within the past few decades, American culture,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: particularly its popular culture, got depressed. And that's why when
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: something comes along that has this vibe of 80s nostalgia,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: oftentimes there's this huge appetite for it because we yearn
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: for that. I don't want to call it a simpler time,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: but a time of you could take pride. not just
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: in your country, but like we knew what virtue was.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: We knew what heroism was. And the irony is that
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: even the maverick cop who wore the sunglasses and the
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: leather jacket and, you know, probably smoked because everyone was
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: smoking in the movies at that time. Even that guy
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: was always like saving the little girl from the drug
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: cartel or something like that. There was always this sense that,
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: you know, our most cynical heroes still had that heart
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: of gold and would do the right thing and the
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: tough thing in a tough situation. Yeah.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: And, you know, some of the themes that went on
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: throughout pop culture was justice, whether it's coming through, you know,
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: police shows and like the tough cops or just people
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: who are doing it on their own, because sometimes the
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: justice system doesn't work. In fact, Jim, you mentioned one
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: of those programs where, you know, in 1972, a crack
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: commando unit was sent to prison for a crime they
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: didn't commit. They promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: in the Los Angeles underground prison. And, you know, still
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: wanted by the government, they were surviving as soldiers of fortune.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: And if you have a problem and no one else
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: can help, and if you can find them, maybe you
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: can hire the aid team, right? So they were out there.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: It was a perfect show for kids of our age.
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: I mean, you had the fighting where nobody ever actually
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: got injured, much less killed. PA, Mr. T was, you know,
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: huge star of the 80s because of that show. He
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: was always welding something. And he would always end up
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: fighting the tough guy, the bad gang. And, you know,
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: he just knew how it was going to go out.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Murdoch was crazy. Just absolute fun. And then you had,
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: you know, like Knight Rider was very different, but same way.
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: Another guy just kind of out there making sure justice
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: gets done on his own. MacGyver was awesome. Magnum P.I.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: to some extent. And then you just had the fun shows.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: You know, the critics always had their nose in the air,
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: but shows like the Dukes of Hazzard. I mean, what
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: was more fun than the Dukes of Hazzard of, you know,
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: jumping cars and so forth and bumbling police in that
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: particular episode? The other thing I liked then is that
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: there actually was a family hour in primetime with shows
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: that you could watch as a kid, because I'm telling you,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: anything that's out there now, I don't think my mom
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: would have allowed too much. So like Family Ties, I
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: know it's got a tainted reputation now, but the Cosby
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: show at the time was clean entertainment for the most part.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: You know, you had Cheers, you had Night Court. And
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: if you're a little bit younger than we are, you know,
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: TGIF on ABC, late 80s, got your Perfect Strangers, Full House,
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: stuff like that. Stuff that was safe. Parents were like,
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: hit the mute, stuff like that. So then in music,
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: you know, music was so much better in the 80s.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: My wife and I, and when we have friends over,
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: sometimes we'll play what we call the music game, you know,
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: way up there in your cable package or whatever you have.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: You could probably do this on Spotify too. There's a
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: 70s channel, 80s channel, 90s channel, 2000s channel, oldies channel.
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: And so what we sometimes do is just hit the
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: button on the remote, knowing what channel's next without looking
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: and see how fast we can identify the song. We
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: always stink on the 2000s because it's just bad music.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: It's not even like, I wish I knew this song.
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: It's like, somebody name this song so I can get
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: back to the jails and the era that I actually like.
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: Because the quality of music in the 2000s compared to
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: back then, not just the 80s, but 60s, 70s, even
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: the early 90s is so, so different. I blame the
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: boy bands for ruining music, but other people may disagree
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: with that.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: I was just going to say that we can blame Britney.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: For the assembly line of, you know, Disney Channel starlets.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: Auto-tuned.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: All of a sudden, they get a little bit older. Suddenly, boom,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: they're on the cover of Maxim, looking like hussies. And,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: you know, then all their music videos are half naked
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: for the rest of the time. She was the trailblazer,
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: and a lot of people followed in that wake. But
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, didn't mean to interrupt, because you have a
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: very good stream going.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: No, no, no, that's fine, too. And you said movies,
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: I love the Indiana Jones trilogy. There are only three.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Back to the Future trilogy, the original Star Wars trilogy,
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: two out of three of those were in the 80s.
