There used to be a saying, "God's in his heaven, all's right with the world!" Never, in my lifetime, has there been a period where it has been "all's right with the world!" In all my years on this planet I have never known a time when there hasn't been a war, never.

The reason the west is in the doldrums and the developing countries are charging ahead is because the west sent most of their manufacturing jobs to the developing countries in the 1960's - how's that for cutting your own throat?

I'd like to think I'd learned something about human behaviour over my lifetime and to help where I can. We used to take in runaway teenagers, put them in sleeping bags on the floor when necessary. The only thing I asked of them is that they phone their parents and tell them where they were. Without exception --- without exception --- of the umpteen children my husband and I helped, not one parent wanted the child back, not one! Couldn't handle them was the biggest response. Couldn't handle their own child! Forgive me for being cynical, or negative toward society, but most of societies ills could have been avoided if parents had learned how to be parents to their children. As to living in a golden age - what a load of rubbish!