The blog of a North Country Swede!

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

If God is love, what is "love"?

Some background on what I believe ... I would say I am an atheist, but Jonathan Miller (see Note below) remarked that there is no special word for people who don't believe in ghosts, so why use one for people who don't believe in God? Basically I see no evidence of omniscience. In fact, it was my early disavowal of the omnipotent God that allowed the evil of the world—whom I did believe in—that let to my disbelief.
Note: For additional background please watch Bill Moyers' interview of Jonathan Miller from Bill Moyers Journal available as video on the internet and as a podcast from iTunes for 5/4/07.
How do I then account for "love"? What is love, for that matter?

Looking it up in dictionary. com, I found 18 entries defining the use of the word, "love". The one that I believe is fundamental to all the others relating to another being, is;
"9. affectionate concern for the well-being of others: the love of one's neighbor."
Without this aspect, love is not love ... it is some form of desire for my own gratification.

Then, when I say God is love, I am saying that love is the highest ideal, the highest form of oughtness ... to that which I ought to conform in living my life.

This understanding of love as the central conforming principle of existence comes from my having been raised a Christian. Therefore, religiously, I am a Christian. I generally conform to the evolving moral and ethical values based on the Judaic-Christian heritage of Western civilization.

There is one more facet to my belief structure. That is that I experience my existence as preceding my awareness of my existence. My awareness or consciousness comes out of my existence as a function of my existence. My existence has produced my awareness as a function of my existence. Therefore, philosophically, I am an existentialist.

Putting all this together, I would "label" myself a Christian existentialist atheist.

Back to love.

One doesn't have to be a genius to see the benefit to the primary group—family, tribe—of an "affectionate concern for the well-being of others." Pregnant women and small children require protection, as well as those temporarily incapacitated due to illness or injury. It is obvious that the group—extended family or tribe—that has the strongest support network has the advantage.

And it is equally obvious that the group has to be protected against its opponents and other dangers in the surrounding world.

And it is the codification of an explanation of the obvious that becomes that group's "religion". and successful to the extent the religion allows the group to remain strong in the face of its enemies and adversities.

Human beings noted the benefits of mutual support which evolved through recorded history to the pronouncement ascribed to Jesus:
"This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

Behind or underlying my "label" is an attitude of rational skepticism that can be best described by the Jain version of the "Blind Men and the Elephant":

Six blind men were asked to determine what an elephant looked like by feeling different parts of the elephant's body.

The blind man who feels a leg says the elephant is like a pillar; the one who feels the tail says the elephant is like a rope; the one who feels the trunk says the elephant is like a tree branch; the one who feels the ear says the elephant is like a hand fan; the one who feels the belly says the elephant is like a wall; and the one who feels the tusk says the elephant is like a solid pipe.

A wise man explains to them

All of you are right. The reason every one of you is telling it differently is because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all the features you mentioned.

This resolves the conflict, and is used to illustrate the principle of living in harmony with people who have different belief systems, and that truth can be stated in different ways.

Rational skepticism requires that we discuss our beliefs honestly with each other in order to discover and learn as much as we can about our reality ... our elephant ... at any given point in our existence. This in turn requires that we allow everyone to have their say.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Our shame: Prosecutorial Misconduct

First and foremost, this is not in any way meant to dilute criticism or condemnation directed at the Durham County, North Carolina District Attorney Mike Nifong of the infamous "2006 Duke University lacrosse case."

I would simply ask in witnessing the outrage over the prosecutorial misconduct in that case, where is the outrage over the now more than 200 cases of wrongful prosecution overturned by post-conviction DNA testing that the Innocence Project has uncovered? And why are there so many faces of men of color found in these cases?

Please listen to the Bill Moyers Journal interview with Jerry Miller, the 200th person exonerated by post-conviction DNA testing, "Jerry Miller and the Innocence Project."

Shouldn't we be ashamed of our lack of outrage in Jerry Miller's case?

