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

Monday, December 7, 2020

Posts that I especially recommend today: Monday, December 7, 2020

Obviously, I don't agree with several arguments he makes, but I vigorously defends his right to express his views. I argue that he makes two fundamental mistakes. The first, it is not Big Pharma, etc. that is wrecking harm on this country and a number of others. It's Big Capitalism. The capitalist system which affirms the rights of private parties to own and control economic property portends what we have today: the overwhelming concentration of wealth and power in a very few hands. It is inevitable. Eventually the ruling capitalist classes must resort to ever greater amount of fascist-like control--censorship and manipulation of information which are the hallmarks of neofascism.
The second mistake he makes is that he assumes--no doubt, he learned this in schools--that we live in a democracy. It could be thought of as a capitalists' version of democracy, but it definitely isn't any real democracy where the people decide conflicting issues. Capitalism is the inverse of real democracy. The system gives power in the form of ownership and control over the economy to private individuals and their families.
  • An International Message of Hope for Humanity From RFK, Jr. featuring Robert Kennedy, Jr. asking for your support for his struggle against Big Capitalism (no, it's not Big Pharma,  Big Data, Big Oil, etc. (15:37m). Posted on Children's Health Defense. My reaction: Kennedy makes two fundamental errors and I've already pointed to one. The second is that capitalism is in contradiction to any real democracy. Allowing one class to privately own and control the economy is the other. Over time the system inevitably results in the concentration of power in a few hands that we see today. Thus, what we have is a fake democracy.
  • Richest 1% own 43% of global wealth, while billions have no wealth at all by Michael Roberts from Climate & Capitalism. My reaction: Under capitalism, ownership means control. Thus capitalists control 43% of economic decisions. I think this understates capitalist control of the world's economy which, I think, is much larger. But this is another indication that capitalists, who merely bet on, and loan money to, competing corporations that are largely run by comfortable and highly trained upper-middle-class technical workers, have won the war against the lower working classes and small business operators. However, due to the ever increasing attacks by corporations, the engines of capitalist accumulation, on the Earth's ecosystem, their victory will be of a Pyrrhic kind which will end in the extinction of humans and most other species. 
Recently this tiny group of capitalists has entertained fantasies about escaping to another planet after they have ruined Earth. However, because they ("capitalists", "oligarchs", "billionaires", etc.) are also humans which have evolved on planet Earth and there is no other planet like ours in which they can realistically access, these are just fantasies.
  • Infinite Spiders by John Steppling from his weblog. (Note: He gathers many of the most profound thinkers to offer insights, including his own, on the post-WWII development of our societies under capitalist ruling classes.) My reaction: I only scanned this article, but I gather from this scan that Steppling argues that advanced technology is being used by capitalist ruling classes for their own benefit (power and profits) instead of the benefit of the vast majority of people on our planet. I totally agree with him. Technology is neutral. It can be used for the benefit of people in general or it can be used by self-serving groups of people. Capitalism is a system that has used technology for the almost exclusive benefit of a tiny group of transnational capitalists located predominately in the powerful US/Anglo/Zionist Empire.
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