what was americas mood in 1994-1995?

[Student]

I am doing a project and I already goggled it and need help. what were the "big ideas" and "feelings" of these years? what was the mood like? what was society like?

[jeffrey f]

The mood at that time was not good, but getting better.

The economy was coming out of a recession, but it was taking time for the boom to be felt by everyone.

There was not a lot going on in the world and America was adjusting to life after the Cold War; there was a lack of focus.

[tuffy]

The mood was pensive. The Soviet Union was gone, but the nations of Eastern Europe was coming out of fifty years of Soviet domination. Such areas of Bosnia and Serbia were in a state of flux and people who had only their selfish interests in mind were causing problems that drew America into the conflicts. It was 4 years since Dessert Storm and Hussein was becoming a threat to Middle East peace, once again. President Clinton was reacting to some incidents by firing missiles into certain hot spots, but not committing any ground forces in the Middle East.




One of the major concerns at that time were computer viruses and how much damage they could cause. Actually there was panic among government leaders in the U.S., Fortune 500 companies, and the big banks regarding viruses. Many turned out to be a hoax, but not all of them.

[Sub Ponte]

If you already goggled it then you have all the information that could possibly be produced about this subject. Just hand in whatever results you goggled and Bob's your uncle.

[staisil]

In the 1990's the United States played the role of world policeman, sometimes alone but more often in alliances. The decade began with Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and the resultant Gulf War. In 1993, war was in the African country of Somalia, as television images of starving children led to an attempt to oust the warlord, General Mohamed Farrah Aidid. By September, 1994, the U.S. was once again sending troops to a foreign country to overthrow a military dictatorship, this time in Haiti. In 1996 about 20,000 American troops were deployed to Bosnia as part of a NATO peace keeping force. In late March 1999, the U.S. joined NATO in air strikes against Yugoslavia in an effort to halt the Yugoslavian government's policy of ethnic cleansing in its province of Kosovo. The decade was to end much as it began with U.S. forces deployed in many countries, and the U.S. playing arbitrator, enforcer, and peace keeper throughout the world.
The 90s have been called the Merger Decade. On the domestic front some big issues were health care, social security reform, and gun control - debated and unresolved throughout the whole decade. Violence and sex scandals dominated the media starting with the Tailhook affair in which Navy and Marine Corps fliers were accused of sexually abusing 26 women. President Clinton kept the gossip flowing as several women accused him of sexual misconduct. The ten years ended with this president narrowly surviving a trial to remove him from office for perjury and obstruction of justice. President Clinton's escapades were proving to be a hindrance to his Vice President Al Gore's campaign for the oval office and polls were reporting that 70% of the American people were saying that they were "tired of the Clintons".
Violence seemed a part of life. In 1992 South-Central Los Angeles rioted after four white policemen were acquitted of video-taped assault charges for beating a black motorist, Rodney King. 1993 brought terrorism to the American shores as a bomb was detonated in the garage beneath the World Trade Center. That same month of February saw four agents of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms killed during an unsuccessful raid on the Branch Davidian cult compound in Waco, Texas led by David Koresh. Americans were glued to their TV sets in 1995 as the football hero, O.J. Simpson, was tried for the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole, and her male friend, Ron Goldman. This trial pointed out the continued racial division in the country as most blacks applauded the not guilty verdict while most whites thought an obviously guilty man had gotten away with murder. The shock of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19,1995, was compounded by the revelation that the perpetrators were not foreign terrorists but were U.S. citizens led by a U.S. Army veteran, Timothy McVeigh. In the months between February 1996 and April 1999 there were at least fourteen incidents of school shootings with the most lethal being on April 20, 1999 when 14 students and 1 teacher were killed and 23 wounded at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado.

There was good news, too. The booming economy led to record low unemployment. Minimum wage was increased to $5.15 an hour. The stock market reached an all time high as individuals learned to buy and trade via the internet. Americans enjoyed the country's affluence by traveling more (up 40% since 1986), by reveling in sporting events such as the Atlanta Summer Olympics -1996, and by "consuming" as never before. America faced the new millennium with an open, diversified society, a functioning democracy, a healthy economy, and the means and will, hopefully, to face and overcome its problems.