Monday, June 25, 2007

George W., you are no Harry Truman

Few things have been as disturbing as the president's now implacable belief - which he has been decreeing with increased frequency -- that he is the modern-day Harry Truman, fighting a necessary war even in the face of widespread opposition from weak and blind people in his own country and around the world, but that he is destined to be vindicated by history. And, as he sees it, the more he fights against anti-war headwinds and the bolder he is in the risks he takes, the greater his vindication will be.


To get perspective on why George W. is no Harry Truman, listen to the BBC World Service's "Winning the Peace", a series of four programs in which Former High Representative of Bosnia, Lord Ashdown, "looks at the role of the international community in ending conflicts and rebuilding countries." Paddy Ashdown "looks at cases where occupation has succeeded and where it has failed, and what lessons there are for the future."

The first of the four is of particular interest:

Part One: Germany after the War

We should be ashamed of Cheney

Vice President Cheney is a perfect example of the type of despotic leader our constitution was SUPPOSED to guard against. The fact that he still retains a powerful position in our government is something we the people should be ashamed of.

Are we so fearful and weak that we can be led around like a herd of frightened sheep by an insanely secretive tryant?

The executive branch of our government is supposed to manage and lead according to the laws passed by the legislative branch. These laws are written through a deliberative process representative of the will of the people. These deliberations are slowed by the process itself to dampen the swings of popular opinion. The judicial branch is there to insure that we follow the law.

This whole structure was put in place because our founders knew from experience that power unfettered by law and residing in an unbridled executive was (and is) the source of practically all of the evil that governments bring to our world. And much of that evil comes from self-righteous leaders who tell us they know best what is good for us or some variation of "If you knew what I know, you wouldn't question what I have done for you/am doing for you/am about to do for you. But I can't tell you what I know, because then I wouldn't be able to do it."

What is now coming to light are things done in our name that are so horrific that we should be ashamed. These things continue to this day, and they are evil.

The problem is that there is such a long trail of horrific things done in our name that the current set of bastards can literally ask, "What are you complaining about? This is nothing new. What do you think was done at Wounded Knee?"

We should not cower from responding. From our Christian heritage, we know the answer. It is redemption. This is combining repentance with conversion ... renouncing the past and then doing what love commands ... for God is love.

But we have no one calling us to "oughtness" born of love ... what we ought to be ... out of our "isness" ... what we are.

It's a shame.

Reference:
Pushing the Envelope on Presidential Power
By Barton Gellman and Jo Becker
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, June 25, 2007

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Agent Orange, dioxin, and Vietnam

Friday's—June 22, 2007— program on Democracy Now was about the lawsuit working its way through the U.S. courts for which "earlier this week, a delegation of Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange traveled to New York. Some testified in federal court. They’re suing over three dozen chemical companies for manufacturing the toxin. The list of companies being sued includes Dow Chemical and Monsanto." -From the transcript of the program, Vietnamese Delegation in U.S. to Sue Chemical Companies for Ongoing Effects of Agent Orange.

It is hard to imagine anyone—any person, group, organization, nation— doing anything this horrific ... knowing the damage the poison—dioxin—would cause. Having to acknowledge that my country DID do this ... on purpose ... and now the bastards responsible for making the choices that allowed it to happen, paid for it to happen, received payment for it to happen, performed its happening ... these bastards are trying to shirk responsibility?

When does the stink of our elite ruling class finally cause we the people to gag?

A thought ...

I went to Marc's Place last night, billed as "a monthly coffeehouse of music, poetry, and discussion inspired by the memory of Coalition Member Marc Shapiro." (Note: The "Coalition" is the Central Jersey Coalition Against Endless War whose website is www.againstendlesswar.org.) It was a program of music, poetry, and discussion. Ordinary people spent the evening together openly, publicly ... freely ... sharing our concerns about where our leaders have taken us as a country. This is the real strength of our nation.

And it isn't just people on the left of the political spectrum ... it's people all over the place, doing all sorts of stuff ... from a country music bar in Austin, Texas, to a mid-week social at the Baptist Church in Lincoln, Nebraska, to a union picnic in Seattle, to an annual stock holders meeting in Chicago, to a jazz club in Greenwich Village ... people in these United States are doing their thing.

