This is the last installment of the introductory travels of McMammah, or "how did the product of comfortable, middle-class, Northeastern Republicans become a liberal Democrat railing against modern conservative Republicans?". If indeed one can use "modern" and "conservative Republican" in the same sentence. How did the transformation begin that turned that individual into a "middle-class, middle-aged male, mad as hell?"
As I came of age and went through early adulthood in the 1980's America was going through profound changes that haunt us even now. Being in the middle of the changes, and not extremely conversant with economic theories and politics, there was no real frame of reference for what was happening.  It is only with the passing of years, and the additional knowledge and perspective that should be products of those years, that you can make sense of the changes. Many of these were highlighted in previous installments.
There was one final episode that has haunted me to this day. At the time it was not viewed as having anything to do with politics or economics or public policy. No, as with too many of us, the analysis stopped at the nose in front of my face. It was viewed not as a public issue, but as a private failing.
First the background. My wife and I were married in 1985. We had met while both working for one of the major insurance companies that had its headquarters in the Hartford, CT area. By the time we were married my wife was still at this company, while I had moved on to work at another insurance company in Hartford. 
After being married for a little over a year we decided it was time to start a family. Sure enough we figured something out because soon my wife was expecting. It was during this time that the incident occurred.
Now while dating, and the first year or so of marriage, our tax returns, whether filed individually or jointly, were fairly unremarkable. Some years we owed a little in taxes, some years we got a little back in the form of a small refund. So sitting down to fill out our tax return was a chore and a nuisance, put off due to procrastination, not because it was cause for trepidation.
That changed the year my wife was expecting our first child.
I put off doing them as I always did until it was early April and they couldn't be delayed any longer. I went through the usual steps and got to the end and could not believe what I was looking at. We owed $2,700. 
Now I had heard that there had been some big tax law changes taking effect that year. But like most people paying some attention, but not close attention, I figured that was the extra $5 a paycheck I saw in my take home pay once the new tax law took effect. I had heard that the interest on credit card debt was no longer deductible, but we didn't have very high credit card balances at that time, so I thought nothing of it. 
My wife was unbelieving when I told her. I double-checked the math. She peppered me with questions. Had I included all the charitable donations? Medical expenses? Had I missed any deductions? We went over it and over it, but it kept coming out the same. Not a few hundred back or owing a few hundred. No, we owed $2,700.  And mind you between the two of us we probably had joint gross incomes of about $50,000 at the time. 
My biggest memory of that incident, the one etched forever in my brain, is of me sitting at the kitchen table, reviewing the 1040 packet, looking at all the instructions one last time, while my wife, approximately 5 or 6 months pregnant, sat on the couch sobbing and pleading out loud, "what did we do wrong? What did we do wrong?" 
We would need to dip into our investment and savings accounts from work. Moving into a larger house, and out of the multi-family home we were living in, would have to be pushed out to the future.
If you ever want to feel inadequate, or small, as a man, then sit there listening to your wife sobbing and wondering where you went wrong with something. And you have no answer for her.
And of course I thought I had screwed up. I had to, who else could it be? We had not changed anything on our tax forms and yet here we were looking at such a drastically different result than we had been experiencing. How could I not have known? How could I not have seen it coming?
Meanwhile at the office I discovered I was not the only person experiencing this tax liability shock. No, other co-workers, all college-educated, white collar professionals, mind you, were experiencing similar results. From the various conversations it was clear what the change had been. We had continued to claim ourselves as a dependent on our W-9 forms for withholding. Apparently with the big tax changes of the 1986 tax act that didn't work anymore. So yes you received a minuscule increase in your take home pay, but then you were clobbered on the tax tables when it was time to file. The only way out of this was to no longer claim yourself as a dependent. So my wife and I both changed our enrollment forms to claim zero dependents. And our take home pay dropped. But at least there were no major shocks on the next April 15th. 
And that's where things stood until I began to get engaged politically as my family grew and I worried not only about my future but those of my sons.  As I witnessed and experienced the upheavals hitting the American middle class, and as I read more about the dramatically rising incomes and wealth of those already at the top and the stagnant wages and salaries of the rest of us. As I sensed and then saw the evidence of shrinking opportunity for the average American. And then one day it hit me.
One day I realized I finally had an answer to my wife's plaintive pleading question from all those years ago. I finally knew where we had gone wrong. I finally knew what we had done wrong.
We had made the mistake of being middle class in Ronald Reagan's America. 

I read somewhere recently that soon there will not be anyone in the work force who remembers what it was like to work in America prior to 1980. In other words everyone in the work force will soon have no frame of reference with which to compare the current American workplace. Ronald Reagan's America will be considered the norm. That is a very frightening prospect.