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: And so very little good in the movies was made
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: after that. There's a couple But comedies like Fletch, Ferris
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: Bueller's Day Off, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, Caddyshack, The Original Vacation,
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: Christmas Vacation. We actually had comedies in the 80s. Everybody
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: got so woke and offended that they can't even make
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: them hardly anymore in Hollywood. And so just so many
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: different things pop culture-wise. And then the things that you
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: see in Stranger Things and other things if you look
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: back at the 80s nostalgia. There was freedom. You could
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: ride your bike all around town. You didn't have to
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: worry that somebody was going to abduct you or anything
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: like that. You didn't need a bike helmet. Maybe you
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: did need one, but you didn't have one. You could
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: play sports for hours in your yard or your friend's yard.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: And as long as you're home for dinner, in my case,
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: my paper route, all was well. You had cars bigger
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: than aircraft carriers. It was fun. If you did get
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: into a fender bender, you probably didn't even feel it
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: that much. And Jim, the best thing about the 80s
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: in retrospect now, No social media.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: There is no record of our misbehavior from that decade, Greg.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Excellent list there. I'm going to point out a lot
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: of people who ended up joining NASA said they did
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: it because of Star Trek, either the original television series
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: back in the 60s or even the movies that came
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: along into the 1980s. When I was in Poland earlier
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: this year, I met a company that is doing medical robotics.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: And they're there where they're actually building the robotics and
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: and I'm not making this up, above the door, there
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: is a picture of Richard Dean Anderson as MacGyver with
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: a saint halo over him. Like, MacGyver is the patron
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: saint of engineering. So think about how many people ended
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: up becoming engineers because they saw MacGyver making a crossbow
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: out of a pen and a paper clip and a
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: rubber band or whatever other stuff he used back then.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: You mentioned the A-team, and you're talking about, like, you know,
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: they were in the Los Angeles Underground, Greg, that was
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: the clearest Los Angeles underground compared to Karen Bass. Things
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: never looked that bad for them. Yes, they'd often have
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: to scramble out the door because Decker was coming or
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: something like that. But, you know, Hannibal could always find
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: the materials for his disguise as the waiter or whatever.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: There was somebody who needed them or something like that.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: And look, we learned the important lesson of the A-Team was,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: you know, always be willing to stand up for justice,
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: always be willing to stand up for people who are
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: being bullied or oppressed or mistreated. And remember, you can
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: always shoot them and no one will ever die. That's
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: an important lesson for kids to improve. And as we
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: learn from that show, knowing is half the battle. We
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: learned that from G.I. Joe. The other half of the
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: battle are red lasers and blue lasers Which also never
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: destroy anything. And remember, if you shoot an enemy plane,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: the other pilot will always parachute it out in time.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: You might get captured, but you're never actually going to
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: die in war. And that's another important lesson for kids
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: to learn.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: And you remind me now that the 80s was great
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: for catchphrase TV. You know, you had Arnold on different
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: strokes with what you're talking about, usually Willis, but sometimes Willis.
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: Another character. And then, of course, at the end of
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: every A-Team episode, you know, Hannibal lights up the cigar
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: and says, I love it when a plan comes together.
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: Teaching kids the value of planning. You know, I think
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: about it. The only time I remember Face ever looking
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: worried on that show was when they went to Universal
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Studios and he saw Cylon. Which is a reference to
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: Battlestar Galactica, which I believe was 1980 or was that
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: late 70s? I'm trying to, you know. Yes.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: And he was on. The actor was on that show.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: Yes. The most perfect in-joke. And they did it in
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: the opening credits, if I remember correctly.
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: Fantastic. All right, we could go on forever, but we
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: love about the 80s. I think what we miss about
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: the 80s will be a little bit shorter, but we'll
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: get to that in just a second. In the meantime,
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: we know we've talked about fast-growing trees before, but they
• 23:38
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• 23:40
  Speaker 2: now trees.com. Think of it like your local nursery, but
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: online with more than 1,600 varieties of trees and plants
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: delivered right to your door. And with fall here, now's
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: a great time to think about what you want growing
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: in your yard come spring. Caromba's family, as I've mentioned
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: so many times, very, very happy with our products from Now, Trees.com,
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: we've got a great snake plant. We've got the lavender plant.
