"For starters, free market fundamentalism will be looked upon no more kindly than religious fundamentalism is today. On the whole, the modernist corporate agenda will be no more politically influential than the traditionalist Church is now."

Perhaps that explains why the corporatist agenda seems to support religious fundamentalism today. They seek to protect themselves through the same devices? I would argue that the tradionalist Church is actually more politically influential today than it was say in the sixties and seventies up to today. I've often wondered as to why.

Of course Islamic fundalmentalism has been singled out as a threat, but I would argue Christian fundalmentalism and Zionism have been strengthened.

{Well, what if we moderns did the same with money? What if the way to solve our problems—the only way—is to turn money on its head? Make today’s power source for greed and corruption tomorrow’s resource for giving and caring. This would require something extraordinary, “a true revolution of values,” to quote Martin Luther King, Jr}

you would be rounded up and then summarily shot as a terrorist.

there is no way to reform capitalism and i doubt if dr king were alive today that he would actively endorse reforming the system. i kinda imagine him hanging out w/ chavez, castro and morales.

also...

{They would put capitalism to work for social change, sustainability, and shared prosperity, not the wealthy. They would set up an economic system that rewards men and women for being creators of good, not consumers of goods.}

a point often overlooked is any economic growth is going to be bad for the environment. period. the world has to start looking at post modern steady state economics. we can no longer sustain economic growth - in america or around the world - whether that growth falls under the guise of capitalism or a human global socialist state (we can still dream).

the circumstances that confront us mandate new paradigms of thinking (political/economic), including nurturing human life into a post fossil fuel dependent world. tick-tock....

...peace...

Capitalism could no more be put "to work for social change, sustainability, and shared prosperity, not the wealthy" than slavery could have been.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

I'd take out the last word of this quote and replace it with justice. One man's happiness may be due to another's downfall whereas justice for one is justice for all.

I liked this article a lot. Capitalism is here to stay. Period. What is needed is capitalism with a conscience. Luckily we already have a good, starting, working model: Scandinavian capitalism/socialism.

As much as we might like to see socialism tomorrow, given the overwhelming force possessed by the present regime, that is not a practical expectation.

I think we will have to content ourselves, for the present, with incrementalism - chipping away at the present system as opportunities present themselves, this process hurried along by the activities of the OWSers.

That's why I'd like to see the rapid development of a progressive third party - probably the Greens - which would be the means by which the general population would cooperate with the OWSers to swing our politics to the left.

With a concerted effort begun soon, a progressive third party could cramp the duopoly's success in the 2012 elections. This is true because many more people are now aware of the excesses of the oligarchy (thanks to OWS) that were not aware three months ago. These newly-aware need progressives candidates for whom to cast their votes.

Please spare me the usual arguments that the Greens are no good and that OWS is a meta-movement that is above electoral politics (maybe it is, but it can use all the help it can get).

The Greens can be improved.

A strong progressive third party can only compliment the OWSer's activities, and will not in any way hamper them.
A congress full of the usual Rs and Ds will do what it can to hamper OWSer's activities, in accord with their master's instructions.

Once upon a time, there was The Lord God Jehovah-- generally regarded as the Creator and Supreme Micro-Manager of the Universe, and the source and purveyor of divine right and authority upon the ruling 1% of manunkind, i.e. emperors, kings, and their aristocratic cohort.

The Western Enlightenment indeed sought to remove or at least decouple Jehovah from His (emphatically "His") place at the top of the pyramid.

Though there was insufficient prevailing sentiment to annihilate or forsake Him entirely, He was superannuated and reduced to an honorary executive position.

Like the founder of a vast corporation, this CEO emeritus retained His own office somewhere in the back of the executive suite; His name, if not His image, was kept on the company letterhead, and He was habitually invoked and referred to reverently by His successors.

But the joke was on the Enlightened. Because Jehovah has long since slipped out the back window and marched back in the front door-- this time as Mammon, and dressed in street clothes.

And He's obviously nursing a cosmos-sized grudge against the secular humanists who presume to do without Him.

The reconstituted 1%, the overclass energized by Mammon's own whirligig of money and power, are busy wreaking His revenge on the infidels who refuse to worship Him and accept Finance as the be-all and end-all, the sine qua non of life itself.

This time around, His motto is "No More Mister Nice Guy!"

If He's indeed taken down, they'd better bring along plenty of silver bullets, cloves of garlic, and wooden stakes to finish the job properly.