I began working in January of 1980. So I had about a year of working before Ronald Reagan took office. Throughout the 1980's the changes to the American workplace began to take hold. It was just difficult to see what was going on when you were right in the middle of it. It is only now with the passing of time and the gained perspective that you see how far the American worker has fallen.
There used to be checks and balances in the American economy and the workplace. There was a sense that we were all in this together. There was an unspoken pact in the country for those of us working in white-collar non-union jobs. If you did your job and did it well you kept your job. Your compensation was based on two primary pieces, how well the company did and how well you did your job. 
When I began working we had a 40 hour work week. The first company I worked at that included a 45 minute lunch. So the actual amount of time you were expected to be "on the clock" was 36.25 hours a week. On top of that there was an unwritten rule that on payday you could take an extra 15 minutes for lunch in case you wanted to go to the bank across the street to deposit your paycheck. Automatic deposit was in its early stages at that point. 
The next company I went to was much smaller and not quite as generous. There you were only given half an hour for lunch. This meant you were expected to work 37.5 hours a week. They did have a nice little option though where you could work a 9 hour day instead of 8 hours. If you chose to do that you then took off every other Monday or every other Friday. 
As the 1980's unfolded though all of this began to change. The first sign I remember was how overtime rules began to change. Up until then you were expected to work your 40 hours (minus your lunchtime of course). The amount of work you were expected to produce was based on that formula. Not for long. 
After a while the corporate mantra was all about how we were professionals. Professionals aren't on the clock, they don't punch in and out, they do what's needed to get the job done. The amount of work expected of workers changed. Or sometimes the amount of work expected of your area stayed the same but the number of people in the area shrank due to layoffs or attrition without hiring replacements.
We began to hear the phrase "professional day". That was what you were now expected to work. And if that meant 10 or 12 hours a day then that's what you were expected to do. Lunches were taken away. Not literally, you were still allowed to eat. But you were now expected to work at least 40 hours and lunch time was extra, beyond the 40 hours. And if you couldn't get everything done in 40 hours, well see "professional day". 
Now people did have to work 40 hours or longer before Reagan. But there was overtime. If you were a certain level you received direct payment for extra hours worked. If you were above a certain level you received "comp time". This was time you could take off from work and still get paid, extra vacation time as it were, to account for those extra hours you worked beyond 40. Reagan changed that too. Companies could have you work 45 or 50 hour weeks and not have to compensate you in any way. It was a Brave New World and not a good one for the average worker. 
As I experienced these changes my mind drifted back to a conversation I had in a hallway one day in the mid-1980's. This was post-Patco strike where Reagan had broken the air traffic controller's union and signaled to corporations that it was a new day and the government and its power were on their side and not the side of workers and unions. Some of the signs of change were apparent but again not in a way where a young person like myself was catching on to what was happening.
I worked in an area where we were in one state and one of our main end user groups was in another state at a location about an hour or hour and a half away. A couple of people from that group came down every week. This one week one of the higher-ups was there as well, someone who maybe showed up once a month. It so happened that he and I happened to be alone in a little area for a few minutes and just started chatting.
He made the comment that he felt sorry for young guys like me who had so much of their careers in front of them. I found that puzzling but he continued. He said he had been in meetings and at seminars and it was a whole new attitude in the corporate world and management. He called it a hard-edged attitude toward workers. A "what have you done for me lately?" attitude. Workers were seen as nothing more than interchangeable expenses. 
For some reason that conversation stayed with me during the years. I think at first because it seemed so weird and to have come out of nowhere. Especially when I had started my professional career being told I had it made (see Travels of McMammah Part 3). Now it stays with me because I see how prescient it was. All the changes that were going to happen to the average American workers and families were foreshadowed in that grim assessment. 
America was changing and not for the better. 
 

My adult work life began at a major insurance company in January 1980. I was hired, after passing an aptitude test, to go through the computer programming training class. Like many corporations in the insurance/financial sector this company was expanding the number of programmers so that they could increasingly automate their operations. These companies were drowning in row after row of cabinets with paper forms.
It was a Presidential election year, but that was still almost a year away. We were still living in a country recognizable to anyone who had grown up post-World War II. A country where there was work if you wanted it, work that would pay the bills, and where if the company did well everyone shared in the good fortune. To bumper sticker it, we were still living in Franklin Roosevelt's America.
This was especially evident at this particular company. On my first or second day of employment I sat through the orientation film. The film of course related the history of this company. One point that was emphasized with pride was how nobody lost their job at this company during the Great Depression. There were no layoffs.
Now there were furloughs, and some people had to share jobs and/or be reduced to part-time work. The point was made though that everyone working for this company retained a position and at least a portion of their income at a time when so many people had nothing. It certainly made you feel good about the company you were working for and gave a certain sense of security.
