McCain is 68.  Born in 1936.  He is a member of the Silent Generation.  Here's how non-descript the silent generation is.  If you Google "Silent Generation" the first two hits are articles about the GI generation.  It is the story of their lives - ever overshadowed by missed opportunity and flat out smallness.  There were only about 50 million of them compared to almost 50% more GI and Boomers.  They were the bland bologna lost in between two slices of bread (one white, one wheat).

Without a doubt the most famous members of the Silent generation are partially famous for dying young.  If you think of famous Americans who died at the peak of their undefined glory....  give it a second and you'll name a blond chick named Monroe and a slicked back dude named Dean, James Dean.  Oh, and in case you came up with Elvis instead of James Dean, don't worry, he was a Silent Generation guy too.  Same thing if you thought of MLK jr.

What trivia is always placed on the Silent generation?  The fact they never elected a President.  Kennedy to Bush sr were all GI Generation and then Clinton forward has been Boomers.  Obama is a Boomer.

McCain's generation is characterized by a lack of decisiveness, following rather than leading and being, for lack of other labels frustrated by their inability to find a cause.  The fact that James Dean starred in a movie about a rebel without a cause is almost perfect in a singular summary of 50 million Americans.

McCain has an incredible amount of generational history to overcome.  In many ways Obama was given a gift when the Republicans turned to a member of a group, sorry to say, who are political ballast.  Space takers, role fillers, but not a generation with any experience at the rudder.  If McCain wins, it will be, from a generational perspective, a miracle.

The project manager that oversaw the re-development efforts of downtown Indianapolis claimed the entire project got done because of chocolate chip cookies.  He explained that at each project meeting (attended by all the municipalities - city, police, fire, building contractors, etc) that at the beginning of each meeting he handed out hot chocolate chip cookies....  with a catch.  If you needed a favor, say the building contractor needed Meridian Street closed, you had to give your cookie to them (in this case the police rep).  During the meeting, if you needed 3 favors, you had to do at least 2 for someone else and 3 if you wanted to eat a cookie, too. 

This process, while resisted a bit at the beginning turned into a wonderful swap meet -- kids swapping baseball cards, if you will.  And it was a badge of courage to walk out of the meeting with 4 cookies - it said you were valuable and people needed you.

So, at your next meeting, when cooperation is a bit low, crank up the cookie machine!!

My favorite T-Shirt, while a bit irreverent, reminds us that we have plenty of time, if we use it wisely...

"It's Not That Life Is Short....  You're Just Dead So Darn Long"

This speaks to me, ignoring any spirituality issues to the fact that with an average lifespan in America approaching 80 years, we really do have a lot of time to create our own reality.

Generally the generation is a buy-product of the culture - one's personality is shaped by genetics and/or a very small circle of influencers by the age of 3, 5 at the latest.  But a persons approach toward society is shaped about 8-18 as the child becomes aware of the impacts of technology, government, entertainment, the economy and "milestone events" (Challenger Exploding, Landing on the Moon, 9/11, Pearl Harbor, etc).  The GI generation is so fun to talk about because they are a huge paradox - the same group that wanted small government and came up with the acronyms SNAFU and FUBAR in reference to government ineptitude flourished under government aid.

One could/would argue that 9/11 was "the great depression" and society/culture changed on that day.  We took a very nurtured and pampered generation of kids and cocooned them even more -- like every generation, it tends to lash out and be "counter" to their parental influences.  In theory, todays teens will be very pragmatic, very inclusive, and distrustful of the institutions supported by their parents.  So far, the trend is hard for us to recognize, because by definition we don't understand it ( the inevitable role of the dumb, not with it, dad) but todays kids are "all in this together" in the same way the GI generation was in it together.  It's just that "it" is different - todays kids grew up in such a techno life they don't know life without it.  Technology to them is for "sharing" whereas we Boomers view technology as infringing on our freedoms and sharing "too much" information.  Todays kids see technology as a friend forming opportunity to expand community.  This generation will be the one, to quote in a new context, President Reagan "tear down this wall" and crawl out of the cocoon the controlling Boomers built around them.  They will be sick of play dates and want to make their own friends so to speak.  Those walls may be geographic, national, generational, racial, or the wall of the human genome.  We will, with the luck of a long life, find out.