There are those who believe that the separation of private wealth and government is an impossibility, citing the historical record as proof. Yet, the founders of the United States understood that the separation of Church and State was evolutionarily the right step at the right time and we the people are better off because of it. Now, in the 21st century, the separation of private wealth (corporate money) from public policy is an urgent evolutionary step. To those who believe that cannot happen, I would say that their imaginations are asleep and their values artificially constricted. I applaud the author for comparing religious fundamentalism (and the general social disgust toward it) with free-market fundamentalism (and the growing social disgust toward it). When money and profit begin to serve the common good, the care of the environment, the unity of humankind and the uplifting of humanity out of poverty and ignorance, we will have learned to use money as an ethical tool rather than an addictive worshiping of a delusional superiority based on the hoarding of resources beyond what any one person, family or community needs to thrive. Luckily for us, human nature is pliable and full of potential, and does not consist of only our fear and selfishness. When we begin to institutionalize our finest qualities--our creativity, compassion, courage and love for life--we will be on our way to constructing a global civilization far better than the one being constructed by unfettered greed and international lawlessness.

Jerry Gerber
www.jerrygerber.com

"That the Occupiers have made no demands has prompted observers to criticize the movement for failing to offer a new vision. The confusion is understandable, and the critics can be forgiven. No demand is big enough for the Occupiers’ intention. The Occupiers envision a true revolution. Their movement has a mission: dethrone the corporate kings of modernity. Give birth to a new, post-modern age of humanity."

And for that to happen, a new culture will be required to replace our very dysfunctional one. Not too long ago, at the end of the 1990s, there was a psycologist and sociologist team who observed and reported on what they called the rise of "Cultural Creatives," which this short article summarizes, http://www.lifepositive.com/Mind/culture/creatives.asp I would argue that what we've witnessed/now witness globally is a revolt sparked by what drives these Cultural Creatives. Of course, I'm partial to such an analysis as it dove-tails with my own--The ultimate reason we face today's regime of dilemmas is because our culture is corrupted to its core: If Every Child has to have its Own, then in the longrun, no one will have anything as there's not enough to go around.

"... the almighty dollar will be absolutely essential to our emerging new age ..."
"What if the way ... is to turn money on its head?"

The almighty dollar ain't so almighty. Of what substance doeth it consist?
In truth, it hath no substance. It CIRCULATES. It essentially IS NOTHING
BUT CIRCULATION. If the circulation is impeded, the existance of dollars
is impeded, and with total cessation of circulation it vanishes. [This is not
a comprehensive explanation of money, of course. I reckon the really extant
processes that "are" money are so arcane as to be not admissible in normal
peoples' minds. They mostly don't like to deal with such "hocus-pocus".]
We know certainly that the circulation can be long-term, as in the situation
of a mortgage loan for purchase of a house, and its repayment over e.g. 30
years. Nevertheless the house is accounted as standing good for the dollars loaned. The situation is termed a "performing asset [loan]". But what would
be the situation if the house's "owners" lock the doors, put the key in the
mailbox, and walk away? (This happened in 2008.) Wherein then doeth
the dollars loaned subsist? The bank then has both the house and the
accountant's ledger-entry of the dollars loaned "on" the house. But then
THERE IS NO CIRCULATION. The bank can of course sell the house.
(Maybe!) But most likely it will sell at a loss to the bank. At least some
of the dollars loaned "on" the house are lost: THEY VANISH. So much
for the almighty dollars.

Worldwide, the financial-market-derived flows/circulations are so large
and complicated as to be beyond understanding by any but professional
moneymen, and may-be beyond even their understanding. Could all the
worldwide circulations, flows, loans, derivatives, etc. encounter a vanishing
act similar to but much more serious than a bank's loss on a mortgage
loan? You betcha! The whole fine and fancy edifice of money that we've
let be built can decline into an un-peopled ruin. If we may want to resort
to Biblical images, the relevant image is not money as god. The relevant
image is the edifice of money as the Tower of Babel.

aequum, you go too far with the "beyond understanding" stuff. When governments turn a blind eye to regulation, when greed clouds the mind of the unwary, when the moneylenders not only own the temple, but the entire apparatus of advertisement and control, what is left for the average person to assume? It's all too horrifically understandable. When I was younger, banks rarely got themselves in a situation where there was much chance to lose meaningful amounts of money. Then everything went crazy. Some lenders did not even ask for principle repayment, just interest. Derivatives, or some such foolishness will protect them. The Big Boys said so! It must be true.

This article interests me.

Particularly the psychological Aladdin's Lamp it opens up.

I've been looking over my most thought provoking articles, from persons in this time and from the past, trying to come to grips with some of the ideas put forth in this piece.

Can mankind really change? Or has ten thousand years of civilization already changed us into something less than we were before, or for the better?

