The last stage of capitalizm

"Even if the whole planet were offered as collateral, it could not cover Wall Street’s play."

"Never in the history of the world has finance capital so dominated the real economy, and only in the past two decades have derivatives been so central to finance capitalism.  The meltdown of 2008 was caused primarily by derivatives, requiring a bailout in the tens of trillions of dollars that is still ongoing, with the Federal Reserve buying up securities that no one would purchase – that is, bet on – otherwise. Yet, the universe of derivatives deals has grown much larger than in 2008, effectively untouched by President Obama’s attempts at financial reform.

"Derivatives are the ultimate expression of financial capitalism: they are primarily bets on transactions, rather than investments in production. ...."

From BAR executive editor Glen Ford at BlackAgendaReport.com.

True?  Perhaps generally, yes, though the issues are a bit more complex.  Watching these things, though, we're perhaps concerned about the runaway nature of our governments and economy. We hope for the best, but our concerns aren't new; they've been the subject of writings across the world's religions. You wonder if those prophetic writers might have been given a brief look at the current world.  They've described it as best they could, it seems.

Try an objective review of things we've been told that will accompany the end of the age:

- wars and rumors of wars around the world, but don't worry; the end isn't yet.

- an emerging collapse of the world ecosystem.  Clean water becomes scarce causing a significant population decline. (declining aquifers, polluted ground water?)  Forests and grasslands will be burned up.  (drought, climate change?)

- precious metals will lose their value. Currency will become ambiguous, falling in value, perhaps through inflation or the hyperinflation some countries have already experienced.  (ok, that's weird.)

- wealth will change.  Trade will require participation in a government approved financial system. A mark or number in our head or hand (ha! .. electronic transactions rather than physical currency?) will be the required transaction credential.

- a consolidation of nations into a world government will finally succeed, but only for awhile.  It will perhaps be like current hubristic governments, and it will eventually collapse in a world-wide war.  In the aftermath, a new world order?

- and apparently, those who have died will live again somehow.  Ok, enough, enough.

So we sit and watch as the oceans have lost much of their large fish populations, the glaciers melt, and the weather changes.
Wall Street bets on an EU collapse, and developing countries suffer the most.  Either nothing makes sense, or it's all a little too clear.

Today's exaggerated speculations aside, are there facts we can objectively evaluate?   Early writings on the subject were often obscure, but you have to wonder what the prophets saw that provoked such a commentary.  Can we be realistic rather than religious/superstitious? Is there an appropriate response in our life choices?

Lead the way

If alarm bells don't ring when you check the chart, move on to something more interesting. For the rest of us, ....

Management vs. leadership:  Decades in the military and civilian workforce have provided only a little clarity, and perhaps it's not a truly fair comparison.  The two positions may represent opposite ends of a spectrum along which we might find ourselves.  None claim it's an easy journey; few have done it gently.  All make many mistakes along the way.  Theoretically, it can all be done with dignity and poise.

That said, note the style of the leader:  Equips others to perform without being told.  Cheerfully rocks the boat and presses for decisions.  Recognizes that rules aren't perfect; they can be rewritten.  Deals directly and serves well to the very end.

Executive Summary:  One way passes the time.  The other changes things.  Are both required?  Is it really that clear cut?

Easier

Life issues.  It's easier to let the government manage them.  Or perhaps it's easier to let our favorite political party decide them.  Neither has proven worthy of such trust.

The purpose of government is to serve all the people well in accordance with the vision and principles laid down.  I don't envy them the task, of course, despite the fact that my mother insists I should run for president.  I honor those men and women who serve in government, hoping to do well by the country and its citizens, but they've little chance of being genuinely and fully successful.

So, how shall we then live?  That's the question Francis Schaeffer asked a few decades ago.  Among his comments, he warned about our increasing dependence on government for our formation.  Government rules touching schools and churches, humanistic reshaping of the common media, the leveling of values, of noble purpose, and the advance of materialism.  He was right, of course.

There's an infantilism in each of us that perhaps wants someone else to take care of everything, like when we were children and our parents sheltered us from the world. We want to leave it all to them and focus on ourselves. There's never been a time when an individual of conscience could actually do so.

It will be a bit of a lonely road, and certainly not an easy one.
(Photo:  the far side of Djibouti, 2011; friends live down by the shore in the distance.
Precious friends.)

If now you attempt to think for yourself and make your own way forward with a good conscience, you'll be a radical. You'll be the oddball, the nonconformist, the fringe person.  You won't fit the community norms, the church norms, or the political party norms, will you.

We could just let it all happen and be carried along by it.  Most will.  A few I know will not.

An interesting subject for a new year's bucket list, no?  What shall we then do differently?
Happy New Year.  :)

Homosexuality

"... homosexuality affects far fewer of us than gluttony, materialism, or divorce. And as Jesus pointed out so often in his ministry, we like to focus on the biblical violations (real or perceived) of the minority rather than our own.

In short, we like to gang up."

... "And when we make separate categories for the “real sinners,” when we reduce our fellow human beings to theological issues up for constant debate who cannot even be told they are loved without qualifiers, when our (thinking) conveniently renders others the problem and us the heroes, maybe it’s time to sit across a table and get to know one another a little better, to break up some categories and make some new friends. Maybe it’s time to drop our stones for a while and pass the bread.