Another thought ...

The greed of our ruling class is ruining us ... because they have no idea of what makes our nation great. They think it is the wealth and power that has been created ... when it is the motivation, energy and labor of the people that creates ... the true source of wealth and power.

Bloomberg? Unity08?

The "normal" political two party system here in the United States is unraveling.

It is time for we the people to take our country back and put an end to the fearmongering vs. pork barrel politics that only benefits politicians and the special interests they serve. We have enough wealth and power as a nation to be secure from foreign coercion AND have a solid foundation of heathcare, education, and affordable housing for our people from full employment.

We need competent managers in our executive branches, rational skeptics in our legislative branches, and principled judges in our judicial branches. In other words, we need another revolution ... at the ballot box.

This is the context within which the potential "Bloomberg For President" campaign plays out.

It isn't just whether or not Bloomberg can win the presidency, it is the setting in motion of real change. Remember Goldwater in 1964? That campaign led straight to Reagan ... the problem with the Republicans being that with the Peter Principle in full bloom (yes, I get the pun) the Republicans produced George W. Bush, the 43rd president of these United States.

Personally—as an aside—if Hillary dillary gets the Democrats' nomination, I would vote for Bloomberg in a heartbeat.

And with that in mind, I will be checking out the Unity08 political action campaign.

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Iraq: It's a fool's errand

Retired Army Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey, who in 2003 was among the first to call public attention to the relatively small size of the U.S. invasion force, said that the new operation shows how outnumbered U.S. troops remain. "Why would we think that a temporary presence of 30,000 additional combat troops in a giant city would change the dynamics of a bitter civil war?" he said in an interview yesterday. "It's a fool's errand." (Emphasis added.)

Iraq Push Revives Criticism of Force Size
by Thomas E. Ricks
Saturday, June 23, 2007
The Washington Post

Back on April 27 Bill Moyers interviewed Jon Stewart from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central on the Bill Moyers Journal on PBS. Access the archived Bill Moyers program here: Jon Stewart, April 27, 2007, and here's an excerpt it with a clip from the Daily Show with jon Stewart:

CLIP: THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART

JON STEWART: Bush had come mainly to discuss the war spending bill, recently passed by the Democratic Congress which gives the president all the funding he desires for the troop surge, but ties the funding to a definite date for withdrawal of the troops. And you won't believe what the president thinks of that idea.

GEORGE W. BUSH: �pushing legislation that would undercut our troops just as we're beginning to make progress in Baghdad.

JON STEWART: Oooh. We're just beginning to make it ohh they just pulled the rug to d'oh, it's just happening now! You know, I seem to remember, we've been making progress for quite some time now.

GEORGE W. BUSH: That's progress. And it's important progress, and it's an important part of our strategy to win in Iraq.

GEORGE W. BUSH: Iraq has made incredible political progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: The Iraqis are making inspiring progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: Iraq is making incredible political progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: I believe we're making really good progress in Iraq.

GEORGE W. BUSH: We're making progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: We're making steady progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: We're making progress. It's slowly but surely making progress.

GEORGE W. BUSH: In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.

JON STEWART: Wait a minute! Wait a minute! I figured this out. I know what's wrong with what we've done in Iraq. We've been following time as it goes forward. What a classic mistake. Linear time is so pre-9-11.

END CLIP: THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART

Another excerpt:

JON STEWART: But war that hasn't affected us here, in the way that you would imagine a five-year war would affect a country. I think that's why they're so really — here's the disconnect. It's sort of this odd and I've always had this problem with the rationality of it. That the President says, "We are in the fight for a way of life. This is the greatest battle of our generation, and of the generations to come. "And, so what I'm going to do is you know, Iraq has to be won, or our way of life ends, and our children and our children's children all suffer. So, what I'm gonna do is send 10,000 more troops to Baghdad."

