That’s Just What I Was Thinking
By Jeff Hackman
Have you ever had that experience when you thought something, but you couldn’t find anyone saying what you thought? It makes you wonder if you’re on track. Then, out of the blue someone else confirms what you thought!
They call economics the dismal science. Of course these days it is more dismal than usual. However, as I teach economics to high school seniors, I have been encouraging them to think of the multiple crises—while full of very real pain—also provide a chance to question assumptions we’ve held, and perhaps an opportunity to start something new. And, perhaps the new could be even better than the old that is being deconstructed.
Recently I read this by veteran journalist William Greider:
But he’s [Obama’s] trying to govern by convincing people that we will be able to get the old good times back. And my view is that the good times ain’t comin’ back. For lots of reasons – including the ecological crisis and global warming and the weakness of our economy.
“This is the hard part. The sooner the country comes to terms with that, acknowledges it as fact, not just fear, then we can start this great era of reform and revitalizing the country and society.”
In his new book, Come Home, America: The Rise and Fall (and Redeeming Promise) of Our Country, William Greider sees the public’s anger as good news for the country – “America the Possible,” he calls it.
“We’re at a break point in our history,” he said. “And it’s not just the financial system, although that’s front and center. It’s the deteriorated economy, it’s militarism looking out in the world, trying to find the next war. It’s a lot of things coming at us, all at once. I believe, on the other side of all of these adversities, we can become a better country.”(1)
This week I watched the Nova special Extreme Ice, in which scientists turn up their warnings about climate change another notch. Ice is melting even faster than predicted just a few years ago. It the next few decades several countries will literally disappear beneath the waves.
Also this week, an F-22 fighter jet crashed in California. Tragically, the pilot died. The other loss is a $339 million airplane. We had 183 of those, now it is 182. My question is: do we really need those planes? Even if I wasn’t a pacifist, I think the answer is NO. The advantages of the F-22 are irrelevant in the conflicts the US is in. In economics we talk about opportunity cost—that is, what you give up in order to get what you got. I found out that the private high school I teach at has an annual budget of $6 million. If you do the math, you realize that you could fund my school for 56 years with ONE of those $339 million F-22s! We educate about 400 students each year. Our school will be 56 years old next year. What a tragedy that our nation values unnecessary jets more than it does education!
Some people are beginning to question the sacred cow that is the military-industrial complex. Pennsylvania’s own Rep. Joe Sestak (a career Navy man who achieved the rank of three-star admiral) says enough is enough. That kind of sea change, if it really takes hold, will be part of the solution. This country can no longer afford the sprawling global military occupying over 700 overseas bases.
It seems these walls we’re ramming into: financial, political, military, health care, environmental—all result from moving in directions that are detrimental to the long term survivability of our planet. I haven’t read Greider’s book yet, but I bet he’d say we’ve been un-American too long. It is time to “redeem the promise” of America. I prefer to look at these crises through global as well as spiritual lenses, but I also like to believe that the ideals of America can still be pursued in a way that reaffirms the commonwealth.
Next week the G-20 get together to discuss the global crises. Will the powerful catch the spirit of de-centralization, de-carbonization, de-industrialization and de-globalization that will lead to a future for all the children? Let’s hope and pray they do, or this verse from Bruce Cockburn’s song They Call it Democracy may come true:
See the loaded eyes of the children too
trying to make the best of it the way kids do
one day you’re going to rise from your habitual feast
to find yourself staring down the throat of the beast
they call the revolution
Actually a revolution of some type is fast approaching. It’s just a question of what type it will be.
(1) http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/032709a.html Michael Winship
March 27, 2009. Also, watch Bill Moyers’ interview with Greider at www.pbs.org/moyers
