The Long View
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from the American Academy of Arts & Sciences…Our Common Purpose: Reinventing American Democracy for the 21st Century, a report of the American Academy’s Commission on the Practice of
Democratic Citizenship, comes at a pivotal moment in the history of the
American experiment.
by Nina Luo in The Nation…Progressive philanthropy lacks good strategy, so too many of our organizations are hollow—and that left us unable to prevent a second Trump term.
by Adam Tooze in London Review of Books…America’s more liberal-minded spokespeople may talk about America limiting itself to defending a small yard with a high fence. But what is inside that fence is clearly everything that matters to state power in the current moment.
by Matt Novak in Gizmodo.com…It’s all about protecting against China, but there’s the added benefit of protecting against Trump.
by John Ganz in Unpopularfront.news…I think we are in a crisis of hegemony moment: neoliberalism is dying, but its replacement is yet to be born. And, as in pre and post-hegemonic times, the field of politics is fragmented and incoherent, there’s no hegemonic class or portion of a class that’s able to lead, so everything reverts to “the economic-corporate phase,” when different social interests seek their own short-term benefits rather than coalescing behind a vision of social development.
by Jon Henley, et al. in The Guardian…Apps and booklets are offering advice on how to build a bunker, stockpile food and live without electricity in case the worst happens
Daniel Ellsberg, now 91, says “I’m leaving a world in terrible shape and terrible in all ways that I’ve tried to help make better during my years.”
The World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, has always been more than a little problematic. But in recent years, the annual gathering of the rich and powerful has become an increasingly wasteful exercise in vanity.
A string of attacks on power facilities in Oregon and Washington has caused alarm and highlighted the vulnerabilities of the US electric grid.
People are shooting, sabotaging and vandalizing electrical equipment in the U.S. at a pace unseen in at least a decade, amid signs that domestic extremists hope to use blackouts to sow unrest.
A more nuanced depiction of voters and issues can help newsrooms better report on elections and political campaigns.
We live whipsawed by “polycrisis.” That’s the word historian Adam Tooze uses to describe multiple, simultaneous systemic crises that intensify as they collide, resulting in dire and deadly disruptions.
I believe, as wrote Yehuda Amichai, that the world was created beautiful for goodness and for peace, like a bench in a courtyard (in a courtyard, not a court!). I believe that the world was created for tenderness, hope, love, solidarity, passion, joy.
Omega founder Michael Lerner and guest Philip Yun engaged a discussion about the nature of the struggle ahead for democratic governance in the new world we are facing.
Does the nation have a new lease on life? One would like to think so. Sadly, however, it looks to me as though the current period of relative calm may be brief, to be followed by worsening civil hostility.