Outline of U.S. History/Bridge to the 21st Century As we look
ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower
others. Microsoft co-founder and chairman Bill Gates, 2007 The
strongest democracies flourish from frequent and lively debate,
but they endure when people of every background and belief find
a way to set aside smaller differences in service of a greater
purpose. President Barack Obama, 2009 For most Americans the
1990s would be a time of peace, prosperity, and rapid
technological change. Some attributed this to the “Reagan
Revolution” and the end of the Cold War, others to the return of
a Democrat to the presidency. During this period. the majority
of Americans—political affiliation aside—asserted their support
for traditional family values, often grounded in their faiths.
New York Times columnist David Brooks suggested that the country
was experiencing “moral self-repair,” as “many of the indicators
of social breakdown, which shot upward in the late 1960s and
1970s, and which plateaued