Thoughts on Fear and Faith
I have known fear in many of its forms. When I was a very small child I had a recurring nightmare of being pursued across mountain ridges by a huge bear. I never did get caught but I woke up terrified night after night. I usually found comfort in the flyleaf of one of my children’s books that was illustrated with a row of beautiful angels. I had picked out one of them as my own special friend and guardian. Maybe she was watching over me in 1993 when a wildfire devoured my California home. For some inexplicable reason, the terror I experienced seeing the wind-driven flames approach across the canyon morphed into a cool-headed response that saved my life, though with nothing but the clothes I was wearing and the family pets.
Two of my close friends would not heed my warnings and tried to race against time in an effort to save some of their earthly goods. They did not fare so well. Both were caught in the fast moving flames and were horribly burned. I had to help evacuate them in a military helicopter, only to watch one of them die a day later and the other suffer through an agonizing years-long recovery that was worse than death many times over. I experienced a whole new kind of fear and pain when, out of despair at his disfigurement and the unending and unendurable agony of his treatments, my surviving friend, to whose hospital bedside I had devoted six full months of my life, twice tried to commit suicide.
These experiences may pale in comparison to what has recently transpired in Haiti, and, in fact, to what is happening to millions of people around the world every day. Yet nothing I have experienced in my life was more difficult for me than the persistent and gnawing fear of impending foreclosure and financial ruin that followed on the heels of that 1993 wildfire.
I was lucky to survive the fire and its catastrophic aftermath, but even luckier that my mind and my heart escaped untainted by those terrible experiences. I have known many people for whom fear is a constant and ongoing impediment to their happiness. Some of them, at times of stress, actually become stupid, immobilized by their fear and anxiety like a deer caught in the headlights. Others have suffered the destruction of every one of their loving relationships because they could not stem the toxic influences of fear, doubt, and suspicion. Still others even now live boring, unfulfilled, and unhappy lives because they have been too afraid to take the calculated risks that accompany nearly every opportunity in life.
I was lucky, because in that time of my darkest hour I found an antidote to the destructive power of fear: a reasoned faith that, for me, even today makes order from the chaos of life’s ups and downs. My faith is certainly not of the religious or dogmatic kind. In fact, it might just be an invented mythology or a psychological trick. But it has worked for me. In the midst of that terrible time, I made a conscious decision to believe that everything happens for a purpose, and that everything happening to me was specifically and intentionally designed to facilitate the advancement of my soul, the strengthening of my character, and the sharpening of the tools with which I felt I was meant to do good works in the world. This may all sound very narcissistically high-minded, but for me it was a matter of survival. Without that powerful belief in my own life’s purpose I would almost certainly have succumbed to fear, despair, and depression.
Very rarely now does a day go by without some inkling of fear triggering those memories of harder times, reminding me that I’ve actually got it pretty easy. So I say that I am lucky, because for me, fear has been a pathway to faith that everything, no matter how difficult, will always work out for the best. And, in my experience, it has—and does.
And for that I am grateful.
--Peter Alexander (1/21/10)
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Thursday, October 22, 2009
False News. Fox Liar Updates. Faux Nose. “We Lie, You Act On It.”
Fox’s (non-cable) license(s) to broadcast are controlled by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which has the power to set standards and revoke abusers. Broadcasters are forbidden to use a certain seven words made famous by Lenny Bruce, but apparently they can get away with any kind of seditious lie about the President of the United States. This seems to me like a double standard. And it seems to me that truth in reporting is a good deal more important than prosecuting for Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction or the use of the “F” word.
The FCC has the power to regulate this sort of thing. Why isn’t it doing its job to ensure that reporting is truly “fair and balanced”? When public opinion is shaped by lies, what hope is there for Democracy?
Friday, April 24, 2009
Accountability and Justice for All
President Obama is being careful not to appear vindictive or partisan concerning the potential prosecution of Bush administration officials and CIA personnel for crimes related to torture and abuse of suspected terrorists. I understand the fine political line he is walking, but he is ignoring both principle and historic precedent. The argument that a soldier who is “just following orders,” and is therefore innocent of the crimes he commits, was debunked at the Nuremberg Trials after World War II. In that case, Nazi soldiers and SS guards from the concentration camps were held accountable for their crimes even though they were “following orders.”