So, there's a disconnect there between — you're telling me this is fight of our generation, and you're going to increase troops by 10 percent. And that's gonna do it. I'm sure what he would like to do is send 400,000 more troops there, but he can't, because he doesn't have them. And the way to get that would be to institute a draft. And the minute you do that, suddenly the country's not so damn busy anymore. And then they really fight back, and then the whole thing falls apart. So, they have a really delicate balance to walk between keeping us relatively fearful, but not so fearful that we stop what we're doing and really examine how it is that they've been waging this.

Iraq ... it's a fool's errand.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Lead paint and red engines


When we had the opportunity to create rational regulations ... like, let's not poison each other ... literally ... in trade agreements in exchange for access to our (the United States) burgeoning marketplace ... our leaders chose greed over reason.

Well, our international finance globalist leaders. We used to call them Rockefeller Republicans. Now they are better known as Clinton Democrats. Hope that's not too nuanced for you to understand ... Silly Billy and Hillary dillary selling us out to be elected president.

What better example of what happened then the latest recall of the children's toy—the Thomas the Tank red engine—for lead in its paint. ( Note: See "The Little Engine That Could Poison" by Christian Warren on today's—Friday, June 22, 2007—OpEd page of the NY Times.)

There are some old, wise metaphors ... one is ... "Closing the barn doors AFTER the horse has gone is not a solution for keeping a horse."

Why do you think our leaders gave away our real wealth ... our labor market? They didn't get anything of equal value for us in return. Oh ... that's right ... they made THEMSELVES rich and powerful. In the short term we are converting to a banana republic with a chasm between the rich few and the impoverished many.

Folks, the horse has left the barn.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Are you kidding me? ... Blair?

After more than six years of failed policy on the Israeli-Palestine issue, the Bush Administration is proposing to anoint soon-to-be ex-British Prime Minister Tony Blair as a special envoy to the Middle East to help Fatah's Palestine president Mahmoud Abbas "build the institutions and apparatus fro a viable state." ("U.S. Is Urging Blair to Be Lead Mideast Envoy" by Helene Cooper, NY Times, June 21, 2007)

Too little, too late.

Actually, it's the kiss of death.

The Taliban are attacking Kabul in Afghanistan. Hamas has driven Fatah out of Gaza and the Israeli's are attacking Hamas. Lebanon is teetering on the abyss of further violence in and around the Palestinian refugee camps. The violence in Iraq is spreading outside Baghdad in response to our "squeeze the water balloon" aka "whack-a-mole" surge.

And we are going to appoint Tony Blair as a white knight to ride to our rescue?

Connie Rice, you are kidding me, aren't you?

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

The least among us ...

From the asthmatic child gasping for breath in an urban ghetto to the senior citizen lying in his or her urine and feces in a nursing home ... we as a country have abandoned the principle that a society is judged not by how we treat the greatest, but how we treat the least among us.

Let us ask ourselves ...

If a nation as great and as strong—as wealthy and powerful—as ours ... with principles of freedom, justice, fairness, and compassion to guide us ... comes to where we are today ... how did we come to this?

And if we have descended into the abyss of greed and self-interest—with more than enough wealth to have a solid foundation for everyone and more than enough power to be safe from outside coercion—what hope is there for any society to become what we believe we ought to be?

Where are our prophets to call us to oughtness?

Note: Written after reading Bob Herbert's column, "When Dollars Trump Compassion", in today's—Tuesday, June 19, 2007—NY Times.

Monday, June 18, 2007

Iraq, come Septmber ...

Please read Iraq: The Battle of September Has Already Begun by Arianna Huffington, posted June 17, 2007, on www.huffingtonpost.com.

Then get Bill Moyers' podcast, "Buying the War", from iTunes ... it's free ... and listen to it. Or you can simply go to the PBS website archive and watch and listen to it, or download the transcript and read it. It was broadcast on April 25.


Four years ago on May 1, President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier USS Lincoln wearing a flight suit and delivered a speech in front of a giant "Mission Accomplished" banner. He was hailed by media stars as a "breathtaking" example of presidential leadership in toppling Saddam Hussein. Despite profound questions over the failure to locate weapons of mass destruction and the increasing violence in Baghdad, many in the press confirmed the White House's claim that the war was won. MSNBC's Chris Matthews declared, "We're all neo-cons now;" NPR's Bob Edwards said, "The war in Iraq is essentially over;" and Fortune magazine's Jeff Birnbaum said, "It is amazing how thorough the victory in Iraq really was in the broadest context."

