Generation X Takes On the Gerontocracy

‘I ’m not decrepit” is the answer, more or less, that Nikki Haley gives as her reason for running for president.

It’s a sentiment that we heard previewed last week by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who contrasted herself — the youngest governor in America — with President Joe Biden, the oldest commander in chief.

Youth can’t help but be a contrast in an America that is run by a Boomer and Silent Generation gerontocracy. On the very day that Nikki Haley announced for president, Senator Dianne Feinstein (age 89) had her retirement announced. When asked about it by reporters, she seemed not to know that the announcement had gone out, possibly not even knowing it had been decided. Joe Biden falls off bicycles, and up the stairs. America itself seems to be having a senior moment, a failure of cognition that is leading us to shoot down harmless balloons as if they were spies sent from our Oriental foes. Walking into the halls of power, one smells the whiff of talcum powder and hears the arthritic clatter of fingers diving for Werther’s Originals in a piece of Waterford china.

Really, the fact that Nikki Haley — at age 51 — can pose as the voice of a new generation is enough of an indictment itself. Bill Clinton was 46 years old when he was elected in 1992, and the Boomers came into full power. The media helped Clinton’s youth campaign with appearances on MTV and Arsenio Hall’s show. It made up fake stories about George H. W. Bush being confused by bar-code checkout machines. Bill Clinton was always going to win a contest for which candidate is most willing to tell you: boxers or briefs?

But “youth” can’t be a brand in itself. There needs to be a reason for the nation to need generational turnover. For Kennedy, it had been the advent of power for the men who risked their bodies in World War II. It was also the acknowledgment, nearly a century after they came in force, of the great waves of 19th-century immigrants taking their full share of leadership in American life.

What then is left for Haley? Her ad invokes racial and ethnic diversity and pockets it as a point of pride before moving on to an orthodox conservative approach of simple love of country. “On our worst day, we are blessed to live in America.”

The plausible case she makes for generational change is that Republicans have lost the popular vote in seven out of the last eight presidential elections. “I’m electable.” Maybe even, “I won’t make you cringe.”

Generation X is now the most conservative age group in America. It’s also a tiny ship compared to the behemoth Boomers and Millennials. Of all people, the shock novelist Bret Easton Ellis gave a recent explanation for why his is the most conservative generation.

I think part of the reason why Gen X is the most conservative of the generations — much more than boomers, much more than millennials — is that we had the most freedom. We looked to be shocked. We wanted to be offended. We loved dirty jokes. We loved music.

But today, the world has to be childproof. And you have to think like the better people. I didn’t experience that. So I think part of the reason why Gen X is 10 to 12 points more conservative in the polls in the US is precisely because of this reaction against this kind of authoritarian language.

Gen X is supposed to be the skeptical generation. They are held to be more immune to radicalisms, slick advertising, and moral panics. Boomers have had a long, unedifying grip on power, damaging both major parties and many other national institutions along the way. Millennials have reacted to it all like radicals. Their youthful precociousness has curdled into know-it-all dogmatism. Boomers take drugs to function in bed or on the toilet. Millennials took hard drugs to function at grammar school. Gen X is the only one sensible enough to take drugs because they get you high.

The argument for Generation X’s political reign must be that a generation that is aloof is the closest thing we have to one that’s wise, a generation that is jaded is the closest thing we have to one that is temperate. If we can’t have the virtues of great leadership, maybe we can have the vibes.