The principle here is that human beings—if they are to participate in civil society—need to behave in ways that are consistent with basic human values of dignity, respect, and the sacredness of life; and that even in extreme situations individual conscience must play a role. Prison guards at Abu Ghraib were prosecuted because they showed a blatant and sadistic disregard for the dignity and safety of the prisoners. Yet, their behavior was not inconsistent with policies (or the intentional lack of them) handed down from the highest levels of the Bush Administration.
In the case of waterboarding and other forms of torture and abuse inflicted on “suspected terrorists” (some of whom died, and many of whom were later proven to be completely innocent), the perpetrators were following “policies” handed down directly from the White House. But those policies, crafted in secret, were wrong, and they were illegal. This is not a partisan issue. It is an issue of law and of the most fundamental principles of our democracy. “Equal justice for all” doesn’t only mean that everyone’s rights must be equally protected. It also means that everyone must be held legally accountable to the same standard of behavior. Anyone in the Bush administration, or any other administration, who authorized criminal behavior—as well as those who, following orders, committed the crimes of torture and abuse—should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Our principles, our humanity, and our national integrity demand it.
The principle here is that human beings—if they are to participate in civil society—need to behave in ways that are consistent with basic human values of dignity, respect, and the sacredness of life; and that even in extreme situations individual conscience must play a role. Prison guards at Abu Ghraib were prosecuted because they showed a blatant and sadistic disregard for the dignity and safety of the prisoners. Yet, their behavior was not inconsistent with policies (or the intentional lack of them) handed down from the highest levels of the Bush Administration.
In the case of waterboarding and other forms of torture and abuse inflicted on “suspected terrorists” (some of whom died, and many of whom were later proven to be completely innocent), the perpetrators were following “policies” handed down directly from the White House. But those policies, crafted in secret, were wrong, and they were illegal. This is not a partisan issue. It is an issue of law and of the most fundamental principles of our democracy. “Equal justice for all” doesn’t only mean that everyone’s rights must be equally protected. It also means that everyone must be held legally accountable to the same standard of behavior. Anyone in the Bush administration, or any other administration, who authorized criminal behavior—as well as those who, following orders, committed the crimes of torture and abuse—should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Our principles, our humanity, and our national integrity demand it.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
New Funding for Amtrak a Blessing
What a breath of fresh air that we finally have an administration that supports Amtrak. The beleaguered rail system has been demeaned and starved for so long it’s amazing there’s anything left of it. Now, perhaps, it can start serving a broader purpose and take some of the pressure off air travel and its gargantuan environmental footprint. It’s been hard to find much sympathy for Amtrak among the general public, so effective has been the propaganda against it. But one circumstance in particular has always provided an opportunity to think more charitably about the virtues of rail: weather-related delays at airports. Having been a victim of innumerable such delays (mostly at O’Hare, which seems to be in an eternal bad weather vortex) I have never wasted the chance to suggest to my fellow sufferers that now would be a good time to call their members of Congress and ask for new investments in Amtrak. I point out that for shorter trips—less than 500 miles—train service could be a lot more efficient and less time-consuming than air travel with its long security lines, advance check in times, and predictably unpredictable delays.
Amtrak suffers from numerous problems, or course: degraded tracks, aging equipment, and second-class status to freight traffic on east-west routes. The factor of second-class status is a huge one, and one of the greatest detriments to the system. Rarely does any east or west-bound Amtrak train arrive or leave on schedule; and this unreliability factor is like a death sentence in a world where most important activities—business meetings, vacations, family events—abide by firm schedules. In Europe the trains tend to run on exact schedules, and they often ride on state-of-the-art tracks at speeds double or triple what an automobile could achieve. But here in the US, where the mystique of the “rugged individual” (and its partner “personal freedom”) has been used for years to deny public support for things like trains and health care, trains usually run on degraded tracks, at 19th century speeds, and on schedules so undependable that ridership is limited mainly to those who are afraid of flying, or who love trains for their own sake.
Imagine if we had trains running east west at 150 mph. DC to Pittsburgh would take about two hours. Chicago to DC would take about 5 hours. A cross-country trip could be completed in one day with a single overnight. I happen to like Amtrak trains already, even though most of the equipment is aging. I like the freedom to get up and walk around, the convenience (if not the offerings) of the café car, the electric sockets for charging computers and cell phones, and the sense of community that I often feel (people tend to be a lot more relaxed on trains than on airplanes). I also like the absence of heightened security and its associated lines and inconveniences (isn’t it fun to remove one’s shoes at the airport!). Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our trains felt as clean and modern as most airplanes? And think how much we could cut CO2 emissions: a passenger on a train requires about 1/10th the greenhouse gas output compared to one traveling by plane.
