what @Missy_Pants said. take us all with a grain of salt, you just manged to find a subject we like to gripe about. i can’t see where anything was aimed specifically at you.
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Oh, lucky me then!
*lolz
It’s all good.
Like I said, I’ll just chalk it up as a “learning experience.”
Thanks again.
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I’m a Gen-Xer/Baby Buster (February 1972.) Though I pity the poor sales-and-marketing fool that tries to pigeonhole me with that info, as I’m not sure I’ve ever fit into that stereotypical generational mold. 
When my classmates were all about Madonna, I was rocking out to Cyndi Lauper. I don’t kid myself that I’m that far outside the curve, but I’ve always kind of done my own thing.
Though there’s also something to be said for the generation gap. A few years back one of my younger co-workers rattled off the names of a few bands she really liked. Then she told me, “I’m not sure you’d recognize them. They’re pretty old.” I replied, “I know those bands. They were popular when I was in high school.” She looked stunned for a second. 
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Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
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No, that was perfect!
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Here’s a Melz-crafted original “like”, since I seem to have used up my “daily supply” already…
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Coincidence?
I’m a millennial, but I feel old teaching kids 15 years younger than me. We didn’t have a TV or much access to the outside world before I was a teenager, and I generally listened to boomer music in my teens, so there aren’t a lot of things that would make me identify with other millennials (cheap flights and job insecurity, perhaps?).
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I think you just outed yourself as an X-er. 
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Am I the only person left on earth that remembers the media making fun of Vice-President Bush for being amazed at the laser-scanners in supermarket checkouts? Since they were nearly 10 years old at that point, it pointed out how rich and disconnected from everybody else’s reality he was?
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Duh, Bush was President, not Vice-President, granddad.
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I totally remember it. It was very illuminating and possibly a pivotal moment pushing me toward becoming the social democrat I am today.
@daneel: He was running for president when this happened, young one.
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Snopes disagrees.
It doesn’t make him either a good person or president, but it does seem that that specific situation was a bit more nuanced.
I do seem to remember an interview with him (or Barbara) after he ceased to be president where they commented on his infatuation with Sam’s Club, and it seemed to relate to this incident in some way.
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I think what you’re missing is that some of us saw the incident in question on the national news the day it happened. With or without the recorded audio, he looked like a clueless, privileged horse’s ass.
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He probably is. I’m in no way apologizing for him. Until today, I had held that incident as being true, but had never thought to look into it further. I was just trying to add context, not change anyone’s mind
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Watch for yourself.
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I must not become nostalgic. Nostalgia is the mind-killer. Nostalgia is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my nostalgia. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the nostalgia has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
Different times:
Having sampled the ways of the American shopper, Mr. Bush tried to identify with the American bad mood.He pounded a lectern and raised his voice. He accused “professional pessimists” in Congress of conducting class warfare by criticizing some of his programs as favoring the wealthy. He talked sarcastically about advisers who urged him to get “the right political ring” into his oratory and his policy proposals. And he told jokes.
Reminding the audience of his “love for sports,” Mr. Bush added: “And this being an election year, my competitive juices are flowing more than ever. And so today I’m making an announcement that many of you have been expecting for a long time. I am officially declaring my entry into your best-bagger contest. Just one question – paper or plastic?”
Mr. Bush acknowledged that the nation had “run into some hard times,” but told the grocers not to listen to “professional pessimists” who he said “tell us America has become weak and disabled – that our economy has fallen and it can’t get up.”
“Well, that’s plain bunk!” the President said, his voice rising and his fist pounding the lectern.
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Another nail in his re-election coffin, that. The country was in a recession at that time. The “no new taxes” thing was pretty much the final nail. Ross Perot doused the coffin with lighter fluid and tossed a match at it. Voila! Bill Clinton gets elected president.
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I’m not sure this is a good citation because even Snopes discusses the mixed implications of this event. Was Bush amazed or not? The NY Times says yes, Newsweek say no. At best, Snopes points out that different people see different things when viewing the video.
I also have a distinct recollection of this Bush incident and watching this particular footage (19 at the time, and from a politically active family). I specifically remember that Bush thought milk was less expensive that what he saw in the scanner, and that the new technology was so effective in identifying a plethora of items. I (and many others) took this to mean that Bush had never done his own shopping, and hence he was out of touch with what most Americans pay for the most basic items.
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An early X-er. Growing up we were taught to fear nuclear war and ring-around-the-collar. Not necessarily in that order.
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