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: Over the years, we've had a monstera plant, a fig tree.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: Whatever you get, you're going to love it from fast-growing trees.
• 24:07
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• 24:09
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• 24:12
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• 24:15
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• 24:18
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• 24:19
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• 24:22
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• 24:26
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• 24:28
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• 24:31
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• 24:34
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• 24:36
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• 24:37
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• 24:40
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• 24:59
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• 25:09
  Speaker 2: the 80s, alas, were not perfect. So what do we
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: not miss from the 80s? My list is pretty short,
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: so I'm just going to hit it right off the
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: top here. I don't miss people smoking everywhere. I don't
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: love that the government got involved in all that. But,
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: you know, when you were kids, you could smoke on planes.
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: There was a smoking and non-smoking section as if the
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: smoke wasn't going to waft into the non-smoking section. Same
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: thing in restaurants, like the divider of your booth sometimes
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: was the difference between Smoking and non-smoking. There were ashtrays
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: for every seat of your car. Other things I don't miss,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: long distance charges. I also don't miss the Soviet Union
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: or the Ayatollah Khomeini. But I also don't miss the
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: era where three networks and a couple of newspapers decided
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: what the news was, where now we have this broader
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: way of figuring out what exactly is happening in the world.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: You've got to be a little bit discerning to figure
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: out what's fact, what's fiction, and who's feeding you a
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: line of bull. But there's a lot that we've learned
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: in the talk radio era and now in the internet
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: era that probably wouldn't have made Dan Rather or Tom
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: Brokaw and Peter Jennings back in the day.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: Excellent selections there, Greg. As I'm realizing, we didn't have
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Fitbits back then, but my sense is that I would
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: probably do about 8,000 steps a day Getting up from
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: the couch and changing the channel and then going back
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: to the couch. Because remote control, if you were rich,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: first of all, it's interesting, by the way, certain little
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: things in consumer. Your family has a remote control. Remember
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: there was something like wired remote control and you ran
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: the wire across? So there was remote control. Having a
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: VCR was a big deal. And here's the thing. There's
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: a movie coming out in the theaters and you don't
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: see it. You know it's going to be on streaming
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: in like six months at the latest, probably sooner. It'll
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: be on demand in like a week from now. I
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: believe Supergirl had one month between the movie release in
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: theaters and available on streaming. That was a flop. So
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: they were in a rush to get it, you know,
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: figure out some way to get it. You had to
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: wait a year for Return of the Jedi to come
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: out on VHS tape. And obviously VHS tapes are not
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: nearly as good quality as uh dvds or what is
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: blu-rays or whatever they're up to now and stuff like
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: that now it's streaming people don't even buy physical media
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: anymore although you never know when steven spielberg will decide
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: i don't want guns in et i'm gonna change it
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: all to walkie talkies so you know et stop or
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: i will use this walkie talkie to call someone who
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: does have a gun you know um So, okay, you know,
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: that was kind of annoying. It's dawned on me, Greg,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: when's the last time you got lost somewhere? I guess
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: it's probably, it's been a really long time because of
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: Google Maps, Waze, all these different apps and stuff like that.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Think about how many couples don't fight anymore because you don't,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: will you please pull over and ask for directions? You know,
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: that was, we all know where we're going. The other
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: thing I'm kind of sitting there thinking, I don't know
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: about you, Greg, but like how many, you know, like,
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: Childhood can be great and joyous and big picture. I
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: had a great... But I also remember being bored. I
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: remember being bored. There was nothing to do. There's nothing
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: on TV. Mom and dad are saying, go out and
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: play outside or something. Now with the internet, you're never bored.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: There's always something out there that you can... Waiting online, right?
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: There's a long line at the supermarket. Doesn't matter. I'm
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: looking at my phone. It's just a remarkably different way
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: we occupy our time. Very serious downsides to social media,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: the internet, all that kind of stuff. I'm also looking
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: and realizing, look, I went for a print magazine, National Review.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: There aren't newsstands anymore. Newsstands were not only ubiquitous in
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: the 1980s. They were like, how you learn stuff, right?
