Both sides have to understand something very important:
Even as it takes the Many to Make The Few,
It also takes the Few To Make The Many.
As we seek better ways to, in a very integral sense, grow our children up, as we do so, the process seems to (or I have always felt ought to) also have them growing us up a bit more as a result, as well. Assuming, of course, that we have it in our power to provide, with some assurance of stability, the basics that make life not only possible, but bearable as well; and by bearable I mean both in a practical sense, but also in the sense that how we're doing it feels right; precisely because we're trying to do right with each other, in meaningful ways; working it out locally so we can negotiate our own best path by actually talking to one another as an integral part of, everyday working life. And then going that extra step, once we get the training in, in trying to shift around in what needs to be done, so that we can all get a better idea of the full reality, of what it takes to make a practical, and caring, community happen.
I understand. This may well be the rantings of an idealistic dreamer, but still... I have to tell you that it feels right... Right to somebody whose continued existence was made possible by, whether he understood he was doing so or not, following the best balance he could between two opposites in his personality he wasn't even aware he had, to its fullest extent at least, till fairly recently. A balance that ultimately made him create a philosophy he had no idea would become so complete (however relative you might consider complete).
I made this approach to an alternative be designed as it is because it both felt right, and because it makes the best practical sense, that we're ever likely to be able to make, given the two, both terribly intimidating, challenges we have to face now, and our narrowing options because of time
Capitalism is broken. It simply does not work correctly in an electrified environment.
In twenty years, or even less, the temperature of this planet may well tip over a point we will never be be able to recover from. Understanding that it is both because of not only unresolved Capitalist, unpaid, full life cycle costs, of all the things done as a part of the, very real material, and technological development, it created; but that it is also because we are so many now as well; and always making more.
Because of these two main realities, we must mobilize now. Just as if this were a more traditional attack on our physical being. The problem there, however, is that to do such a mobilization, without first also addressing the existing inequality of outcomes we have in place, would be risking a great deal of internal, social turmoil, just when we need further distractions like we need more holes in our heads.
I think my approach to, what is basically just us running our own communities, is the way to address this because we would go into the change by doing a super employee buyout of everything. By which we, and I mean working people, as well as salaried, up to millions a year (it's all negotiable you know), would then be able to run things, temporarily, as a completely managed, super single payer, corporate/government entity; of which, of course we would all the shareholders of.
In this scenario everybody just keeps doing what they were doing starting out. We figure out what a minimum living wage is and we implement it. From then on, no matter what you are employed doing, you will get what the job should pay as the minimum wage, but with the difference being made up by the new Federation Government as your payment to yourself for the bond you took out, on your own credit, for this very, super buyout, purpose.
We then try to streamline everything we do as a consumptive nation.
We get rid of marketing because we won't need it anymore. We can choose as regions and city states what we want to make basic in bulk, and with automation as well, for what, we can figure out, that it will take to meet majority decided, branding translations, to what will be a necessarily limited lists of choices. At least until we get more of the commons set up where all community instrumentality, as well as the full rights of materials utilization each person's share of participation would allow, so that the individual could then make whatever desired end use item, need or fancy, might prompt them to make in their more generously available free time.
We get rid of excessive packaging because we won't need that anymore, either.
We rationalize, completely, all energy creation, and delivery, into a new mix of what still works best, environmentally, with conversion to hydrogen as the ultimate staple fuel; delivered without the unnecessary, high tension, overhead transmission systems we have now; preserving an outdated model of centralized production, to provide for the demand.
We rationalize, once and for all, and make more efficient, our healthcare system; using the Federation government to help rethink how each locality can help, each other locality, treat people exactly as they need to be treated, with true local care and involvement, but with information always organized so that we can keep track of important developments, as well as to aid in the development of new, and/or more effective treatments (and again, it can be negotiated).
