WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL
We stand at a crux in our development as a species.
Faced with economic uncertainty, environmental catastrophes, uncontrollable population increases, epidemics of infectious diseases and a proliferation of terrorist attacks and regional conflicts, we find ourselves and our governmental entities unable to devise strategies to resolve these problems which confront us—both personally, and globally.
The forces of nationalism and isolationism rear their ugly heads. Crime and hopelessness claim our inner cities. The economic disparity between rich and poor widens as class struggles pull us further apart.
The political system of this country, The United States of America, arguably the best in the world, is failing. Politicians are viewed as self-serving hypocrites, their votes sold to the highest bidder as they willing do, or say, anything to get themselves re-elected. Will they be our salvation?
We are at a crossroad. Do we remain on our current path, spiraling downwards towards the eventual and inevitable collapse of civilization, or do we take the steps necessary to insure our survival as a species?
THE CHOICE IS OURS TO MAKE!
So what ARE we going to do?
This is the question we ask when we see the disillusion and confusion in the eyes of our children, when we can't understand why they turn to drugs trying to escape the reality of a world where the probability of a
safe, sane and secure future is non-existent; it's the question we
ask as we see the faces of famine staring out at us on the nightly
news; when we view the victims of the violence which pervades our
society.
What are we going to do?
People everywhere are asking this same question and feeling a
similar sense of frustration at our inability to resolve the
monumental problems which face us.
Resentment abounds at the failure of our governmental institutions to provide a climate in which all of us can flourish, a society where all are free to live without fear in a world where everyone has the opportunity to see their friends and family prosper in a sane and rational environment.
It is time for a new beginning, for a new philosophy that can achieve
these universal objectives--time to cast ourselves free from the
shackles of the unworkable systems which have mired us in the morass
of war and poverty, of starvation and sickness and the desperate acts
of destitute peoples throughout the world--the culmination of which
can only lead to the utter devastation of this planet we all call home.
Parts of our World have recently awakened from the numbing effects of
totalitarian oppression. The cry of freedom rang out: ThePhilippines, Eastern Europe, South Africa, Central America, and today, North Africa and the Middle East; people took to the streets willing to confront the corrupt and repressive regimes which bound them. They demanded change and a better way of life.
Govenments toppled as the philosophies that bound them together bowed before the winds of change. All were destined to fall--sooner or
later, under control or out of control--they toppled from the sheer weight of their inefficiency and the irresistible power of their unhappy populations. Our worry is that the next to fail will take the rest of us with them when they go.
Human history is predominantly a record of the evolution of our tribal disputes. We have expanded from shaggy groups of nomadic hunters to the ultimate reflection of our tribal heritage—the current slate of our Nation-States.
Our world is a more sophisticated one then that of our ancestors. The choices we must make are no longer as black and white as they once were, nor as limited in their consequences. Our tribal disputes have grown deadlier--the stakes our very existence.
This is the tumultuous state of our world today. We blunder on in confusion, chaos and consternation, wondering who we are and where we're going. Looking for answers to the problems that plague us, we search for a way out of this quagmire and a path that will lead us to a just, sane and rational world.
We must face the fact that what I do today affects you tomorrow. Isolation is a thing of the past. Nothing is hidden from the scrutiny of the rest of the world and your business is now my business. What goes on here has repercussions there. Our world has become a very small place. There is nowhere which can escape being affected by the actions of others.
And therein lies our problem. We have failed to recognize that we are all, ultimately, members of one vast tribe--HUMANITY! Sharing a single speck of dust in a cold dark ocean of space--in a nothingness so vast it is impossible for us to imagine--WE ARE ALL THAT WE HAVE!
Unfortunately though, as complex as our world is today our governments still deal with each other in terms of our ancestral tribal mentality. It pits us against them, we versus they and I over you. We're so locked into this fear of others, this legacy of our tribal past, that we border on the brink of self-annihilation. We've inherited from our forebearers a chaotic world straining under there burden of having to deal, globallywith social, political and technological problems beyond the ability of our antiquated governmental systems to answer.
So, what CAN we do?
First, we must recognize and accept the fact that we're all in this together; us versus them is no longer valid. We are all one, independent members of a single species, singular parts of a whole--humanity! We may not like each other, we may hold different views and adhere to diametrically opposed philosophies, but underneath all the dogma is an indisputable underlying truth--WE ARE ALL ONE!