…healthy, whole grain, organic bread, of course."

The above are snippets from Rachel Held Evans' blog.



She's right.  Today's furious condemnation of same-sex marriage often comes from folks who have little to say about the deadly effects of things like materialism ...
... or selfishness
... or anger
... or greed
... or ...

So these uppity church leaders came to Jesus bringing a woman who had been unfaithful.  They wanted to stone her, and they tried to get Jesus to agree with them.  "What do you say?"  After drawing on the ground, he finally answered, but what he said wasn't about her adultry.  It was about their hearts, and one by one they left, deeply convicted by what he'd helped them see.

It's so easy to think we're the good ones and others are bad when the truth is that there are none righteous.  Not one.  So now what do we do?

Golden Years

Got fun plans?  A little travel perhaps; a warm place where you can enjoy some days off?  Of course.

   80% of the world never thinks about the things that occupy our days.

• They don't make a list for when they go to the grocery store.
• They don't wonder when the car insurance is due.
• They don't wonder where their kids will go to college.
• They don't worry about their IRA or 401k.
• They couldn't care less about a Coach purse or a Gucci blouse.
• Traffic doesn't make them crabby on the way home from shopping.
• They don't look forward to vacations.

No stores, no cars, no college, no vacations, ... and no golden years.

Being rich or poor isn't a statement of motivation or willingness to work.  We're not well off because we worked and succeeded while they loafed.  It isn't because we have more natural resources or smarter people.  We don't and we're not, but the difference persists.  Curious isn't it?

Poverty isn't something you choose.  It's something that's done to you and to your family or clan or race or class.  True?

I met one young man in eastern Africa; bright, well-mannered and quite well spoken.  We've worked for a few years on his education and helping his family get healthy.  His biggest obstacle?  Wrong tribe.  He's Mijikenda. There's not a lot of opportunity for him.  If he was Kikuyu however, doors would open automatically.

School kids in western Africa celebrate Children's Day in early June. They're a little
surprised to hear that we don't do the same.  For these, making it past the 6th grade
 is a big deal.  Many do not. The costs are more than many families can afford.

Jesus made a big deal about caring for the poor, the disenfranchised.  It's not because they're pitiable and make us sad with their suffering; at least that's not my take on his teachings.  I think it's because they're the same as us, and it's just not right. He sees us all as pretty much the same, and he knows how screwed up we'll be if we just leave them beside the road.

When we look forward to our vacation or our new home or our ... golden years, that's not the real world, is it.  So, what do we do with what we know?  Change makers and help bringers, they have more fun and they live in the real world.

Feel like sharing a bit of the opportunity and resources you have?  :)

Cities Without Citadels

Vertically! That's the way life distributes us. Civilizations past were pretty much the same. Power, prestige, wealth placed you up the ladder. The poor always occupied the bottom rung of history's record. Inconsequential, peasants, working class.

Centuries past tell us of the ruling class and the innumerable thousands of poor. The few lived at the expense of all the rest. It was as though they somehow deserved the best of everything even if it meant deprivation for others. Inevitable in every culture?

Not true!  It's neither inevitable nor needed; and not every civilization was vertically arranged. There have been interesting times and cultures where the play for dominance wasn't a part. Curious?

Centuries ago along Africa's Niger River, rainfall varied greatly from year to year. One year in six was near the region's average; other years were at the extremes for rainfall on the plains and in the upper regions where the river's source was fed.  So to a greater or lesser extent, the plains flooded a little or a lot and crops did or didn't do well.  There wasn't any way to predict how a year's growing season would turn out, so the residents adapted.  It's instructive for us to see their approach.

The river's inland delta, as it's called, is almost level and the Niger river descends just a few millimeters per kilometer over much of its 4000 km length. When the rains come, the flood moves broadly across the region. The amount of rain determines how far from the river the floods will carry, and it's rarely the same two years in a row.  Folks learned that they couldn't master all the skills and manage all the resources needed for every opportunity.  Fishing was varied from year to year and tremendously labor intensive. Farming was even more so with a requirement to understand which crops would do well in which water depths.  The pastoralists managed their flocks by moving significant distances regularly.  Out beyond the edge of the floodplain that was waist deep for six months of the year, then rapidly inward as the land and vegetation dried up.

Communities specialized and cooperated, and they did so without one specialization or community being at the top. Some years the farmers did better than the fishermen and vice versa. Some years, the herds survived well; others, not so well. They needed each other in order to survive, so they shared more or less graciously. Ancient stories persist of conflicts being resolved generously.

Communities grew into cities around the specializations, and they persisted successfully for more than a thousand years.  It was hard, of course, but they did it without an upper class and without a central government and without Wall Street leeches. Interesting.  More than a thousand years without war or sequestration or ... well, you get the idea.

Our present competition and consumption model is unsustainable, we've discovered, and it brings suffering and death to others.  We're all at risk, but there are many alternatives.

Consider ...  the complex society of the inland Niger River Delta.  Bambara millet farmers, the Fulani and Tuareg herders, and the Bozo and Somono fishermen lived together there for 1600 years – on the basis of peaceful and reciprocal relations.  These were acephalous societies, based on complexification of settlement, rather than centralization.  

See: John READER (1999): Africa, A biography of the Continent. Vintage. London; Chpt. 23 – Cities without citadels.