How did the mainstream press get it so wrong? How did the evidence disputing the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the link between Saddam Hussein to 9-11 continue to go largely unreported? "What the conservative media did was easy to fathom; they had been cheerleaders for the White House from the beginning and were simply continuing to rally the public behind the President — no questions asked. How mainstream journalists suspended skepticism and scrutiny remains an issue of significance that the media has not satisfactorily explored," says Moyers. "How the administration marketed the war to the American people has been well covered, but critical questions remain: How and why did the press buy it, and what does it say about the role of journalists in helping the public sort out fact from propaganda?"

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Globalization is literally killing us!

Please read "FDA Scrutiny Scant In India, China as Drugs Pour Into U.S." by Marc Kaufman in today's--June 17, 2007--WASHINGTON POST.

Then reflect awhile on Bill Clinton's (whom I will call "Silly Billy" in shear derision) globalization schemes whereby he GAVE away our labor, environmental, and food and drug safety rights.

For the life of me, I cannot understand why small "d" democrats consider him a democrat. I know he is registered as a big "D" Democrat ... but those of us who remember Nelson Rockefeller and the tenets of the international finance wing of politics in this country, know that Silly Billy is actually a Rockefeller Republican.

And Hillary dillary is leading in the polling of Democrats? That's because those international finance globalists know they have about a snowball's chance in hell of electing a Republican Party candidate as President in 2008.

Come on, folks! Get a grip. We can take our country back.

We'd better take or country back while we still have something worth saving.

Abu Garib and Army Major General Anotnio M. Taguba

Please read THE GENERAL'S REPORT by Seymour M. Hersh in the June 25, 2007 issue of THE NEW YORKER.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/06/25/070625fa_fact_hersh

“From the moment a soldier enlists, we inculcate loyalty, duty, honor, integrity, and selfless service,” Taguba said. “And yet when we get to the senior-officer level we forget those values. I know that my peers in the Army will be mad at me for speaking out, but the fact is that we violated the laws of land warfare in Abu Ghraib. We violated the tenets of the Geneva Convention. We violated our own principles and we violated the core of our military values. The stress of combat is not an excuse, and I believe, even today, that those civilian and military leaders responsible should be held accountable.”

The stench of my country's evil has reached the nostrils of God.

Our leaders have abandoned the upward struggle in pursuit of oughtness—what we ought to be—based on our founding principles—our core values—for the pursuit of wealth and power.

We have exchanged our birthright for the proverbial bowl of porridge.

Once again the Hand is writing on the wall, "You have been weighed in the balance and found wanting."

May God have mercy on the souls of we the people because justice would send us to Hell.

Friday, June 15, 2007

Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine ...

Can we wait for Bush 43 to leave office before we change course as a nation? In nineteen months we may be in such a deep, narrow hole that we won't be able to turn around, let alone get out.

There are consequences to having an arrogant idiot as President of these United States with enough power and wealth to squander that his brilliant handlers haven't reined him in ... yet.

But isn't it evident—to mix metaphors—that our ship of state is headed for the shoals? That we have run out of ocean?

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

The new economics - Post 11

Some questions regarding the family … looking forward ...

Can we assume that the "family unit"—however defined by a society—has become the basic building block of our society?

Can we also assume that we as a society wish to build the best possible society?

Then doesn’t it become obvious fairly quickly that some members/citizens of these United States of America do NOT look upon all families within the boundaries of our nation as members of THEIR society? (Note: Maybe we should be looking at the attitudes that divide us like Christian versus Non-Christian, member of our particular faith versus non-member, and so forth?)

And while we appear to demand that everyone commit to our notion of a basic family to get support, we—as a nation—do NOT support all of these family units at some basic level … and if this is the case, are we not, in fact, weakening our society? Or putting the society at risk to the extent that our families are at risk? On the other hand, if families at risk are not really part of our society …

Just asking, folks, just asking … but it seems pretty A, B, C kind of stuff.

