Renewable Energy Is Becoming the Deal of the Century—And That’s Good, Because Its Success Most Certainly Is Not Coming from the U.S. Government
Fortunately for humankind, the replacement of fossil fuels with renewable energy does not require the participation of the U.S. federal government. In particular, there are 14 business-related drivers, each independent of government support, that are rapidly making clean energy so inexpensive that the pressures of pure market economics are forcing this change, regardless of the wanton corruption in Washington D.C.
Yet many of us haven’t given up the ghost on U.S. democracy. I invite readers to check out “Mayday,” arguably the nation’s most potent movement in the removal of influence of money over law-making.
Here are a few facts that came from the most recent presentation (yesterday) that Harvard Law professor and Mayday founder Lawrence Lessig (pictured) gave to a large and earnest audience.
• Americans almost unanimously agree on two things: a) money has too much influence on politics, and b) there is nothing that can be done to change this.
• 5.4 million Americans (a little under 2%) made cash donations to a politician in the last election, but the top 100 gave more than the bottom 4.75 million.
• A study from Princeton University shows an almost 100% correlation between Congressional votes and the interests of these Top 100.
• The same study shows that the decisions that Congress makes on the variety of issues are completely independent of the will of the people. Whether 20%, 40%, 60%, or 80% of the electorate supports a certain subject, this has no statistical bearing whatsoever on how the Senate and the House will vote on the matter.
• The biggest effect that money has in all this is, interestingly , not who wins a certain election, but who’s nominated. As an extremely successful politician of the early 20th Century said, “I don’t care who does the electing as long as I get to do the nominating.” In the 21st Century, we see things like the 2014 gubernatorial race in New York, where Andrew Cuomo, who had 35 million to spend on his re-election thanks to real estate developers, corporations and the super-rich refused to debate or even acknowledge his extremely well-qualified opponent, a Fordham law professor (who, ironically, specializes in corruption), because she had raised only $400,000.
My hat’s off to Lessig. A brilliant and extremely accomplished human being, he could be doing anything he wants to with the rest of his life, but he’s chosen to restore meaning to our democracy, which means extracting corruption from U.S. politics, a task not unlike pulling half an antelope out of a lion’s mouth.
Ladies and gentlemen, the hope of our United States as we knew it is now deep into the often slow and concealed process of being quietly but brutally murdered.
Our nation’s veiled assailants are cold and calculating paymasters – they fill the pockets, and tug the marionette strings, of those stripe-suited jackals that now so richly soil the once-honored title of “Public Servant.”
Abraham Lincoln reminded us of the counsel recorded in the Gospel of Matthew 12:25 in the New Testament:
“Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.”
Similarly, first-century Greek historian and essayist, Plutarch, is said to have warned us:
“An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.”
The perilous depth to which our Liberty has fallen already threatens insurmountability.
The hour is late, and yet I’ve not quite lost hope. I think it well past time for us to begin to seriously consider what actions we can take to save each other.
Certainly, doing nothing will accomplish nothing, except the eternal extinction of our cherished Liberty under the fetid claws of tyrannical greed, and with that sad passing comes the demise of that uniquely fond hope that our precious nation once held out to the world.
We see that hope dying under a fixated and methodical army of corporate lobbyists – 11,000 strong and pouring out bribery at an average of $6 million per congressperson in 2009 alone (before the SCOTUS opened the CUvFEC floodgates).
Though Lincoln was addressing the strength and weakness of the nation during the Civil War, his words yet illuminate the danger of modern inaction against that bribery army…
“At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”
Good government is the only hope We the People have to defend our Public Commons and advance our Common Good. Good government won’t come from people who hate government.
Playing the character of Howard Beale in the film Network, the actor Peter Finch advises his audience to get up out of their chairs, go open a window, and stick their heads out and yell as loud as they can, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”
I think we ought to be more organized, creative and persistent than that, but I think these are among the keys: Truth, Non-Violence, Cooperation, Direct Action, and Perseverance.
Those five keys alone may be insufficient, but I consider them wholly indispensable.