Some notes on the current hand-wringing

We are awash in theorizing, which is fine. There's just one matter that needs clearing up. The time we are in is unprecedented. What precedes it may be relevant but it is not that germane. The unprecedented is necessitated by the reality of the bomb and the memory of the Holocaust. It means we are forced to consider conscious moral evolution. And that, my friends, is unprecedented.

My theory is simple. Accept my premise and Run your theories through its colander. The result will be the transformation of what we now call conservatism and the reclamation of a political platform upon which Liberals can proudly run.

End of history?

I suppose it would be easy to dispatch this as another attempt to say we are at the end of history. I do not say that. I say we are at the end of the binary age. We are in for a serious moderation of what conflict has been. It will lead to a future in which war is impossible because we will have lost our taste for it. The plutocracy will endure a natural decline because we will have withdrawn our support for the mega-corporations that execute today's military-industrial mandates.

The future will see growing agreement about what is necessary to function as democracies. Democracy will be the default means of governance. We'll also see the gradual transition from mega-philanthropy to help that is based on face-to-face contact and grass-roots implementations.

Business will survive in a more reasonable and prosperous mode than at present. Its objective will be to center on the actual needs of human beings, as many now do.

We do not have the time or the inclination to make the transition to this future a process involving leaders and seminars and organizing.

We are at a time when individuals can and will imbibe from one another, via mass communication, the blueprints and understandings that underlie the unprecedented change we will all go through.

The change will be holistic. It already is. It has no ideal model but it is tolerant, helpful and democratic. Its name will emerge -- there may be many names.

But they will all reflect these three action values. We will understand a simple law of economics -- namely that education and enablement are the true pillars of love of neighbor, of what we call helpfulness.

I have posted here two helpful signs which are in themselves not sufficient to meet the challenge. We cannot applaud good thinking as if that was the end. We can and will act. We cannot achieve the democracy we need merely by winning a battle over voter rolls. We have far to go but the outline is from binary to triadic. Knowing that and understanding it will make the change we are discussing constant and permanent.

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