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, April 19, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Monday, April 19, 2021

If past is prologue, which we pray it is not, the hearings will use such a buckshot approach to questioning the witnesses that there will be no meaningful takeaway to the public from the hearings.
 
Later they go on to argue:
 
While each of these issues are critical to the national debate, dumping them all into one hearing where the Congressional questioner together with the witness get just a combined five minutes does a disservice to the seriousness of each issue. In fact, this approach has served to hold back change on Wall Street as news reporters simply grab the single most titillating detail from each hearing and put that in a headline. 
 
I argue that the purpose of the hearings will be to give the appearance that Congresspeople are protecting the people from the shenanigans of the major financial institutions. The bank CEOs are closer to the ruling capitalist class (if not a part of it) than the Congresspeople who are treated as mere employees of the ruling class. 
  • Opium poppy production in Afghanistan from Global Research. (Note: This article is posted on Esri a company that is devoted to "A geographic information system (GIS) is a framework for gathering, managing, and analyzing data." However, because there is no date or an author on this post which originated from Esri, I have decided to post it from Global Research as an exception to my usual policy to post articles from their original websites.
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