I wish it were always this good. I am feeling what I suspect many, if not most, of you are feeling. Relief, anticipation, fatigue, and so many more complex thoughts and emotions. The beast has been turned back for now. Since the beast is anything but rational what will it mean? Is it capable of learning? Will it simply lick its wounds and then hope we are off guard and come at us again? We did well. Actually in my 76 years I have not seen better. That means but one thing. We are at another starting point. We CAN go forward now. The beast will be a problem, at this moment an unknown. We do have so much work to do. The planet, the devastation from Sandy and the devastation from the gridlock and so much more. How do we overcome what we face? We need jobs yet any of us who are at all realistic know that the capitalism that brought us here is more the problem than the solution. We know the planet is telling us that the cancer we have become will be attacked by its immune system. We know that our isolation and hubris have cost us dearly. So what is next? Read on below and I'll try to suggest what might be part of it.
I have been beating a drum for a long time. Jim Coffman and I wrote a book that spells some of it out. The final corrected drafts were in today so it is a matter of days. I only say this because I want you to understand that this diary is not isolated. It is part of a story I am trying to tell. I don't care if you agree but I do care if you choose to sleep through what is coming.
Times are going to be rough. So much is in flux right now. No one has a good crystal ball. The global economy is in flux. The meaning of nations is in flux. The way we will survive as a species is even open to question. We focus on the past because the future becomes harder to visualize by the day. Yet the past only tells us how we got here. It points out how blind and unknowing we really are. It is not simply a matter of looking back and correcting our mistakes for as we made them we changed things forever!
There are some things we can gain from looking back. We can see the damage our hubris and arrogance have caused. We can see that the way we framed the world was false. We can see the futility of blind economic gain. We can see that science and technology have not served us as well as we have been led to believe. We can see that our economic system is at best a swindle. We can see that our way of educating your young is as bad as they have said all along and that it gives them no reason for hope. We can see that the religions that say the word "love" really are focused on hate and self righteousness. What we eat is filled with poison. The water we drink, while it lasts, is poisoned.
We have no respect for learning or its limited fruits. We go to leaders who have authority through a now ancient system of superstitions yet we proclaim our enlightened state. This time is unique. It may sound like a repeat of times past but it is unique. Our mastery of science has been directed into a technology that feeds the economic system. We have been programmed to consume and the economy needs that continue. We have a problem folks. Do you see it? From where I stand you do not need a weatherman to tell you which way the wind is blowing.