So, all I can say is it’s about time! And let’s not stop with small investments in Amtrak. Let’s invest enough to fix the big problems and make train travel the mode of choice for all Americans.
Amtrak suffers from numerous problems, or course: degraded tracks, aging equipment, and second-class status to freight traffic on east-west routes. The factor of second-class status is a huge one, and one of the greatest detriments to the system. Rarely does any east or west-bound Amtrak train arrive or leave on schedule; and this unreliability factor is like a death sentence in a world where most important activities—business meetings, vacations, family events—abide by firm schedules. In Europe the trains tend to run on exact schedules, and they often ride on state-of-the-art tracks at speeds double or triple what an automobile could achieve. But here in the US, where the mystique of the “rugged individual” (and its partner “personal freedom”) has been used for years to deny public support for things like trains and health care, trains usually run on degraded tracks, at 19th century speeds, and on schedules so undependable that ridership is limited mainly to those who are afraid of flying, or who love trains for their own sake.
Imagine if we had trains running east west at 150 mph. DC to Pittsburgh would take about two hours. Chicago to DC would take about 5 hours. A cross-country trip could be completed in one day with a single overnight. I happen to like Amtrak trains already, even though most of the equipment is aging. I like the freedom to get up and walk around, the convenience (if not the offerings) of the café car, the electric sockets for charging computers and cell phones, and the sense of community that I often feel (people tend to be a lot more relaxed on trains than on airplanes). I also like the absence of heightened security and its associated lines and inconveniences (isn’t it fun to remove one’s shoes at the airport!). Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our trains felt as clean and modern as most airplanes? And think how much we could cut CO2 emissions: a passenger on a train requires about 1/10th the greenhouse gas output compared to one traveling by plane.
So, all I can say is it’s about time! And let’s not stop with small investments in Amtrak. Let’s invest enough to fix the big problems and make train travel the mode of choice for all Americans.
Friday, March 13, 2009
The Tone of Political Debate in America
I spend probably too much time following a number of issues in the news with which I have been involved as an activist over the years: the fate of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, campaign finance reform, health care reform, the war in Iraq, corporate governance, fishing conditions on the Chesapeake Bay (!), and others. Google News Alerts is both a blessing and a curse in this regard, for my inbox is daily deluged with links to news articles that I usually cannot resist reading. As everyone reading this must know, most on-line news organizations now offer opportunities to comment on the story at hand, and lots of people avail themselves of this opportunity. This interactive on-line feature provides the potential for a wonderful public forum, where alternative perspectives and opinions might be aired and explored. But all too often these venues are dominated by polarized spitting matches between people who sound like they have listened to too much Rush Limbaugh or watched too much Keith Olbermann.
I find this trend to be very disturbing: it seems dehumanizing at its core when the rhetoric descends into insults, name-calling, stereotyping, and vitriol. Not that I haven’t laughed from time to time at some of the more outrageous tirades, like Al Franken’s book a few years ago, “Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot.” But what we see in today’s talk radio hosts and TV commentators—mostly on the right—is not an attempt at humor, but hate speech, pure and simple. Embarrassed leaders like Republican Party Chair Michael Steele may try to make light of it by calling such demagogues “entertainers,” but the demagogues themselves take it a great deal more seriously, as demonstrated by Rush Limbaugh last week rejecting that demeaning title (entertainer) and quickly forcing an apology from Steele. Rush, evidently, relishes the de facto role as party leader that Rahm Emanuel has so cynically (or cleverly) thrust upon him.
Political gamesmanship aside, however, what is truly disturbing here is that millions of people are apparently taking license from their political opinion leaders to indulge in the same kind of disrespect and hate-mongering in their own forays into the public square. With Rush Limbaugh and scores of other talk show hosts legitimizing a sub-basement standard of “political dialogue” for more than 20 million listeners, it shouldn’t be too surprising, perhaps, that unreasoned contempt and overt bigotry have become increasingly common in on-line forums. But it is disturbing, nonetheless—especially when people on the other side of the issue at hand fall into the same obnoxious behavior. Is this healthy? Is it, perhaps, a harmless way for people to vent their extreme frustrations in a failing economy and a world where “moral certainty” increasingly leads to devastating outcomes? Actually, I think it is unhealthy, like a cancer in our social fabric. I try to dispassionately call it out when I see it and to set an example of evenhanded calm in debate (though I fail at this from time to time), but I don’t really have a clue how to stop it. Wasn’t this one of those things we were supposed to learn in Kindergarten?
