REH wrote: > > > > Basically my smug description of Europe was a parody of Ray's smug > > description of America (or vice-versa for the negative descriptions). > > I have no idea how you could see > anything that I have written as defending the history of > European Americans on this continent past present andI am quite cynical about > the future as well. I objected to your sweeping generalization of 08-May that "In Europe they are eating each other, here we are feeding each other." which is a crass misrepresentation of reality for most places. > 2. The problem that economist Chussudovsky mentioned is not > new but is a common process that springs from the belief that > financial, i.e. economic value, constitutes real value in the > world. In that sense every economist who preaches economic > value above community morality or the growth of the human > consciousness or spirit is a collaborator in what Chussodovsky > is complaining about. I simply do not believe that this value > system can end in anything other than human conflict and death. I think the point of Michel Chossudovsky is that economical developments have a big influence on human conflicts, so much so that they are even a motor of conflict. This is a basic element of independent conflict research, and I assume we can all agree on that. Realizing a cause is the first step (and the precondition) to effectively treat it. > > > Then again, your above criticism misses the point as it talks of the > > (distant) past, whereas my comparisions referred to the present > > (according to Ray's appeal to "live in the present"). > > Not a bad idea, "truly living in the present" although I can't findthe > phrase in that post. Perhaps you could post what you are > referencing as I am in this case. That would make it simpler. On Sat, 08 May 1999 20:45:24 -0400, you wrote: > > > But Chris, in spite of all of this, [my father] taught us to live in > > > the present. The danger of living in the present is to forget the past and to ignore the impacts of present decisions on the future -- both is a 'good' recipe to repeat the mistakes of the past and to mess up the future. Clinton and many Americans are clearly "living in the present" and the results are accordingly. Let's leave "living in the present" up to animals -- humans have developed a brain to remember the past and to project the future. > All to say this is not new. Nor is it old for people like my > sister to be abducted by a government and sent thousands > of miles from family, friends and culture to a school to > drive the Indian out. Or for Gypsy children, like the Bolshoi > ballerina studying with me at present, to be abducted by the > Swiss government and put with Gadje families who were > supposed to drive out the culture from their genetics as well. There is no way to compare the oppression and destruction of Native Americans by the US gov't with the handling of Gypsies by the Swiss gov't. Nobody was "abducted by the Swiss government" -- there have been wrong-doings by a social foundation which had the task of ensuring the education of Gypsy children. These wrong-doings were stopped 26 years ago, and since then, the Swiss gov't has spent millions of dollars to investigate the cases and to pay compensations (did the US gov't do anything similar for Natives?). An independent study came to the conclusion that "the main guilt of the authorities was lack of control of this foundation." Please check your facts better before handing out random accusations and sweeping generalizations. > Last week I also heard the National Rifle Association use > the Swiss requirement for weapons and food in their > basements as a justification for the free flow of firearms > in America no matter how many street gangs, drug lords > or disgruntled adolescents have them. The NRA's argument is really ironic, because "the Swiss requirement for weapons" is limited to the personal _military_ gun of each _soldier_ and has nothing to do with the free flow of _private_ firearms (which is more strictly regulated in Switzerland than in the US) that the NRA wants. > In my opinion we suffer from a poverty of workable non-violent > models and imagination. IMHO Switzerland offers such a model and has offered it for a long time now (even _before_ it was rich), not only internally but also externally (Red Cross etc.), but it seems that the powers-that-be are more interested in tearing down this model and (dis)"integrating" it into the imperialist EU, instead of adopting this model. It is "in the way" of the "New World Order", like the Yugoslavian model of non-aligned socialism was. Chris
