“Traditionalism” through the Lens of Cultural Ecology
A battle is raging in Washington for ultimate power, and while it’s being defined by personality (specifically, one “yuge” ego), it also hinges on political philosophies. The common terms liberalism and conservatism have lost their usefulness in navigating these...
To Billionaire Doomsday Preppers: Your Wealth Won’t Save You
With Donald Trump’s election and the rising perils of war, climate upheaval, accelerating inequality, and civil unrest, some of the richest people in the United States are making escape plans. In a recent New Yorker article, “Doomsday Prep for...
What’s the Role of the Legal System in Creating an Equitable Economy?
In this episode of Next Economy Now, Erin Axelrod, a Partner at LIFT Economy, interviews Janelle Orsi, founder of The Sustainable Economies Law Center. Orsi is an attorney living and working in Oakland, California. Her law and mediation practice...
Awaiting Our Own Reichstag Fire
Millions of Americans now share the profoundly disturbing experience of watching and waiting as their nation lurches toward authoritarianism. In a previous essay, I described the Trump administration as a “presidency in search of an emergency”—i.e., a crisis that...
A Hard-Nosed Optimism
In last week’s essay I used the phrase “hard-nosed optimism” to describe the attitude needed now as “an alternative to the lies of divisive bullies who take advantage of the elites’ failures in order to promote their own patently...
Richard Heinberg on ‘America First’.
Eight minutes into his inauguration speech, Donald Trump presented one of his key policy shifts. “America First”, he announced. And then, again, in case anyone had missed it, this time more slowly and deliberately, “America First”. He went on...
The Über-Lie
Our new American president is famous for spinning whoppers. Falsehoods, fabrications, distortions, deceptions—they’re all in a day’s work. The result is an increasingly adversarial relationship between the administration and the press, which may in fact be the point of...
Trump’s First Test on Taxes
Donald Trump’s voters have high hopes that he’ll boost the economy and protect jobs for those who’ve been left behind after three decades of flat or shrinking paychecks. They didn’t vote to make the super-wealthy even wealthier. Even Steve...
How Do I Know Good Can Overcome Ignorance, Spite and Hate? Because I’ve Seen it.
I want to share a story with you today that I’ve not shared before on this blog. I was moved by something I saw on Twitter to the effect that the future will not remember Trump, but the future...
Trump Versus the Media: This Could End Badly
The first week of the Trump presidency has seen an extraordinary and unprecedented confrontation between, on one hand, the new leader and his spokespeople, and on the other, mainstream American media outlets including the New York Times, the Washington...