with the Fall of Saigon in 1975 on one end, and Reagan’s second term in 1986, on the other—we see a pervasive shift in the collective psyche from the optimistic and communitarian idealism of the sixties counterculture to a reactionary and fear-based culture obsessed with the threat of various kinds of religious and moral evil. This period sees Reagan’s Manichaean characterization of the Soviet Union as the “evil empire,” the beginning of the “war on drugs,” OPEC’s “stranglehold” on American oil, and “America held hostage” in the Iran hostage crisis.