Hard to gain perspective from inside the box.

Of all those thoughts from the past I referred to a minute ago, JFK's 1961 address to the United Nations stands out for me head and shoulders above the rest. Could he have been for real, meant what he said, so passionately, despite his frequent appeals to 'reason'?

I like to think so. I need to think so.
---------------------------

"Until all the powerful are just, the weak will be secure only in the strength of the General Assembly. [of the United Nations]...

peace is not solely a matter of military or technical problems -- it is primarily a problem of politics and people. And unless man can match his strides in weaponry and technology with equal strides in social and political development, our great strength... will...vanish from the earth.

I come here today to look across this world of threats to a world of peace. In that search we cannot expect any final triumph -- for new problems will always arise. We cannot expect that all nations will adopt like systems -- for conformity is the jailor of freedom, and the enemy of growth. Nor can we expect to reach our goal by contrivance, by fiat, or even by the wishes of all.

But however close we sometimes seem to that dark and final abyss, let no man of peace and freedom despair. For he does not stand alone. If we all can persevere, if we can in every land and office, look beyond our own shores and ambitions, then surely the age will dawn in which the strong are just, and the weak secure, and the peace preserved.

Ladies and Gentlemen of this Assembly, the decision is ours. Never have the nations of the world had so much to lose, or so much to gain. Together we shall save our planet, or together we shall perish in its flames..."

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jfkunitednations.htm
--------------------

I don't know who arranged for the assassinations of JFK and his brother Robert - perhaps I don't need to know.

If we can all wake up long enough to avert complete destruction, from the "perfect storm" now engulfing this planet and all of its inhabitants - that will be vindication and justice enough.

Manysummits
===

There is no doubt that money has been worshiped as a god. That may be
what's (unconsciously?) in the minds of the 1%. [Why do they want so much?
The scale of their wealth doesn't make any sense, other than as something
to hoard. Like old King Midas, they can sit on their pile of gold and count it,
but they can't touch any human person, or she'll turn to gold.]

Jordan Luftig makes the crucial point: That as we did (very justifiably) reject
fundamentalist dogma in religion(s), even so we (equally justifiably) reject
the "offshoot" of fundamentalist religion, which is business fundamentalism.
As an example (I may be mistaken), I seem to remember reading that old
John D. Rockefeller said: God gave me my money. My apologies to J. D.'s
memory if that's not so, but I think it is so. That very attitude is what we must
get rid of. After all, what IS money that it should be hoarded? In huge
amounts it is nothing but some kind of a symbol. An IDOL, really. And idols
are condemned in most religions, properly understood.

Here's an idea: If I own an office building, in which I rent-out office space,
I'm required to pay a property tax on the buillding every year, just to enable
myself to KEEP the building. If we are burdened with the Supreme Court's
doctrine, that a corporation is a person, why not also say that money is real
property? And why not make the holders of excessive amounts of money
pay a property tax on their money-property every year, just to enable
themselves to KEEP that money? A similar claim could be made on any
form of un-performing, HOARDED wealth. Something also must be done
about hoarders' slipping their money out of the country. If the hoarders see
their money being diminished via an "ad valorem" tax every year, they will
LOOK AROUND for some proper business in which to invest their money,
and hire people to work [which provides jobs, which we want].

We all know who will "jump up on a stump" and start to preach to us yockels
(as they see us) that such a tax would be "job killing". In reality, the hoarders
would not have been creating any jobs before their hoarded wealth was made
taxable anyway. So what jobs would an "ad valorem" tax on hoarded wealth
be killing? There WEREN'T any such jobs. We all need a healthy dose of
getting real about some maxims of the past, which we can no longer indulge.

My congratulations to Jordan Luftig

Fantastic article Jordan. May your vision for the future come to fruition ---and the sooner the better.

It is the profit motive. What is Capitalism without profit? The profit motive is both an honest incentive to survive and, to a reasonable degree, prosper, through the effort, labor, goods and/or services you produce, as well as as the expression of the ancient, and still present, darker human motive to get something for nothing while taking unfair advantage of your fellow human beings in the process. Some kind of blend of the best of a healthy form of the profit motive (how we do that is probably equal part psychospiritual and social) with the best of what a socialized economy can do to strengthen the middle class and keep the wealth ratio between those who have the most and those who have least at an optimal level, that being a level which increases and sustains social peace and happiness. I guess it is about the evolution of the profit motive into a more sustainable service motive, or perhaps the better integration of both.

jsg

There's a lot of what I see as short-sighted nitpicking in this discussion; particularly from the folks who have concluded capitalism cannot be reformed, but has to be replaced. I'm generally sympathetic to that point of view... but.