I completed the training in computer programming and began working in one of the IT departments. Our training class had taken to meeting after work on Friday evenings at one of the local bars. I can still remember sitting there about that time, either as our class was nearing "graduation", or shortly thereafter as we had been dispersed throughout the company. One of our instructors had joined us. He was basically telling us young adults (mostly, there were some career changers in the mid-to-late 30's among us, but most of us were on our first job out of college) that we had it made if we wanted to make a life-long career of this.
"Just think of it", he said, "you're computer programmers, in an industry desperate to increase automation, at a company that didn't lay anyone off during the Great Depression!" Not an exact quote but pretty darned close.
So this is late winter or early spring 1980 when I'm sitting in the bar listening to this. I'm 23 years old and being told by an older established adult that if I do my job, and if I want to do this as a career, I am basically set for life.
By the mid to late 1980's all that had changed. I had moved to another insurance company still working as a computer programmer. Many people I knew though still worked at my former company. Then one day came the startling development. Layoffs. Massive layoffs. At the company that had not laid off anyone during the Great Depression.
Now it was different. There was increased competition we were told. Profits were being squeezed. There had to be streamlining and belt tightening. So hundreds of people were let go. You could see the shock on their faces as they were interviewed by local reporters on their way off the grounds. For those that car pooled or took the bus to work a fleet of taxi cabs was lined up outside the building to take them home. Courtesy of the company of course, princes that they were.   
The company that found a way to avoid laying off anyone during the Great Depression now had to lay off hundreds when it was allegedly "morning again" in America. To say the least people's entire world view was turned upside down.
It was unsettling for everyone in the area not just at that company. I can remember they called our entire application support team together a few months after these shocking layoffs. We were to have a special meeting in a conference room/auditorium on the top floor of the building. Luckily we had some inkling of what the meeting was about - an announcement that they were beginning analysis of what would be the next platform to replace the ancient application we were supporting. Still as one co-worker told us as we started to head up to the floor, "all I know is if I look out the window and see a line of taxis I'm not going up, I'll just leave the building."
The times they had changed. There was no context to it all yet, just that inner sense that things were different.  Context would come later with age and more experience.

When last we left McMammah on his journey he had progressed (in every sense of the word) from being the progeny of solid Northeastern Republicans to registering as a Democrat once he turned 18.
For a number of reasons - age, the times, personal sidetracks - politically I went dormant shortly after my 18th birthday. Oh sure I followed current events. There was still enjoyment in the horse race and numbers aspect of elections. The Presidential election of 1976 was followed with great interest. The contest between Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford seemed to echo the beneath the surface division at my college between graduates of public high schools and graduates from private schools. The "pubies" and the "preps". 
During the Democratic primaries I recognized that Morris Udall was the more liberal of the two main candidates and closer to my positions on many issues. But having suffered through the drubbing of 1972 with McGovern I wanted to win. That fight between principle and pragmatism was fully joined at a very young age. 
I was very pleased when Carter won, but admittedly lest enthused with his administration. He seemed okay personally and some of his policies were good. I still believe with climate change becoming increasingly alarming and important that he will be looked on very favorably by history as this was the only time in my adult life where I feel we had a coherent energy policy. But that's a topic for another day. 
Still you had to admit that he was not that effective as a leader. And so we got Reagan.
At this point I took a hiatus from politics. I did not like Reagan's policies. I think I could tell he basically was going to be good for rich people and not average ones like me. But my focus became getting a job and finding my way in the world.
A number of incidents occurred during Reagan's tenure that I did not think of in political terms at the time. At the time they seemed to be isolated separate events, but looking back they were emblematic of the changes that Reagan wrought, the transformation of our society from FDR's "we're all in this together", to the "you're on your own" philosophy that has guided the Republican Party and our economic and fiscal policies since Reagan took office. With hindsight I can now see what was happening to me personally and to our country. This is the foundation of what put the "MAH" (mad as hell) into McMammah.
These events and recollections will be examined in more detail in the next postings.

Where to begin? How about at the present.
I am middle-aged. How much middle and how much aged I'll leave to your imaginations. 
I am a white male born in the late 1950's to professional white collar parents. My father worked as an actuary at insurance companies. My mother was a registered nurse who stayed at home and raised four children. She returned to work part-time once the youngest child (not me, I'm number two in birth order though the oldest male child) was older and college tuition payments for the eldest child, my sister, drew closer.
Despite living on one income for most of the time the children were growing we always lived in a single family home in a decent neighborhood, went to decent neighborhood schools, had at least one car, and took family vacations. Oh the vacations. Some time remind me to tell you about the three week family trip to Europe, or the five to six week trip out West. Try taking those vacations today and see if you have a job to come back to.
My parents were Republicans. Northeastern United States Republicans. They supported Rockefeller. They voted for Goldwater even though they felt he was a little too far "out there". My mother despised FDR. Yet if asked my mother would label herself a liberal rather than conservative. She defined liberal as someone who was willing to change what was being done if it didn't seem to be working while a conservative would be more resistant to change. 
