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

Thursday, June 14, 2012

Black is White, Hedges are Bets, and Your Money is Mine

Click here to access article by Zeus Yiamouyiannis from Charles Hugh Smith's blog, Of Two Minds.

Libertarian capitalists such as this writer are very good at examining the flaws of contemporary capitalism, and this piece is a worthy example. Unfortunately, they have a very naive streak running through their essays. It's as if a group of heroin addicts ended up in charge of the US Empire and these critics wrote essays arguing that this arrangement would be fine if only we could get these addicts to pass laws to control their addiction.
...we turn to frequent contributor Zeus Yiamouyiannis for a sharp analysis of why our "profits are private, losses are public" crony-capitalism is self-destructing and what is needed to move forward to a sustainable, adaptable, wealth-generating capitalism.