Stone Cold Pimpin'

Some thoughts on the turning of history
I read somewhere last week about how the illegal war for oil will be a historical event, not a political one (I think it was in Salon; maybe somebody can tell me), for true historical events change everything (whereas political events (Gulf War One) change things only a little). At least that was the point I think was made.
Anyway, my point, or my musing, is how this illegal war will be a historical event. The BushJunta is determined to recast this war as World War II all over again. If the Gulf War erased the "mistakes" (i.e. the protests, the bad feeling) of Vietnam, I think these old Hawks want to erase the Cold War, to bring us back to an obvious Nazi-like enemy, and a triumphant America that goes in and establishes dominance over the world--the full world, mind you, not the half that the Commies didn't take. Hence, no real surprise that the Bushies' PR people are cooking up these "Movietone" propaganda reels for consumption.
Let's also assume that we don't all get vaporized. Let's also assume that America doesn't turn into a totalitarian police state. What happens to our culture? Will everything before the war become unfashionable, so much a part of "the past" that it will start to look like "history" (in quotes). Is this the cut-off point for the century? Will all rock and pop music, and the hope it exudes, feel like naive rubbish? Will we be unable to watch TV shows and movies that are not situated in a wartime context, because the feelings expressed will seem so alien? (I had this experience when watching the Cherry Orchard, which became the crux of my review--none of the actors seemed to connect to the play's sense of a future, any future, instead playing everything comic and futile, like the butler that is left in the house at the end of the play.
Don't forget that the extreme right see the rise of youth culture (which reached its quick apex in the '60s) as all that went wrong in America. If they can turn back that clock, and all that youth culture has spawned, then they have won a decisive victory.
Question for further thought: what works of art (low- or high-brow) will comfort us post illegal war? What legends will be diminished, who will be reassessed?