I find this trend to be very disturbing: it seems dehumanizing at its core when the rhetoric descends into insults, name-calling, stereotyping, and vitriol. Not that I haven’t laughed from time to time at some of the more outrageous tirades, like Al Franken’s book a few years ago, “Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot.” But what we see in today’s talk radio hosts and TV commentators—mostly on the right—is not an attempt at humor, but hate speech, pure and simple. Embarrassed leaders like Republican Party Chair Michael Steele may try to make light of it by calling such demagogues “entertainers,” but the demagogues themselves take it a great deal more seriously, as demonstrated by Rush Limbaugh last week rejecting that demeaning title (entertainer) and quickly forcing an apology from Steele. Rush, evidently, relishes the de facto role as party leader that Rahm Emanuel has so cynically (or cleverly) thrust upon him.
Political gamesmanship aside, however, what is truly disturbing here is that millions of people are apparently taking license from their political opinion leaders to indulge in the same kind of disrespect and hate-mongering in their own forays into the public square. With Rush Limbaugh and scores of other talk show hosts legitimizing a sub-basement standard of “political dialogue” for more than 20 million listeners, it shouldn’t be too surprising, perhaps, that unreasoned contempt and overt bigotry have become increasingly common in on-line forums. But it is disturbing, nonetheless—especially when people on the other side of the issue at hand fall into the same obnoxious behavior. Is this healthy? Is it, perhaps, a harmless way for people to vent their extreme frustrations in a failing economy and a world where “moral certainty” increasingly leads to devastating outcomes? Actually, I think it is unhealthy, like a cancer in our social fabric. I try to dispassionately call it out when I see it and to set an example of evenhanded calm in debate (though I fail at this from time to time), but I don’t really have a clue how to stop it. Wasn’t this one of those things we were supposed to learn in Kindergarten?
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
YES!
It is wonderfully encouraging to see that the Obama Administration's new trade representative, former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, is drawing a hard line on the enforcement of labor rights and environmental protections by our trading partners. (See: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7934583.stm) . This is how we can "export" our treasured American values of freedom, fairness, and human dignity. The laws we have in this country should apply equally to the countries that we trade with. In the heat of the Iraq war the administration said "We don't torture" but then turned over prisoners to Syria, Egypt, and other countries, knowing full well that they would be tortured. (The administration, in some cases, even relied on "confessions" obtained under torture in other countries.) Obviously, this was a subversion of our values. If we don't torture we can't use other countries to do the torturing for us!
The same principle should apply to the exploitation of labor and environment. If we don't exploit labor (well...in theory, anyway) we can't allow other countries to do the exploiting for us. But that is exactly what has occurred under globalization and "free trade". We get most of our consumer goods from countries where working conditions, wages, and environmental degradation are so bad they would never be allowed in the US. Yet, our willingness to ignore those conditions as long as we could get cheap consumer goods has enabled and encouraged horrendous abuses. Obama and Ron Kirk are on the right path to restoring the US as global leader of freedom and democracy by insisting that our trading partners rise to acceptable standards in the way workers and the environment are treated.
--Peter
The same principle should apply to the exploitation of labor and environment. If we don't exploit labor (well...in theory, anyway) we can't allow other countries to do the exploiting for us. But that is exactly what has occurred under globalization and "free trade". We get most of our consumer goods from countries where working conditions, wages, and environmental degradation are so bad they would never be allowed in the US. Yet, our willingness to ignore those conditions as long as we could get cheap consumer goods has enabled and encouraged horrendous abuses. Obama and Ron Kirk are on the right path to restoring the US as global leader of freedom and democracy by insisting that our trading partners rise to acceptable standards in the way workers and the environment are treated.
--Peter
Sunday, March 8, 2009
The Opportuntity to Create a Sustainable Economy
With all the rush and anxiety to get our economy (and the world economy) moving again we are at risk of losing an opportunity to redesign from the ground up the way the economy works. After all, what good would it be to recreate the same unsustainable, excessively consumer-driven system that we already know has been destroying the ability of the earth’s ecosystems to sustain life? In response to the crisis, American families seem to be following a logical course: reducing spending and personal debt and increasing personal savings. Banks and businesses are doing the same thing, and with good reason. Because so much of Wall Street value turns out to have been based on fraudulent (or at best, highly leveraged) transactions, it is natural for individuals and institutions alike slow down and look twice before leaping back into a “business as usual” scenario.
