The Fall of the American Empire Is Painful To Watch
My friend Cameron Atwood writes: Crass pandering–this (the commercialization of America’s national parks) sickens me.
Yes, it’s an ugly sign of the times, i.e., the decline of the American Empire. The U.S. has fallen on hard times, and now needs to compromise its values in order to keep its fiscal head above water. Too much arrogance, vain, blind militarism/imperialism, corruption/corporatocracy, voter apathy, failure to invest in education, decline in moral standards, xenophobia/bigotry/exclusivity, failure to tax the super-rich, etc.
The chickens are coming home to roost; it’s not pretty to watch.
For a great many reasons, the current GOP presumptive nominee (a national tragedy in himself) is unique in the list of that party’s candidates over the past century. One notable reason, in this context, is that he has admitted (albeit obliquely) that “America” – the USA – is no longer “Great” but must be made great “Again.”
Of course, his prescriptions – to include further deregulation, no minimum wage, more tax breaks for giant corporations and the wealthiest, gargantuan expenses for deporting 12 million people and building a wall across our entire southern border – will be disastrous if implemented.
On the “other side” (such as it is) the neoliberal champion and coup/intervention/regime-change hawk Hillary Rodham Clinton is likely to prove little better – and perhaps worse, as she will have the ready cooperation of much of the Democrat party establishment.
The GOP presumptive, meanwhile, is broadly reviled across the leadership of that party, and would likely enjoy only cursory cooperation on many fronts.
A choice between them is like deciding which of your fingers you’d like to lose.
In spite of our Republican and Democratic traditions, it’s now said that there are really only two political parties – the Populist camp and the Corporate camp (and the leadership of both parties has placed itself firmly to one side of that equation).
Yet the path we must tread together is that of vigilance and communication, and the bright horizon to which we again set our eyes must be the universal freedom and birthright for all to live in dignity and prosperity.
The now glaring alternative encircling us is the perpetual indentured servitude of the entire human species to an elitist, autocratic, and monopolist collective whose sole endeavor is to blindly exploit and deplete the people and resources of our world in order to increase the opulence of a few.
Our choices: dignity or slavery, liberty or death. It’s often been so.
Many civilizations have perished through blind and cruel devotion to monumental waste. Given our massive arsenals of indiscriminately lethal weaponry, if we fail, we may not be merely the next… we may be the last.
That said, there’s still hope.
We’ve proven our ability to harvest and store free and abundant solar and wind energy – ultimately brought to us by the modern sunlight that pours down upon the globe every day.
That means the prosperity and stability which we who live here in the US often ascribe to the 1950’s, and the social consciousness to which we aspired as a nation in the 1960’s, can both be achieved – for all the people in the developing nations of the world, for ourselves, and for future generations.
What’s required is a moon-shot style dedication of leadership and funding, and a WWII level of popular mobilization.
That potential may look quite remote now, but humanity has underestimated itself before, and nobody a year ago was predicting the movement-driven rise of Bernie Sanders (nor the media-driven rise of his polar opposite).
Don’t. Give. Up.
You make some wonderful points supporting optimism here. Thanks very much.
Thank you! …for the opportunity and forum, and – especially – for your tireless work on behalf of all our futures, Craig.
Very cool of you to say that. I really DO consider myself tireless, btw; I’m not sure what effects we’re creating here, but I AM sure that I’m not giving up.
Like us all, he was imperfect, but two of Gandhi’s observations seem appropriate – paraphrased here:
What we do may seem insignificant, but it’s important that we do it.
We may never see the results, but inaction yields no results.
Cameron,
I just love how you alternate between a sort of “sack cloth and ashes ” doomsday street prophet, compete with sign saying “The end is nigh”, and a fiery old time revivalist, Hell fire preacher, demanding repentance , castigating evil doers, and calling down vengeance on perceived sinners !
It makes such a welcome change from all those blandly moderate, carefully researched, prudent commentators, trying to resolve complex issues with equally complex solutions. Who can bother with all that nonsense eh?
Much better to offer a castigate of your foes and vague sweeping unrealistic generalizations, without any realistic details.
Most entertaining, but ol’ Donald is doing it better…. (well at least louder!)
marcopolo, how pitiable it is that yet again you return to your weak pablum of ad hominem and insult – how predictable and tedious.
Cameron,
” weak pablum of ad hominem and insult ”
Hmmm, well I’m sorry you feel that way, but then when your, ..ah.. peroration contains such a paucity of substance among a bombast of pompous rhetoric, I’m afraid it’s inevitable the reader will react with the observation, parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus ! Quid rides? Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur…but enough of such banter.
Again, I urge you to abandon wasting time calling for a revolution that will never happen and sanctimonious castigation of imagined enemies. Instead I invite you to help improve the environment by joining the rest of us in developing practical, environmentally beneficial projects.
Come and join the rest of us, use your talents to make a difference. When you can write about your own contribution to improving the environment, you will discover no one is interested in ad hominem criticism.
Otherwise, you must not be surprised when others view your grandiloquent pronouncements with a certain skepticism.
I’m sincere when I urge you to join a positive project that defines what you are “for” not just what you’re “agin'”.
marcopolo, your repeated use in this forum of the term “revolution” is a straw man. I have not called for revolution.
It is a straightforward matter of fact that, by unbalancing the global climate, the status quo of human agriculture and energy generation and use has been, and is now, causing severe harm to the potential of continued civilization.
Data specifics are readily available to anyone who has willing eyes.
As to what I am “for,” I made that plain above: “We’ve proven our ability to harvest and store free and abundant solar and wind energy – ultimately brought to us by the modern sunlight that pours down upon the globe every day…” “…What’s required is a moon-shot style dedication of leadership and funding, and a WWII level of popular mobilization.”
As a species, we must rapidly evolve from fossil dependence to modern sunlight energy. Time is short. If you want to apply the term “revolution” that’s your hyperbole, not mine.