Like the president, who turns 50 on Aug. 4, I belong to a generation that expected a racial utopia.

Despite the doomsayers, there are nondegree jobs that will ensure a prosperous future.

This week on The Confab: Dorothy Height's funeral and the end of an era. The racial shorthand of "victim studies" in the reparations debate, Clybourne Park and the complexities of gentrification, and Guru, Mos Def and reconciling the black middle class in the hip-hop community. Join The Root's managing editor as he talks with media and culture writer Natalie Hopkinson and regular contributor to The Root Stanley Crouch.

* Podcast production by Abdullah Rufus.

* Podcast theme music by Timothy Morrison.

There's a hunger for the full cake, a "Great Society" redux where some in the White House are oddly convinced (in defiance of history) that war can be maintained during domestic economic crunch.  Certainly, the argument of inheritance from the previous Administration (and, perhaps, the Gatsby-like bubble boom of the Administration before that) is a strong one.  We don't discount that. But, in the end, President Truman's buck-stopping dogma rules the day.  What ultimately matters is how this President responds to it.