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, January 28, 2017

2 ½ Minutes to Midnight – Our World in Peril

Click here to access article by Robert Dodge from Common Dreams.
Nuclear weapons and climate change represent a clear and present danger. Retired Marine Corps General Anthony C. Zinni,  former commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East has stated, "We will pay for climate change one way or another. We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today, and we'll have to take an economic hit of some kind. Or, we will pay the  price later in military terms. And that will involve human lives. There will be a human toll."

We know what needs to be done and how to do it yet no one in a leadership role has shown the political courage to take the necessary steps.
This piece from the liberal website Common Dreams looks at two dire issues confronting humans, but their narrow ideological belief in, and support for, the status quo (the reign of capitalism) forces an uncritical reader into accepting their conclusion: appealing to the government of the capitalist ruling classes to behave themselves. This is an utter delusion. This is engaging in childish fantasy-thinking that no politically aware adult should be doing. 

The underlying problem that insures that both fates await us is a system that requires growth on a finite planet in order to exist and, at the same time, offers abundant rewards to a tiny class of people who rule over humanity and whose rule is sustained by that system. Because there is only one major problem, there is only one major solution! It's only the means to accomplish this solution that needs to be solved by humans. We must spend our time on that urgent task instead of being lead by those loyal to capitalism down dead-end roads that only lead to hell and our extinction.