Critical Era

I feel like the 90's could be classified as a critical era in "slow-mo." There are particular requirements for an era to be classified as "critical" and many events have taken place to reflect these requirements in the 90's. However, these events have not not been rapid, and stability seems a little far off. To focus on the behaviors and public opinion, presented are a few reasons to why I feel one could consider the 90's as an "almost" critical era.

Public opinion and behavior seems to have flip-flopped in small shifts between right and left wingers. Bill Clinton won votes because of his domestic policies as opposed to previous international policy to contain the Soviet Union. After his term, the votes seem to reflect the shift to a less domestic focused policy to the pre-emption strategy of George W. Before Clinton, partisanship was greatly influenced by military, in the 90s I feel like this had worn off. The public's beliefs and actions show slow, moderate changes that have yet to climax into what our book describes as a traumatic event. In the future, I believe if Barak Obama and Hilary Clinton continue to have political influence that black and white partisanship may change drastically. The number of minority voter will increase and may have dramatic, traumatizing, results. I also believe that Guiliani may have the ability to attract moderate democrats with many of his political views and this may lead to shift in partisanship as well.

However, because the last few presidential elections have been so close, I feel there hasn't been any major shifts to classify the last two decades as critical. Until the point of a consistent majority is reached, I feel we are unable to determine whether or not we are stable or at what point we were at a critical era.