But it's more than freedom. Small, ecology-minded companies like his might prosper (until they are eaten by the corporate sharks), but this "freedom"--which is essential, in my opinion, to the fundamental human need of making and trading things--has become a MONSTER in the form of multi-national, global corporate predators, who, a) have destroyed our power--and our right as a sovereign people--to regulate them, and b) are looting, plundering, and trashing environments all over the world, and where they are not killing union organizers and other leftists and throwing them in mass graves (Colombia--Bush's ikon "free trade" country in South America), they are enslaving people in sweatshops ("free trade" zones) and destroying local food production with U.S. Big Ag dumping, pesticides and GMOs.
Regarding "a"--our power to regulate these corporate monsters--see Kpete's post today--the most important post you will ever read. The death of our election system has just been sealed by a Florida appellate court, which has ruled that the "trade secret," proprietary programming code in all the new electronic voting systems is a sacred corporate "right" that trumps the right of the voters to know how their votes have been counted.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x475245You may be familiar with the case--FL-13, a 2006 Congressional race, in which ES&S (brethren to Diebold) voting machines 'disappeared' 18,000 votes for Congress in Democratic areas, in an election that was "won" by the Republican (naturally!) by only 300 or so votes. The lawyers for the Democrat (Christine Jennings) have asked two Florida courts, now, for access to ES&S's "trade secret" code, to try to figure out what happened to those 18,000 'disappeared' votes. Both courts have said that the voters have NO RIGHT TO REVIEW THE CODE. The corporate "right" to profit from our election system (--and, unsaid, to fiddle our elections) TRUMPS the rights of the voters!
There are many things wrong with our election system, but this is the coup de grace. This is why we are wasting billions and billions of dollars killing people in Iraq, instead of, say, growing trees in Iraq to restore the local environment and save the planet--or converting our economy to "green" energy, or other such projects. This is why we can't move the political system. RIGHTWING BUSHITE CORPORATIONS are 'COUNTING' ALL OUR VOTES with TRADE SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code--in extremely insecure and INSIDER HACKABLE voting systems--with not even a whisper of objection from our Democratic Party leadership, cause they're in on it, the bastards.
I fully understand Hawken's information and point of view. I have been part of this quiet "green" revolution that he speaks of--small protests, small projects, small groups, small "greenings," multiplied hundreds of thousands of times the world over. (See his web site/gathering place for it: -- www.wiserearth.org --) This is the driving force behind the peaceful democracy revolution that is occurring all over South America. It is the foundation of that movement, and of a worldwide 'third world' rebellion against "free trade" (global corporate piracy). And Hawken's is a profound and well-informed thinker on this subject. He understands that the dispersed, leaderless, unentrenched nature of the movement is SOMETHING NEW. It is huge. It is non-ideological. And it is some kind of "immune response" of the human race, as a whole, in the face of grave danger to our species and our planet, which addresses two major crises, the environment and human rights, and is averse to "pathological concentrations of power," as he puts it. It is NEW THOUGHT in the struggle between the powerful few and the powerless many, between the rich elite oppressors and exploiters, and their victims. He also correctly identifies big business as the wrecker of the planet and the biggest threat to human rights.
But to explain "How to Stop Our Political and Economic Systems From Stealing Our Future," without addressing the theft of our elections here in the U.S., which deprives us of the power to control the monster corporations that operate from our shores--and that are polluting the planet and oppressing people everywhere--is to leave out a crucial element of people power and of our communal responsibility, especially as the citizens of the U.S., enclave of the Dark Lords. The South Americans did not begin to make progress on first world "free trade" and World Bank/IMF oppression until they had done years of hard work on transparent vote counting and other democratic institutions.
The truth is we must do both--small "greenings" everywhere, AND curtailment of global corporate predators--and the latter must be centered in the U.S. and in the movement to RESTORE our democracy, first of all by throwing these corporate election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor.' They are democracy-killers. They are WHY we cannot begin to control our government. Removal of "trade secret" voting counting from our election system must be Priority #1. And Hawkens may be pointing to the way to do it: small protests, small groups, small transparent vote counting projects, all over the country, in every precinct, in every county. Change is NOT going to come from DC. It is NOT going to come from the Democratic Party, which has totally suppressed information about "trade secret" vote counting, and has colluded with the Bushites to put this non-transparent voting system in place (--in common purpose with them, to thwart the huge antiwar majority--56% just before the war started, now grown to over 70%). Change has to come from US, the people, in our own local groups, each in our own unique way.