http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6BLKV7L8OU
This video was forwarded to me a few hours ago, and I imagine now it is making its way across the screens and speakers of computers all over the world. It is a powerful, moving piece - corny, too - but it will likely affect people by giving them an injection of hope. My 90 year-old mom said to me yesterday that she wishes I'd gotten a job in Canada...she is feeling depressed about the state of the world, as almost all critically thinking people are these days. I recognize that we are in for a helluva ride in the coming year. All plans are off for what will transpire with the coming election. If the Republicans steal this one, again, will the people rise up? If the Dems win, will the crazies in the hinterlands start a violent civil war? How are the various factions adding up the score these days? T, our neighbor, who comes twice a month to help us control the dust in our house, is paranoid. She tells me stories about the M13 and, I, in my ignorance, thought she was talking about a new automatic weapon. No, she said, it's a violent gang that is trying to take over the world. They are currently in deep conflict with the gangs in LA. M13 apparently originated with the Contras. I imagine it is being fed by all sorts of groups, the leaders of our coup d'etat (or rogue goverment, if you prefer, a gentler name for it) included. T said she won't leave the island anymore due to the proliferation of guns and violence. I wonder how much fear you need to swallow before you become emotionally and physically paralyzed in that way. I wonder how many of us privileged folks are walking around in a delirium, taking our meds (well, I take my vitamins, thank you), and blissfully unaware of the brutality under our noses.
I guess this wondering will have to wait a bit. I have the last bits of my book to wrap up...assuming anyone will be reading such things come the winter. Time seems to be shortening rapidly.
Watch the video. It will cheer you up, as long as you don't think a leader will save us...it's us who's got save us, by making the leader work for us.
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2 comments:
Hi Beverly.
Yes, the video is moving. I also feel the USA is in a very tight spot. In 2004, I said the election was 1856 all over again. We ended up with another Buchanan. 2008 = 1860. Not in terms of slavery, etc., obviously - but more in terms of sheer importance.
The essential issue is this: whoever gets elected / selected / ends up in office is going to be the leader of a massive Empire hellbent for Saturday in its despotic thirst for resources.
This was all laid out a decade ago, and was the kind of stuff I was discussing when I was at Goddard 2001 - 2003 (my how time flies!) It's about resources and it's about global influence in order to obtain resources.
Here are the documents:
THE COLLAPSE OF COMPLEX SOCIETIES
by Joseph Tainter, Cambridge, 1990
Examines how societies collapse from resource failure, and retreat from highly complex societies to simpler organisations.
GEODESTINIES
by Walter Youngquist (prof em, Oregon), National Books, 1997
- exhaustive research on every resource, explaining its sourcing and extraction outlook. Recently updated, just this month, Aug 2008.
THE END OF CHEAP OIL
by Colin J. Campbell and Jean H. Laherrère, Scientific American, March 1998
http://tinyurl.com/4wfekp
- The low down on the energy situation, as viewed in 1998.
Note: when you read that article, remember oil production has been flat since 2005.
CHINA DEBATES the
FUTURE SECURITY ENVIRONMENT
by Michael Pillsbury, January 2000
National Defense University Press
- based on docs from China's military, gives an overview of unipolar vs. multipolar geopolitical systems. Doesn't account for energy problems, but the next doc does...
RESOURCE WARS: THE NEW LANDSCAPE OF
GLOBAL CONFLICT
by Prof. Michael T Klare, Holt, 2002.
- examines in detail how energy and resources will spark future conflicts, rather than ideologies.
THE PARTY'S OVER: OIL, WAR, AND THE
FATE OF INDUSTRIAL SOCIETIES.
by Richard Heinberg, New Society, 2005.
- what it says. Kind of like Tainter, but more specific.
COLLAPSE
by Jared Diamond
- takes up where Tainter leaves off, examines how certain and specific societies failed due to their failure in resources.
Those pretty much explain EXACTLY where we are at. Frankly, there is no "hope" for the USA. Any hope for the USA, to paraphrase JH Kunstler will come from people working hard and working really well, and doing the right thing, and THIS will build confidence and bring "hope". But HOPE for America? In its present configuration? No. Way.
Obama, if he's lucky, will prove to be the Gorbachev of the American Empire - the last leader of a nation gone completely off the rails and into the weeds - a nation so proud of its own idiocy that it will try to drag everyone along down with it.
Obama, and leaders like him, will facilitate a slower crash, a more gradual collapse from unipolar domination to regional hegemony. McCain and leaders like him will simply drive the country directly off a cliff, ASAP.
But make no mistake: Obama will do whatever he must to keep the lights on at home and the Empire running smoothly, even as it builds down and burns up every last resource on earth. Obama is a dramatic improvement over the present junta. But just because he's better - even A LOT better - than the present bunch of gangsters, doesn't make him "good".
HW
Oh - here's a good article on "the Future":
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174967/john_feffer_the_view_from_2016
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