Thursday, July 8, 2010

The Political Threat to PHYSIS

It has been a while since I last posted here and many things have been going on in the political world since then. One of the major issues I have taken note of is the increasing political threat to Nature (PHYSIS) herself.

I've been listening to the radio, watching TV, and reading on the Internet about the increasing push by the American Right Wing to continue pressing corporate power over all else. The belief seems to be that we must allow businesses to do what they want so that they can take care of our economy - aka "trickle down economics". Well, we've been doing that since the 1980's and it worked out as long as the people at the top were being responsible, but we have found out that they are NOT responsible people. They have taken our economy down with their gambling failure which then required a ridiculously large taxpayer bailout for them in order to keep this capitalistic economy floating and not dive into a depression.

Now, what does this all have to do with Nature? EVERYTHING. Corporate power when left unchecked as it has been since Reagan was in office, is again threatening both the Earth and our human Freedom. Large oil companies are poisoning the planet, killing animal and human life, and making exorbitant amounts of money with no intention of improving the social welfare of the locales they inhabit. Africa, South America, and now the US is suffering from the irresponsible actions of corporate tyrants.

On top of this, the fundamentalist Christian populist/political machine is mobilizing in a way never before seen since the times of the Crusades lead and/or fueled by people like Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Pastor John Hagee, etc...... They conduct wars in the name of God (just like their Muslim brothers by the way), push corporate agendas in the name of God, and exploit Nature as if there was no tomorrow for them. (Perhaps because there is no tomorrow for them due to their Apocalyptic psychology).

I think its time that this new combination of corporate/religious militancy be addressed as a real threat to our planet and to our human freedom. This is not a benign political ideology anymore, but it is becoming a real political movement which needs to be opposed. Nature herself is caught in the middle of wars between extremist religious zealots and unregulated corporate competition. The people behind this often claim that their god is granting them the right to conduct themselves this way at the expense of everyone else.

I don't know about you, but I was never asked about this, nor was I told by ANY god that this was a good thing. I doubt Nature was asked what she thought about it either. In any case, this is no longer something we can ignore.

What will you do about this? I have one idea: reviving an ancient pre-Christian, Hellenic practice on which our country was founded on, its called DEMOCRACY!