We reform the military into only four main groupings (Fleet -- all main waterborne, and airborne, offensive and defensive assets; Mobile Infantry -- all main ground combat assets, including close air support, and immediate mobile placement assets; Command and Control -- self explanatory, as well as Federation Rapid Response -- a combining of the existing MAC operations, Army Corp of Engineers, FEMA, the Bureau of Land Management, and the Environmental Protection agency)
We make mandatory national service, of no less than 6 years, by everyone, starting at eighteen, and up to, say, thirty years of age (which will also be negotiable), become law. Service that would then provide a combined 3 years of Junior College, and generalized Trade School education, if that education was lacking; something that could hopefully be done in expanded, already existing, state facilities, with the training personnel being a mix of both state labor, and New Federation provided service personnel. This service would then be utilized across the full spectrum of what the revised military would be responsible for; a big part of which, of course, would be doing everything we can to plant more carbon fixers (hopefully with short grow spans), protect more ice flows at the poles, respond to natural disasters, develop, and maintain, better, unified critical systems transportation, everywhere it is needed, as well as provide coordination, and development research, to make the production, and delivery, of hydrogen fuel, universally available.
Everybody who is already, or is then made, unemployed, and no longer eligible, for national service, would be paid the basic living wage to attend a, to be determined, comprehensive skills review, and needs requirements, education; emphasizing (hopefully) not only possible remedial work, but also providing for the possibility of growth in both hands on skills (as in the sense of tradesmen), as well as, more technical process skills, and general people management skills.
And in that, of course, the community itself will have to play the major role in determining what those, "to be determined" things are; but doing so with the confidence that the transition government would be making it a priority to marshal not only material aid, but the research, and planning aid, to help each region, and each city state, be able to plan for their individual needs, but also with an eye on how they can best mesh with the entities around it.
The point here is that we will need to strive for as many, more generally capable people as we can create, as well as as much efficiency as we can muster, so we can weather lean times that might likely be coming, and still have life be bearable as I have described it.
We must do this, however, understanding that, however much we strive for self sufficiency, we are unlikely to achieve it in full, with all city states. This means we have to accept the inherent advantage of reinvigorating (and redefining), already extensive city state, and regional, cooperation; using as imaginative a blend of ways as we can possibly think of, to share labor, materials, and knowledge, so that regional variations in ability, and resource, can be utilized as a leveraged means to "scratch each other's backs," so to speak, in new and even more helpful ways. That way we can keep critical abilities, and infrastructure, doing what they've always been doing, but with a lot more possibility of doing it a whole lot more for the general good than it has ever been done before.
None of this is an impossibility, in and of itself, but just a great deal of change, in a very short amount of time, and change of this magnitude is never easy. But there is simply nothing for it. We must take this on, and do so with the sure knowledge that it must be do or die, because I'll be damned if I can see how else we could go about doing what needs doing, and still have any hope that it could be enough to make a difference in the short few decades we have left to act; intimidating amount of change or not.
This is what is essentially your call now. Whether to take this on or not. Whether to demand that current institutions and parties acknowledge this as the most probable way to start leading the rest of the world in helping us do everything that can be done to keep more carbon from going into our atmosphere; get more carbon out; and protect every part of our polar ice cap we can; and then perhaps branching out to shade cities, as well as whole swaths of arable land at, or near the equator; doing it so it can not only work the carbon problem more, but because it will help other people find their own best bearable balance of the practical, and the meaningful. So that their hands are just as energetically, and imaginatively engaged in finding, and working solutions as ours are.
See Also:
[Post Note: Since having generally more capable people would be every community's goal, we would be in a much better position to do what this next link makes quite clear we should do. J.V.]
HEALTHY, WEALTHY AND WISE
Yes, worldwide education rates have gone up, but we still have a very long way to go.
[Post Note: Developments like this one could go a long way towards making individual city states nearly self sufficient in food production, without taking huge swaths of land.
J.V.]
FRANKENSTEIN'S MEAT
Soon enough, burgers will grow not just in fields, but in vats. If the sound of that bothers you, know that you're not alone.