O.K., say we have this family unit thing going for us. Isn’t it necessary to have a system for getting to the family the basic resources this family needs to be a strong and healthy family?

Didn’t we build an economic system from the Great Depression and WWII on that was based on the purchasing power the “normal” wage earner generates being able to provide the basic resources for his/her family? Didn’t this allow the parent who wasn’t the wage earner to tend to the care and nurturing of the family? (Note: Families tend to hav e children.)

And now with the purchasing power of the normal wage earner falling to global standards … (Note: Are global wage standards relative to the care and keeping of a mule?) ... how will the normal family unit acquire the basic resources NECESSARY for maintaining a strong and healthy family ... let alone tend to the care and nurturing of the family?

Maybe we should start by defining a strong and healthy family? Then ask ourselves what are the basic resources necessary to maintain that family?

And shouldn't we ask why our nation's leaders GAVE away OUR wage standards without compensating for the American family's loss in purchasing power? And our environmental standards? And our food safety standards?

More to come.

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

The New Economics – Post 10

Thoughts looking forward to Labor Day … a ways away.

Some concepts that should be considered by our brilliant economic intelligentsia?:

- Human demand for goods and services cannot keep pace with their supply if human demand depends on the purchasing power provided from wages for human labor. (Note: In today's Westernized economic globalization scheme.)

- The huge fees for predictive analysis and other financial services now being extracted from the economy amount to a huge tax on market transactions of real goods and services.

The combination in this country of (1.) the drop in consumer demand facing us because of the drop in mean family purchasing power based on wages for human labor, and (2.) the drag on the economy by the imposition of financial services fees, portends an economic correction of significant magnitude ahead.

While we conceivably have ways and means to wring the exorbitant financial services fees out of our economic system fairly quickly, we do not have ways and means to efficiently adjust mean family purchasing power without significant social/political upheaval. (Note: We have gone about as far as we can with inflating home property values.) This is one of the problems of Westernized economic globalization in third world countries: there is no efficient mechanism in the touted (and dramatically misnamed) “free” market system to allow the basic unit of society, the family, to efficiently adjust purchasing power as needed to stay afloat in a Western-style (“money” and banking) market.

The United States is now on its way to becoming a banana republic with its chasm between rich and poor. Before we get there, a populist leader will arise to challenge us to alter course. As we go through our next sociopolitical-economic interregnum, China will be observing our course with a hammer-lock on much of the world’s resources and much of our cash.

Fasten your seatbelts, folks. This is going to get interesting.

Monday, June 04, 2007

The new economics - Post 9

The Age of Information rises … and we fall.

O.K., let’s play around with the concepts of the marketplace that may or may not undergird our economic theories. (I’m planning to take an economics course at Montclair State University this fall—I’ll keep you informed of my progress toward that goal.)

Suppose we have a village market where first thing in the morning grain sellers set up to exchange grain with goat milk sellers for goat milk. We could have phrased that as grain buyers come to exchange their wares with grain sellers for grain, and goat milk buyers come to exchange their wares with goat milk sellers for goat milk. As the day wears (is that a pun, or what?) on (as well as my exploration of economics), more sellers and buyers will appear in the village market.

Let’s say that we have three (3) grain sellers and three (3) goat milk sellers mingling into the early morning scene.

A grain seller arrives before dawn and sets up as the solitary vendor in the marketplace. Let’s assume that he has arrived early because he has some experience with this market and knows when to be first.

Even in this simple situation we begin to see the complexity of the decisions feeding into the strategies for selling and buying. What will this seller ask for in exchange for, say, a bushel of grain? What will he/she be thinking? Most likely it will be, “How can I get the most goat milk for my grain? But I only need so much goat milk. More than that, and it will be wasted. Less than that, and I will not have enough to feed my family the goat milk they need to stay healthy.”

Beyond that the grain seller will have some knowledge of whether or not there has been a good or bad crop of grain for the current market, and whether or not there is more or less than enough goat milk to meet the needs of all who would buy it.

