We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, April 3, 2010

High-stakes Eurasian Chess Game: Russia’s New Geopolitical Energy Calculus

by F. William Engdahl from Voltaire. Engdahl is an astute observer of the new Great Game that the ruling classes of the great powers are fond of playing at the expense and lives of the rest of us. We need to keep informed of these games as we work toward a decentralized world free of such criminal elites.