"I am he, as you are he, as you are me, and we are all together." Familiar words from and old song, but the message is one we need today--we ARE all together! We can no longer look at life through that narrow tribal viewpoint, we can't afford to--our very existence depends
on us discarding it. No longer can it be East versus West, North
versus South or Me versusYyou. The competition between nations for
land, for food, for power has imperiled the survival of our species.
We stand on the brink.
The governmental systems operating throughout the world today are the haphazard results of the random evolutionary growth of humanity, inherited by us through no rational pattern or premeditated forethought. We are trying to deal with the basic survival of our species within a system which can't possible rise to the challange of resolving that which needs to be resolved.
The established "powers that be" have a vested interest in maintaining the status-quo; to do otherwise would be, for them, political suicide.
We are locked into a spiral of nationalistic competition which is
strangling us; arms, economics, even food and water are the
weapons we use to attack each other.
We view others with mistrust and suspicion, fearful of their motives and aims, when all the while failing to see a universal truth--WE ALL ESSENTIALLY WANTTHE SAME THINGS OUT OF LIFE!
Yes, we may want them to different degrees, and our wants are relative to our particular individual situations, but most of us only want our
fair share. Most of us do not seek advantage over others--rather we
search for what little peace and harmony we can find in the troubled
world around us--most of us simply want a chance!
Certain inalienable rights exist for everyone on this planet and until they
can be guaranteed to all we shall never be free from war and the
cries of the oppressed. These rights are fundamental to the health,
safety and well-being of all humanity and they are neither up for
sale to the wealthy nor the exclusive province of the chosen
few--they are a God-given bounty to us all. They define the basic
limits of the human condition and without them we are no more than an
animal scurrying from one dank shelter to next in a pathetic search
for sustenance.
Every man, woman and child, as citizens of Planet Earth, has the fundamental right to adequate food and shelter; to sufficient health care, educational and employment opportunities in order to insure a chance at a productive life; the right to elective representation and the freedom to choose who to be and where to be it, provided it doesn't infringe upon the rights of others.
We all have the right to live in a world which affords us all the opportunity to grow and prosper in peace, and until EVERYONE enjoys these inherent rights our world will never be free from the yoke of terrorism, war, violence and fear.
With no rational, universal economic policies we are all held hostage by
the irrational and capricious nature of the many financial markets
and fluctuating currency values. With the impetus of our inbred
hostility and mistrust we exhaust our national treasuries in the name
of defense. With our hands tied by arbitrary and unnatural borders,
and our distribution systems controlled by the forces of profit and
greed, we watch helplessly as some of us starve to death while others die of over-indulgence. Competition rules rather than compassion.
The momentum of our past rolls on. Unimpeded by logic or rationality we are trapped by a system that cannot, and will not, change under its
own volition. Our leaders, burdened by restrictions placed upon them
by our archaic notions of national sovereignty, grapple with issues
which they are fundamentally unable to answer. Our fences may keep
you out--but they also keep us in.
So what ARE we going to do? How can we reconcile ou vast differences: the disparity in the distribution of wealth and resources, the myriad forms of political ideologies, and the gulf between those who have, and them that wants, to the satisfaction of all?
Once we accept the reality of our shared humanity and begin to understand that OUR SALVATION LIES WITHIN OURSELVES, WORKING TOGETHER, FOR EACH OTHER, AND THE GOOD OF ALL MANKIND, we can take the next step. With the knowledge that we've only ourselves to look to in the quest for world peace, can we move forward.
The underlying cause of most regional conflicts can be directly attributed to an overwhelming feeling of disenfranchise and persecution by the aggrieved parties. Without adequate means of redress and lacking effective control of their perceived destinies, people invariably turn to violence as the last resort to achieve the ends they so fervently desire; sometimes those ends are justified--sometimes they are not--but without the means to peacefully alter their situations chaos is inevitable.
The time has come for a new beginning. We must cast ourselves free from the tribal attitudes of our evolutionary past and create a world in which the rights of all will be cherished and protected. It's time for logic and sanity to reign in place of fear and dread.
Our world has outgrown the haphazard and counter-productive conglomeration of antagonistic nation-states which, through greed, paranoia and the unchecked lusting for power have driven us to the brink of self-annihilation.
FELLOW CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH---THE TIME HAS COME FOR A JUST AND RATIONAL, UNIFIED WORLD GOVERNMENT!
I neither advocate the elimination of established national borders, nor
the sublimation of our unique national identities in the name of some
homogeneous world hive of interchangeable parts--it is those very
differences which gives us our dynamism and vibrancy as a species.
