The Rise and Fall of Liberalism

In Camelot and the Cultural Revolution, James Piereson asserts that, as the 1960s began, liberalism was the single most creative and vital force in American politics and that the Kennedy assassination caused a split within this movement between its more traditional supporters and cultural activists that still exists today. Peter Robinson explores with Piereson how and why this happened -- how a confident, practical, forward-looking philosophy with a heritage of accomplishment was thus turned into a doctrine of pessimism and self-blame, with a decidedly dark view of American society.