So as I grew older and started hitting the age where I could at least follow what was going on in the world I thought of myself as a Republican. That was "our side". That was who we were and so that's who I wanted to win. I also was interested in the drama and horse race side of politics. Beginning with 1968 I would stay up and watch the national party conventions. I stayed up as late as the news coverage would go in those pre-cable days. 
1968 is where the drift began. 
Ah 1968 and the sweet smells of rebellion and cannabis are in the air. Not that I was soaking up any cannabis mind you. I was still too young for that.
But the counterculture was in full swing. My heroes were Hendrix, Clapton, Stills, The Who. And the War. Vietnam. We all talked about it. The draft. Even though our 18th birthdays were years in the future the boys paid attention. We talked about it. Every year when they did the lottery and checked the paper to see where your birth date had fallen that year. One year if I had been 18 my birth day would have been #4. The choice would have been Vietnam or flee to Canada. Or hope for the student deferment like so many Republican chicken hawks obtained. 
One year in 6th grade the teacher asked and all but one or two of the boys said if they were called up for the draft they would go to Canada. Easy to say when you're in sixth grade. But it shows how aware we already were about the war and its potential impact on us.
And this is where the move began. My Republican parents did instill a sense of morality and fairness and justice to their children. Well they tried anyway. So we were prone to being sympathetic to the meek and mild, the poor, the disadvantaged, the downtrodden.
I looked around at the world. The war. The civil rights movement. The environmental movement. Wome's Lib. All of these causes resonated with me and a sense of justice. And on all the issues there was one political group that seemed to be on what I considered to be the correct side. Liberal Democrats. JFK. RFK. McGovern. McCarthy (Gene). These were the people fighting against the war, even though it was "institutional" Democrats like LBJ and Humphrey that were in power and administering the war. And while civil rights and the environment had strong bipartisan followings in that time, again liberal Democrats were in the forefront. 
And so my allegiance began to move. 
I'll admit on the civil rights issue at one point my young mind was puzzled. How could blacks and so many civil rights leaders seem to be going with Democrats? Why did so many blacks vote Democratic? After all the GOP was the party of Lincoln. The Democrats were the party of Jefferson Davis and Stephen Douglas. It didn't make sense to an immature mind. But the modern parties did seem to be switching roles.
And so by 1968 I found myself backing Democratic candidates for national office. Which I'm sure came as great comfort to them and great discomfort to the Republicans that they had lost this young pre-pubescent male. 
First it was Eugene McCarthy as he was the first to announce and take on the leader of his party, Lyndon Baines Johnson. After his strong showings forced LBJ to announce he would not seek reelection Bobby Kennedy entered the fray. I stayed with McCarthy out of my sense of young fairness. After all he had been there first and jumped in when it was riskier to do so.
This led to one of my most cherished moments with my Grandfather (on my father's side). He was an arch conservative, fan of Nixon and Goldwater. He was grilling steaks on the grill at his house on Cape Cod. We were visiting. It happened that I alone was out back at the grill with him. He asked me who I supported in the election. I responded "McCarthy". 
He roared. "McCarthy? McCarthy supporters get hot dogs. Everyone else gets the steaks!" 
I then responded, "that's alright Grandpa, I like hot dogs." 
He shot back with finger extended toward me, "good for you! Stick to your guns! Always stand up for what you believe!" 
Looking back with adult hindsight I wish I had backed RFK. He went beyond just being anti-war. I believe he may have been a transformational political leader. He could appeal to blacks, working class whites, anti-war youth, in a way other candidates could not. How different America would have looked after a Bobby Kennedy presidency instead of Nixon and his Southern Strategy and Watergate. Bobby appealing to our better angels, Tricky Dick playing on fear and suspicion. Our world and nation would look very different today I believe and in a very positive way.
So by 1968 my transformation was underway. Through the 1970 and 1972 election cycles it was complete. My first political experience was working at the local Democratic headquarters making calls to out of town students for absentee ballots and dropping campaign literature at selected houses. I even wrote a letter to the editor on behalf of George McGovern. "George Will Do It" is the title the local paper put over the letter. Judging by the returns few, if any, found its arguments persuasive.
If my move to the Democratic Party had not been complete, Nixon and Watergate insured it was. 
I sat riveted during the Senate committee hearings and later the House Judiciary committee hearings. Nixon was trying to steal and undermine our democracy and had to be stopped. Again who was leading the charge? Liberal Democrats. Heroes were made such as Barbara Jordan. A few brave Republican souls put country before party - but most of them ended up paying a political price and being punished for such audacity. 
And so after my 18th birthday as I went to the high school library to register at a special school registration event I proudly told the registrar I would register as a Democrat.