The United States, as a Federal Republic, is a prime example of a system where individual states have maintained their distinctive characteristics while under the umbrella of a unified federal authority--the same would hold true under the auspices of a unified world government.
Nor do I advocate an all-powerful centrist state. I believe that as much control as possible be left in the hands of the lowest level of local autonomy. We should all be free to follow our own destiny as long as the rights of those around us are preserved and maintained and they are free to follow theirs. I simply seek a mechanism to confront the social, political, environmental and developmental issues which concern us all, globally, and provide us with a rational framework to move on toward our shared destiny.
A Social Democracy in a free-market, capitalistic environment would
seem, to me at least, to be the rational choice for the basis of a new world order. Under a system of this nature the provisions for providing
the minimal requirements for a productive and fulfilling life are
taken out of the private sector and given over to the control of the
elected bodies of government while the engine of economic growth and
prosperity is left relatively unfettered.
Such functions as the availability of adequate food, accessible
healthcare, educational opportunities, and sufficient housing, is
ultimately less expensive for us, as a society, to furnish to those
that need them then it is to deal with the constant and continuing
ramifications of a perpetual class of under-educated, under-employed,
marginally malnourished and criminally prone people.
Free Enterprise, tempered by reasonable restrictions, is an essential requirement in a healthy society; it provides the impetus for growth and change, rewarding the innovative and culling the inefficient. The primer for the pump of progress in the fields of technology and science, free enterprise helps expand the bounds of our knowledge and allows us to realize our personal economic potential.
In the ideal scenario, again in my opinion, would be an
international body of elected representatives answerable and
accountable to their respective electorates who would deal with questions having international implications while more regionally focused problems would be the concern of localized assemblies of diminishing authority--all the way down to that bastion of democratic
involvement, the town meeting.
The seed now exists for the formation of such a world-wide, law-making body, although in its present manifestation it's no more than a political sideshow, more concerned with pomposity and demagoguery than in the finding of solutions to the real problems we face. I refer, or course, to that current travesty of international affairs--The United Nations.
It's not my intent here to lay out the specific operation of a newly
revamped United Nations. There are many examples of governmental
organization and much deliberation and compromise will be necessary
to arrive at a workable and effective system. The point I do wish to
make is that there do exist models for governmental assemblages which
can legislate effectively and fairly.
There is no absolutely perfect political philosophy--as we are imperfect,
so are our governments. We are only as good as we strive to be and
the efficacy of any endeavor is directly proportional to the energy
we put into it. It's possible to conceive and implement such a
system--IT ONLY AWAITS OUR WILL TO DO SO!
We, as a species, have reached a cusp in the course of our quest for
civilization. We suffer serious problems whose consequences, if left
unchecked, are dire indeed. The "powers that be" are unable, or worse, unwilling, under the constraints of our present world order to initiate the political changes we need to allow us to move on to the next plateau in our continuing climb from the swamps to the stars.
It's easy, however, to recognize that a problem exists, and the idea of a
unified world government is neither new nor radical. The trick, as
I'm sure you know, is in the getting from here to there. And so, if
you've waded through this diatribe with me so far and will bear with me a bit longer, I'll come to the point: and that being that I think there's a way out of this dilemma and a path we can follow to get us where we want to go.
It's time to call the bluff of those in power who claim to speak for the will of the people. Let's give the people--US--the chance to speak for ourselves.
One look around at what's been happening in the world lately is proof that we have the power to pull it off: We saw it happen in the Philippines where the people confronted the Marcos regime and caused their downfall.
We saw it happen in South Africa where the long subjugated native population claimed their rights and the government, although undeniably against its will, had to accede to the weight of reason and justice.
The Iron Curtain crumbled before our very eyes. Pushed by the press of the people of Eastern Europe and aided by events occurring in the former Soviet Union, the recently oppressed called for a better way of life and the sheer weight of their numbers gave them protection in their actions.
And today the cry of freedom rings forth from Egypt, Libya and Syria, as
their people mobilize and march in protest against repression and
injustice.
If
you've made it this far it's because there's a message here which
strikes a familiar chord somewhere within you. I believe this same
chord echoes within most of us on this planet. It may be called
something different, and felt differently by each individual, but I
believe that anyone with even the smallest shred of consciousness and
conscience can hear this chord as well. The energy for change is out
there--shared by most of us it only waits to be harnessed; it
resonates to the power of our shared. humanity and common
aspirations. And recognizing that power will start us on the path
toward that sane and rational world.