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: I guess that was kind of the tail end of
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: the morning newspaper and the afternoon newspaper in terms of
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: what the news cycle was. So you had more time
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: to learn the news and digest it. And there wasn't
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: this relentless pace of, What's happening now? What's happening now?
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: This accelerated news cycle and stuff. So there are certain
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: things about the 80s that I miss. I think your
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: comment about the consolidation of media is very much a
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: fair one. Institutions like Print National Review were true outsiders
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: and very limited in their reach. But I'd also note, Greg,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: that was the era of the monoculture. And you could
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: kind of say that that getting into the 90s were
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: kind of the last era of I mean, Ronald Reagan
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: could say, could quote Gary Coleman, what you talking about?
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: Or where's the beef? Or stuff like that. Because all
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: of America was watching the same thing in prime time.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: And I think we've lost it. something with that. So
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: my things I miss have ended up being a lot more,
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: things I don't miss have ended up reminding me of
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: the things that I miss, Greg.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that too. Yeah, people ask you, wait, you didn't
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: have a remote control? Like, no, I was the remote control.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: Exactly, yeah. Come on, go change the channel. There you go.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: That's exactly it. And it's usually to a program, you know,
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: if you're getting that order, the one that you didn't
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: actually want to watch. So I was like, 60 minutes
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: is on or something like that at the time. Oh,
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: and by the way, our kids still do get bored
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: once in a while. The catchphrase that you need to
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: remember from Mrs. Corumbus is boredom is a choice. So
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: there's always something interesting that you can go do.
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: Do you not have anything to do? Because I'll give
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: you something to do.
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: Yep, exactly right.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: In a moment, final thoughts on the 80s. All right, Jim, we,
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: of course, have not mentioned the pinnacle of cinematic creation
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: that came in the 1980s. It was released in July.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: So some people say it's not a Christmas movie. Of course,
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: it's a Christmas movie. But more importantly than it being
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: a Christmas movie, it is the greatest action film of
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: all time. Die Hard is a creation of the 1980s.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: And in addition to everything else we've discussed, Die Hard
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: alone should make the 80s very, very special.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting because, first of all, we would
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: agree it's an 80s movie. I think it's also very
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: much a late 80s movie, and I think you could
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: just find stylistic and aesthetic choices. It very much is
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: about the fear that Japan is going to take over
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: corporate America. I don't think you'd call it a xenophobic
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: movie by any stretch of the imagination, but there definitely
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: is this sense of Japan as this strange force hosting a...
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Company Christmas party on Christmas Eve or stuff. The growing
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: suspicion of the media, Geraldo Rivera and stuff like that.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: You know, Dick Thornburg definitely was a message of that.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: And I think I kind of wonder, I don't know
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: if you'd say this is, you know, post-Aaron Contra or something.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: John McClane is a very heroic character. Al Powell is
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: a very heroic character. Overall, the Los Angeles Police Department,
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: not a particularly heroic force. And like, look, it's not
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: like in the early 90s, we'd see reasons to doubt
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: the competence and good intentions of the Los Angeles Police Department, right? Yeah.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: So yeah, they had some issues for sure, especially in
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: the few years that would follow there, which led to
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: a lot of other problems as well. So in the end, yes,
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: kind of a ground level cop, the hero in the building,
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: you know, it was It's a perfect movie. I would
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: clean up a lot of the language. But other than that,
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: the wisecracking, the plot development is just absolutely fantastic.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: Well, Greg, as they say on Basic Cable, yippee-ki-yay, Mr. Falcon.
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: Well, share your 80s memories with us. I've certainly had
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: a lot of fun going down memory lane with you
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: on this one, Jim. So maybe we'll have a chance
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: to go down that way again. So anyway, have a
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: great weekend and I'll see you on Monday.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: See you Monday, Greg.
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: Jim Garrity, National Review. I'm Greg Karambas of Radio America.
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: Thanks so much for being with us today. Please be
• 32:37
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• 32:39
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• 32:58
  Speaker 2: Last Call this week for the Three Martini Lunch. Again,
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: join us Monday for the next Three Martini Lunch.