THE BLOG
of John Gelles
October 3, 2006My message to Cyberspace Society and to Victory Over Want forums
On what to focus and where
Curtiss Priest writes on 1 October (on cyber-soc@topica.com):
"So, let me see if I have this right. The country is going to
hell in a hand basket, and the majority of Americans simply
want the price of gasoline to go down.
"This sounds like a prescription for a 3rd World War.
"Americans either have to eat dog food for the next thirty
years in hovels, or, they can bomb the hell out of everyone
that gets in their way. -- Welcome to America.
"Regards,
"W. Curtiss Priest
"P.S. best place to focus one's energy? We need to invoke
a true civil war in America. Those of us who see how the
arrogance and attitude of many has created these very
problems need to imprison, not the ones driven into crime,
but the ones that have driven out the American Dream.
"1. Every loud car driver ...
2. Every debtor should be ...
4. It should be OK, not to work as hard ...
5. Energy sustainability should be enacted ...
6. People should walk and bicycle ...
7. Reinstitute the front porch of houses ...
8. Neighbors should help neighbors ..."
"I could go on."
------------- end of Curtiss' view ------
Shortly after Curtiss expressed disappointment with much that is wrong in the world, I sent Ron Morrison's view of 'Keynes without debt": a panacea for all that can be put right if you have the money to employ people to do the tasks implied by Curtiss -- whatever they are.
Morrison is one of many who see inadequate production of public and private necessities and inadequate money in the purse's of actors who should buy the output of such production as the addressable inadequacies via the ideas
of 'Keynes without debt'.
I suppose nearly all the readers of internet comment -- from the center to left of center -- agree with Morrison: only they act as though 'Keynes without debt' is too subtle for them to understand.
Curtiss once said that kind of writing was the result of "thinking outside the box". I do not agree: Morrison, Abba Lerner, Abe Lincoln, Ben Franklin, and thousands I can't name at the moment thought this way -- right "inside the box" of common experience.
Yet Wes Burt, Bill Ellis and Curtiss, seem to want to ignore Morrison because the boxes they prefer to stay inside are "theirs"!
It's a form of the "not invented here syndrome". The most practical way to move from decentralized open systems that are succeeding in the information revolution to successful political economy that can afford to be green and neighborly, is to listen to Morrison and build on what he implies. One place to do that is on wikispaces.com -- where a network of independent spaces could be created to focus on what ails our nations, friends and selves.
As to our enemies -- they can do no more harm than we allow.
John Gelles
http://revolutionary-reform.wikispaces.com
http://ustaxreform.wikispaces.com