But what the author is talking about is a revolution of values. Change society's values, and the economic system could serve very different ends than those it does now.

Joseph Campbell said that the central question all of us face in the wasteland of modernity in which we live is: Is the machine going to rob you (us) of your (our) humanity, or are you (we) going to be able to make the machine serve human ends?

If we make serving human ends the raison d'etre of the machine (economic, governmental, etc.), the world could be transformed for the better. It's up to us. All of us.

Capitalism should be tempered by ethics and a foremost concern for your fellow man. I sell at our local farmers market because I have a passion for what I do and I genuinely want to improve people's lives with my products. The customer's needs and desires become my own. Money is incidental and therefore does not control me. I have always believed that the best way to win when the game is rigged is to not play their game at all. A possible solution might be to form a society within the greater society, boycotting where possible those companies and individuals who crave money and power as a mean of control. Buy as much as possible from local small businesses, keep your money in a credit union, talk to others constantly about the possibilities, and stop playing their games.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.” “Perhaps no single phrase from the Revolutionary era,” observes historian Jack P. Greene, “has had such continuing importance in American public life.”

For good reason because what follows directly from that original document has been abolished from collective memory: .--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness......"

The 1% has expended huge time, energy and money to erase this complete thought so necessary to comprehend the full meaning of the text by Jefferson et. al.

A complete sentence from the Declaration of Independence begins with
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; "
and ends with " ;that whenever any form of government becomes
destructive ... it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it ... as to them
shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness."

I count five clauses, all beginning with the word "that". All but one of the
clauses is separated from the previous clause by a semi-colon, ";" .
I think that the exception [separated by a period] is unfortunate -- really
a mistake -- because clearly all five clauses express [list] interconnected,
self-evident truths. A version of the punctuation has four semi-colons.
See "A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional
Documents and Debates, 1774-1875" (Elliot's Debates, V. 1, pp.60-61)
Supposedly from Thomas Jefferson's notes.

It is a pity -- for us, the posterity -- that the construing and S.C. deciding,
as to what is the law, does not take the Declaration of Independence
into consideration. It should be! Abraham Lincoln " ... argued that the
Declaration of Independence was a founding document of the U.S., and
that this had important implications for interpretating the constitution."
From Wikipedia: Declaration of Independence.

The complete sentence I've been discussing is, to me, a profound and
very moving expression of [the bases of] human rights. If our laws had
been construed with proper consideration of this one sentence, we now
would be a very different [and very much better] nation than we now find
ourselves to be. Indeed, even one of the clauses: " ... it is the right of
the people to alter or abolish (the old government) ... and to institute new
government as ... most likely to effect their safety and happiness" would
have sufficed to have intrroduced much good effect into society. If the
corporation-as-person were to be elevated to a [militaristic] eminence of
Capitan of Industry, all to the detriment of the people, the people would
have had the right to alter or abolish that eminence.

Personally, I don't care a lot about Jefferson's owning slaves more than
200 years ago, or about his being a member of an elite. Many men then
owned slaves. Jefferson just never found a way to not own the slaves
that were on his farm. He was too much occupied with his thoughts.

I ascribe great profundity and great beauty to the entire Declaration of
Independence.

My major point -- in reply to Amurkan's post that was just above mine -- was
the fact that one sentence with five clauses presents INTERCONNECTED,
"self-evident" truths of what the new nation SHOULD be all about. And, all
five truths fit properly together to make ONE theme: That is, throwing off
old customs/government with the blessings of JUSTICE on the side of the
revolutionaries. [And may I say that such justice, in Jefferson's concept,
derives from the purpose(s) of a god of benevolence, however one may
have come to know of such a god.] There is an almost mathematical
derivation from " ... all men are created equal" to " ... it is the right of the
people to alter or abolish ... " a detrimental government. And for such
reason, I concentrated on that ONE complete thought.

I did not in any way intend to downgrade the part of the preamble that
you quote. In fact, the latter portion of what you quote: " ... it is their right,
it is their duty to throw off such government ... " reiterates the fifth clause
in the sentence I discussed. So, I did not neglect the idea of "throwing off"
a despotic government. I did intend to express my opinion that Jefferson's
conceptualization DERIVES the act of throwing off a detrimental government
from first principles.

I'll present another portion of the Declaration of Independence that you didn't
comment on. The signers inscribed their names under the wording: " ... we
mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor."
What government office holder or corporate C.E.O. or president today even
speaks of honor, let alone "sacred honor"?