We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, August 6, 2011

The Biggest Criminals Are Out of Sight: Shop and Shoot America

Click here to access article by Linh Dinh from Counterpunch.

The author sees signs of social disintegration gripping American society and explains how it relates to the interests of the military-industrial complex.
...one in six Americans is on food stamps, and more and more Americans are losing jobs, including teachers, firemen and cops, as unemployed and deranged teens run wild in “flash mobs” to beat up random strangers. It has happened repeatedly in Philadelphia, my neck of the woods, as well as Chicago, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Boston, Brooklyn, South Orange and Greensboro. There are racial and class components to this phenomenon, as these wilding youngsters are invariably poor blacks converging on white shopping districts.