Unfortunately, as a result, millions of people have lost their jobs. And as the economy stalls and tries to find a new footing, millions more jobs will be lost. The question is, what kind of new jobs will be created for these legions of unemployed to fill? The opportunity before us is to encourage the development of new businesses based on principles of sustainable development. And it is not a small opportunity! Let’s start with energy efficiency. For decades we have been wasting unconscionable amounts of energy in the way we heat and cool our homes, businesses, schools, and public buildings. The market for retrofitting buildings with energy efficiency improvements—from weatherization and lighting to appliances and insulation—is enormous: hundreds of billions of dollars in the US. Some states are taking the lead on this. Vermont has led the way with an “efficiency utility” that has dramatically cut the cost of energy bills for many homes and businesses, and the Maine legislature is now considering two bills that would boost investments in energy efficiency and help underwrite the advancement of a multi-billion dollar efficiency industry, creating many thousands of jobs just within the state of Maine. (See www.opportunitymaine.org). Other states should follow suit, and the federal government should support and encourage these efforts.
The production of electricity is another area where huge strides could be made. Traditional coal, gas, and nuclear power plants are unbelievably inefficient. Even at peak efficiency, only about one third of the embodied energy from the primary fuel source gets converted into electricity. The rest goes up the smokestack or gets released into the environment as waste heat. Then, because of voltage losses in hundreds of miles of power lines, a tenth or more of the electricity that is generated gets lost in transmission. Even more disturbing is the fact that traditional coal and nuke power plants are designed and run at full power, and they burn up fuel day and night at the same rate whether the electricity is being used or not! Needless to say, a revolution in the way we produce and use electricity is urgently needed; and it offers the promise of a new multi-trillion dollar, high-tech industry. There has never been a better time for Washington to reset its priorities and policies on energy.
Other areas with enormous potential are ecosystem restoration and adaptation to the impacts of global warming. Sometimes these are one and the same. For example, the increasingly extreme storms attributed to climate change are overwhelming municipal waste-water and storm-water systems, causing degradation of our lakes, rivers, and coastal areas on a massive scale. The EPA estimates that nearly $400 billion is currently needed to upgrade these systems throughout the US. Other job-creating ecosystem restoration projects include cleaning up toxic sediments in rivers, harbors, and industrial sites, restoring and preserving wildlife habitat, and finding and retrieving abandoned fishing gear in coastal waters and estuaries like the Chesapeake Bay and Gulf of Maine. Taken together, these kinds of projects can create many hundreds of thousands of jobs nationwide and provide enormous societal benefits such as clean drinking water, swimmable beaches, and revitalized fisheries.
There are many other industries where reforms and re-invention could boost efficiencies and create jobs, including transportation, health care, education, and agriculture. But at the bottom line, we come back to consumer behavior. Under our current system, over-consumption is not only encouraged, it is subsidized by political policies that enable the exploitation of labor and resources by many of our ‘trading partners”--countries whose governments do not care about human rights, justice, fairness, or human dignity. This laissez-faire policy approach, which is so undermining to American values, has also undermined our nation’s ability to provide the basic goods and services upon which we all depend. We have largely exported to other countries the means of production for everything from clothing to electronics, and now we are even at risk of losing our ability to manufacture automobiles and many of our basic foods. Public policy and consumer behavior need to evolve hand in hand. Consumers are already focusing more on necessities, which is natural in a recession. But public policy should quickly adapt to encourage this more conservative form of consumer behavior while raising the bar with market signals to our trading partners to clean up their act. For example, we should stop importing goods and services from third world countries where laborers work in virtual slavery.
Finally, as this enormous restructuring of our economic system takes place, the government must ensure that individual families are not cast into poverty and homelessness, and that the out-of-work workforce is quickly trained to fill the jobs that a new, sustainable economy will create. The challenge is great, but the opportunity is greater. No one likes change: as long as the status quo was reasonably comfortable nothing was going to change. But now that things are in turmoil, now that people are already very uncomfortable—this is the time to seize the moment, making the kind of dramatic changes that were politically impossible before. Now is the time to re-engineer our economy—not by micromanagement and central control, but by using the economic power of our government to absorb much of the shock that threatens the well being of American families, and by crafting policies that encourage industries and consumer behaviors that are sustainable in the long run.
