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

Thursday, May 28, 2015

TPP Sovereignty Challenge

Click here if you wish to access the transcript of this 6:28m video interview with Michael Hudson, Prof. of Economics, from Real News Network.

The interview begins this way:
PERIES: Michael, what do you make of this fast-track legislation?

HUDSON: It’s appalling. It’s so bad that when I try to describe it to professors who are not economists or to foreigners they can’t believe that there’s actually a law that is classified as secret. That the congressmen and senators can only read by making an appointment, reading in secret, without taking notes. That they will be accused under national security legislation if they tell anybody what it’s all about. It’s amazing, what is happening is of such a great magnitude, that people are not out in the streets.