And Now, Back to...

Back to what? That's the question for today. I've been getting the sense, from the political scene, the mainstream news, and the US' take on world events that people are feeling like things are going back to the status quo. Personally, I have my doubts that the genie will go back in that cramped little bottle, but just in case, I'd like to review what that would mean, if any of you are among the people saying, "please, please, please, just one more century where we Americans get to dominate the world, print money like it's toilet paper, use far more than our share of ... well, everything, make messes and not clean them up, and ignorantly march along behind the phony stories of what has happened, is happening, and will happen in the world."

Is that where you want to go? Back? Back to world wars, children starving in [insert name of this week's third world poster country here], third world civil wars manufactured by world powers, world domination through scorched earth attacks followed by "nation-building," nuclear bombs and nuclear arms races, energy "crises," dot-com bubbles, housing bubbles, penny-stock scandals, manufactured recessions and depressions and degradation of everything we touch?

Or, do you want to move on? Do you want to demand a world where government is here to serve the people, where we don't live by that line in Animal Farm, "all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others," where our children, and those in that third world poster country, all get to have a chance at a happy, healthy life? How about peace and leaving each other the hell alone, instead of perpetual boogeymen, holy wars, and hatred?

Martin Luther King, Jr., once said,

Cowardice asks the question, "is it safe?" Expediency asks the question, "is it politic?" Vanity asks the question "is it popular?" But conscience asks the question, "is it right?" And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him it is right."

We've got a choice. The powers that be are trying very hard to convince the world that if we just stay home and be quiet, let the banks run the economy and the military-industrial complex go attack Iran so they can make a cool few trillion building it back and stealing its oil--if we just keep on sucking in their 'bread and circuses' and staying blind to all the ways they're screwing us and the rest of humanity, everything will be ok. If you're still reading me, you're among those who know that just ain't so. But you may be tempted. So, let's just put it like this...

We can start standing up, making ourselves clear, and requiring that things change at a very fundamental level. Or we can go back. And depending on what we decide, we're going to wind up with the world we deserve.