And beyond THAT is the biological drive for status in group behavior. There is status value in being the top/best seller/buyer … which in the market is identified with wealth acquired from one’s transactions in the market. And here enters the powerful motivation to gain advantage in the market … to gain control of some aspect of the “forces” shaping the market … such as information about future availability of marketable goods and services … which in today’s global economy, the advantage/disadvantage of nanoseconds in advance warning can mean millions and billions of profit/loss for sellers/buyers. (Any wonder the Bloomberg Box made him a billionaire?)

Where does this take us? Where HAS this taken us?

We have an elite earning humongous wealth through securing an information advantage. This is the “science” of economics … the gaining of advantage in now global markets through better, faster analysis of information about those markets.

Does it escape everyone that this amounts to a humongous “tax” on market transactions that is now being paid to “Western” financial elites? And that it could equally be paid to ANYONE ANYWHERE in the future as information technology shifts its center of gravity? And that it is the underlying goods and services brought to market that are the substantive wealth of a society? And that our brilliant “Western” economic idiots are GIVING away our substantive wealth in the relatively short-term self-interest pursuit of an advantage in information about the global market in which goods and services are exchanged?

More to come …

Sunday, June 03, 2007

Kipling and the Gatling Gun ...

For those who take issue with my failure to correct my failing memory by actually looking everything up ... which, of course, is no excuse ... but this is an assemblage of ideas rather than a series of submissions for scholarly publication ... so I would light-heartedly suggest that y'all lighten up a tad!

http://lists.village.virginia.edu/lists_archive/Humanist/v05/0080.html

On the other hand, I should be amazed that ANYONE reads this stuff. Thankful? Well, I guess so ... as long as no one expects me to carry on a dialog with 'em.

Saturday, June 02, 2007

Some thoughts looking forward to the 4th of July ...

The trajectory of the culture of these United States of America is that of one of our own 4th of July celebration rockets. We have reached our zenith and we are now exploding.

Another way of picturing us is as an economic engine that is running way above maximum safe rpm’s and is shaking apart.

The only question remaining is how much damage we will inflict on ourselves and others if we break up.

Greed is as ancient as squirrels hoarding nuts for winter, and can be rationalized in a myriad of ways. But human beings do not survive as solitary individuals. It is the manner in which we open the potential of the future to each new generation that they find the motivation to go forward, and move society with them.

Youth on the path to adulthood will seek those avenues that hold promise for them, at times even minute by minute. If the “straight and narrow” does not yield or hold the promise of yielding the results/goals their psyche desires/needs, many will find other routes—not all of them beneficial to society.

Certainly limiting access to alpha status by shrinking the identifying genetic markers to a smaller and smaller pool is self-defeating for the larger society. George W. Bush, the 43rd President of the United States, is the perfect example of the severity of the damage that can be caused by limiting leadership to one family tree.

Looking at those cultures that have survived for millennia, we consistently find widespread opportunity across a wide segment of the society for those from even the lowest strata of that segment to reach positions of cultural leadership ... and the broader the opportunity throughout the society, the more dynamic the society.

Catholicism has long afforded the opportunity to the lowliest child to rise through the ranks to priesthood, bishop, cardinal, and even pope. The mosques of Islam are open to all, and the current recruitment into Al Qaeda through the “open to all male children” policy of the fundamentalist madrassas portends a momentum we have yet to even begin to counter.

In China the public schools offer academic opportunity to a wide swath of the population, a population that has more gifted members than we have total members—if we take the top 25 percentile as the gifted group. And we—instead—are curtailing academic opportunity on the basis of individual family income, and in fact excluding broad groups from any real opportunity to advance into “ordained” leadership, except as token representatives of their groups.

All trajectories have momentum, even societal ones. We have yet to begin to correct our current course governed by our individual self-interest as the highest good. I believe the explosion we are now experiencing will dramatically alter our course. The question is will we surrender to fear and pursue corporatist fascism, or will we re-exert our commitment to offering equal opportunity to the world’s diverse peoples and regain the breathtaking momentum of our birth as a nation, flawed as it was?