The institutional practice of allocating power within a society, which generally includes the assignment and exercise of authority [legitimate power] by various means, including violence.
Just about everyone now knows that Senator Joe Manchin is courted by and takes significant donations from oil and gas industry lobbyists. Yet, his blatant though somewhat subtle gaming of the legislative negotiating process clearly smells like quid quo pro. Virtually no other senator who is asked will directly confront that fact. They all dodge … More Corruption Nation: Acceptance Becomes a Norm
I didn’t know much about General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Pentagon’s Joint ‘Chiefs of Staff, appointed by Trump. I saw him marching from the White House in his fatigues with the Fake President and a number of his lackeys on their way to St. John’s church where Trump would hold a bible upside … More Mark Milley and Me: Saving the Nation from an Autocratic Attempt
It seems the highest point in John Kerry’s political career was his impassioned testimony before congress expressing his experience of the absurdity of the Viet Nam war. After that came serial mediocrity in search of sustaining moderate upper-class rule. Never again would he to take a principled stand as he pursued his political path, grounded … More Unrealistic Assumptions Dodge Difficult Decisions
Now that I have read President Biden’s “fact sheet” on his infrastructure plan, dubbed the American Jobs Plan, I have to wonder whether it will devolve into an “upgrade” to “modernize” business-as-usual. What we need is a genuine emergency response to the converging crises of climate, a crumbling main street economy, and the continued enrichment … More Building Back Better: Deferred Maintenance vs. Emergency Response
The confusion is palpable as it is widely ignored. We have a new, slightly progressive administration headed by Joe Biden, the empathetic traditional former long-term senator. He knows how to “reach across the aisle” and make deals with Republicans. But wait, those senators were the Republicans of old, who were actually willing to make compromise … More The Infrastructure Illusion: Historic Neglect and Crucial Confusion
The tension between Democratic and Republican politicians is greater than at any time I can remember. The Republicans have no policy agenda; they just focus on obstruction just as they did to the Black President about whom they preferred to remain in complete denial. At least Joe Biden seems to have learned the lesson of … More To Filibuster Democracy, or Not
Today, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the contradictions of American society and political culture lay exposed in the aftermath of the chaotic but organized seditious assault on the Capitol building in Washington, DC. On January 6, in the failed attempt to prevent the constitutionally mandated congressional counting an acceptance of the votes of the electoral … More Healing the Trauma: from Person to Planet and Back
What was once a routine celebratory national ritual—the inauguration of a new president—grows near, the political and cultural tensions grow evermore severe. Not only is the national Capitol subject to assault by a ragtag mob of self-appointed “patriotic” seditionists, incited by none other than the president himself. We are also unfortunate to observe the chaotic … More Has the Nation Gone Mad? Well, Sort Of…
Climate scientist Dr. Andrew Glikson’s brief assessment of our global prospects in his article, “How long for civilization?” is uncomfortably right on target. He begins his short essay, published the day after Christmas, 2020, with an epigram consisting of Albert Einstein’s famous statement, ‘The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over … More Earth System Discontent with Civilization
It is as if 2020 just will not go away. The pandemic resurges in many nations, even the ones that did so much better than US on the first round—which is to say they had a plan and took action on it. But it’s so easy to slack off when things are getting better. Ignoring … More Pandemic, Plutocracy, and Damned Statistics
Robert MacNeil Christie, Author 