Unfortunately, as a result, millions of people have lost their jobs. And as the economy stalls and tries to find a new footing, millions more jobs will be lost. The question is, what kind of new jobs will be created for these legions of unemployed to fill? The opportunity before us is to encourage the development of new businesses based on principles of sustainable development. And it is not a small opportunity! Let’s start with energy efficiency. For decades we have been wasting unconscionable amounts of energy in the way we heat and cool our homes, businesses, schools, and public buildings. The market for retrofitting buildings with energy efficiency improvements—from weatherization and lighting to appliances and insulation—is enormous: hundreds of billions of dollars in the US. Some states are taking the lead on this. Vermont has led the way with an “efficiency utility” that has dramatically cut the cost of energy bills for many homes and businesses, and the Maine legislature is now considering two bills that would boost investments in energy efficiency and help underwrite the advancement of a multi-billion dollar efficiency industry, creating many thousands of jobs just within the state of Maine. (See www.opportunitymaine.org). Other states should follow suit, and the federal government should support and encourage these efforts.
The production of electricity is another area where huge strides could be made. Traditional coal, gas, and nuclear power plants are unbelievably inefficient. Even at peak efficiency, only about one third of the embodied energy from the primary fuel source gets converted into electricity. The rest goes up the smokestack or gets released into the environment as waste heat. Then, because of voltage losses in hundreds of miles of power lines, a tenth or more of the electricity that is generated gets lost in transmission. Even more disturbing is the fact that traditional coal and nuke power plants are designed and run at full power, and they burn up fuel day and night at the same rate whether the electricity is being used or not! Needless to say, a revolution in the way we produce and use electricity is urgently needed; and it offers the promise of a new multi-trillion dollar, high-tech industry. There has never been a better time for Washington to reset its priorities and policies on energy.
Other areas with enormous potential are ecosystem restoration and adaptation to the impacts of global warming. Sometimes these are one and the same. For example, the increasingly extreme storms attributed to climate change are overwhelming municipal waste-water and storm-water systems, causing degradation of our lakes, rivers, and coastal areas on a massive scale. The EPA estimates that nearly $400 billion is currently needed to upgrade these systems throughout the US. Other job-creating ecosystem restoration projects include cleaning up toxic sediments in rivers, harbors, and industrial sites, restoring and preserving wildlife habitat, and finding and retrieving abandoned fishing gear in coastal waters and estuaries like the Chesapeake Bay and Gulf of Maine. Taken together, these kinds of projects can create many hundreds of thousands of jobs nationwide and provide enormous societal benefits such as clean drinking water, swimmable beaches, and revitalized fisheries.
There are many other industries where reforms and re-invention could boost efficiencies and create jobs, including transportation, health care, education, and agriculture. But at the bottom line, we come back to consumer behavior. Under our current system, over-consumption is not only encouraged, it is subsidized by political policies that enable the exploitation of labor and resources by many of our ‘trading partners”--countries whose governments do not care about human rights, justice, fairness, or human dignity. This laissez-faire policy approach, which is so undermining to American values, has also undermined our nation’s ability to provide the basic goods and services upon which we all depend. We have largely exported to other countries the means of production for everything from clothing to electronics, and now we are even at risk of losing our ability to manufacture automobiles and many of our basic foods. Public policy and consumer behavior need to evolve hand in hand. Consumers are already focusing more on necessities, which is natural in a recession. But public policy should quickly adapt to encourage this more conservative form of consumer behavior while raising the bar with market signals to our trading partners to clean up their act. For example, we should stop importing goods and services from third world countries where laborers work in virtual slavery.
Finally, as this enormous restructuring of our economic system takes place, the government must ensure that individual families are not cast into poverty and homelessness, and that the out-of-work workforce is quickly trained to fill the jobs that a new, sustainable economy will create. The challenge is great, but the opportunity is greater. No one likes change: as long as the status quo was reasonably comfortable nothing was going to change. But now that things are in turmoil, now that people are already very uncomfortable—this is the time to seize the moment, making the kind of dramatic changes that were politically impossible before. Now is the time to re-engineer our economy—not by micromanagement and central control, but by using the economic power of our government to absorb much of the shock that threatens the well being of American families, and by crafting policies that encourage industries and consumer behaviors that are sustainable in the long run.
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