Miguel
From: eloasis@earthlink.net
To: pbjflorida@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: {PBJFlorida} Digest for pbjflorida@googlegroups.com - 7 Messages in 3 Topics
Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2012 05:25:21 -0400
Good commentary Miguel and Jim.
Escapism is certainly the byword in the United States. Quite impressed we are with ourselves…so much so, we don't wish to see other perspectives. Here's a quote from the writings of explorer Mikael Strandberg, who sent me this link regarding his very recent return from Yemen:
"There´s a great need for education. I am not talking about Western style education, but people need to learn how to read and write. And to understand there´s another world out there, very different to their own. I used to believe in preserving old and ancient cultures really hard, for the sake of their survival in the future, for the rest of us to learn from them, but the older I get and the more I see, preserving old ways isn´t always a good thing. The lack of education and understanding of other worlds just creates fears, misunderstandings, some hostility and injustice. Old ways are seldom better. Most people we met had no education, couldn´t read and write. Most of them had never been outside their own area." (http://www.mikaelstrandberg.com/2012/07/04/expedition-yemen-by-camel-mission-accomplished/)
Marty
From: pbjflorida@googlegroups.com [mailto:pbjflorida@googlegroups.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 24, 2012 3:30 AM
To: Digest Recipients
Subject: {PBJFlorida} Digest for pbjflorida@googlegroups.com - 7 Messages in 3 Topics
Group: http://groups.google.com/group/pbjflorida/topics
§ "Blood on OUR hands" [3 Updates]
§ FW: Birth of a Caste in America? [3 Updates]
§ Please Read the Careerists by Chris Hedges [1 Update]
Michael Rodriguez <fireryphoenix@hotmail.com> Jul 23 01:08PM -0400
Yes Jim. We have forgotten to collaborate because we are too busy, stretched too thin. Interestingly, not busy enough to pack a movie theater or a sports stadium. I love movies and I don't deny anyone who is a sports enthusiast, but most of us rather look at "something" else than at each other. We rather comment at the screen or at a football play than communicate with each other. We are an unhealthy society needing help.
From: jimbelcher350@me.com
Subject: Re: {PBJFlorida} "Blood on OUR hands"
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2012 00:09:00 -0400
To: pbjflorida@googlegroups.com
Thank you for this Miguel.
This would be a great starting point for conversation, creativity and action toward a new cultural possibility. It will take bold individual and collective/collaborative action to respond to this cultural crisis of our own making.
You said, "We have not come to accept that violent tragedy is social." The lack of real response on this list serve of some of the brightest, most caring people in our community tells me we have forgotten how to collaborate. Pontification we know, we've mastered "being right"; Collaboration and collective imagining -- not so good yet. I think this is the heart of the matter AND also the doorway to a new possibility -- a new cultural narrative.
And you said,"until we take a good long look at ourselves" and "until we start teaching our children how to think and learn" and I might add, we must begin learning (relearning maybe) and teaching ourselves and our children how to get along with each other -- actually, how to get along with all others. We forgot how to do compassion, caring, support, and love of ourselves especially and others -- as in each other person and in loving, caring and supporting ourselves and all species. This is the work, our work.
This blood is on our hands now. It is up to us, not the politicians.
jim
On Jul 22, 2012, at 5:29 PM, Michael Rodriguez <fireryphoenix@hotmail.com> wrote:
The article is good but the commentator neglects the fact that what gets you elected president in this country is a show of machismo. A violent society as ours wants a fictional Rambo, not a real Gandhi. Remember the Willie Horton campaign ads? Strength is shown through incarceration and arming your nation and your home to the teeth. Plus, the NRA is one of if not the strongest lobbying groups in this country. Their power, money, and influence is immense. Anyone who directly opposes the NRA does not have a long political career. Just remember what happened when Obama was elected. Although he kept mostly quiet in his campaign and throughout the administration, gun sales rose to an all time high. Could you imagine if he did speak about tighter weapon laws. Now imagine if Obama, or even Romney, started to advocate tighter gun restrictions in this campaign. Gun sales would go through the roof and whoever is the proponent of tighter weapons control would not be elected. Fifty percent or more of the population does not want gun restrictions. It may sound counterintuitive, but the more you advocate for gun control, especially in the South and Southwest, the more gun sales go up. Therefore, even after Aurora, nothing will change.
Furthermore, we can blame our politicians, TV, and violent video games only so far. I am sure that they all play a part. However, Europe, South America, Asia, and the Middle East display violence on their big and small screens. The Middle East, Mexico, and parts of Central America is constantly plagued by real violence. I believe the difference between those countries and ours is that they live in reality. Although their movies may from time to time contain hardcore violence, and even sex, their endings are all to real, often tragic and rarely happy (or at least not happily ever after). In the U.S. we escape into escapism. We ignore the soldiers still fighting and dying in Afghanistan, yet we go and watch gore, mayhem, and horror in our theaters. We become so enraptured with sports and that our university administrators and coaching staff turn away from credible reports of child sexual abuse. In the U.S. we tend to believe in and want happy endings. But that is not reality. We all die sooner or later. Families split apart. Lovers end love affairs. The poor are marginalized. Children are abducted, abused, scarred for life, or never to be seen again. Yet, most of us tend to pull away from these realities, preferring to believe in and live in fairy tales until violent tragedy strikes us individually. We have not come to accept that violent tragedy is social. Aurora's nightmare is Orlando's nightmare. It is an American nightmare.
Many of the killers have come from middle class or privileged backgrounds. One cannot say that their financial situation played a part in their crimes. Perhaps they faced some types of mental or physical abuse. However, what we do seem to hear is that they all faced some type of disappointment in their lives. They refused to face up to disappointment. Rather than see a worthy challenge they saw unforgivable failure in themselves and in society. Somewhere along the line they traded reality for fantasy. They refused to see live as it is, with its ebb and flow of joy and suffering, and instead adopted the Hollywood, and perhaps even Puritan, version of happy endings. When that happiness was not fulfilled, they could not cope with reality. They sought then, to make sense of life not as it is but as they wished it for themselves. They forced their own twisted view of life into an all to real act of violent death.
And what about the rest of us. We are a sick nation unwilling to look at ourselves in the mirror. We are no healthier than those who commit the horrible mass shootings. We are just one heartbreak or one layoff away. We are looking for quick fixes and happy endings. How often do you hear about protests outside the NRA main headquarters? When we get the chance to non-violently confront the money interests and corporate powers, we back down as soon as they send the police. And we back down to the police because instead of non-violent tactics we use violence and violent words. We often ask our political leaders what will they do? They have done what we have allowed them to do. The question is what will we (the people) do in the wake of Aurora, Virginia Tech, Colombine, and so many others.
Until we courageously confront the forces of profit over people, until we take a good long look at ourselves in the mirror, until we start teaching our children how to think and learn for themselves and deal with disappointment instead of teaching them what to learn so they can graduate to make money (that will mostly likely end up going to pay school loans anyway), there will sadly be more killers and killings such as in Aurora. And the blood will be (as it has been) on all of our hands.
God forgive America!
Miguel
Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2012 08:03:44 -0400
Subject: {PBJFlorida} "Blood on the hands of Obama, Mitt, and NRA"
From: pennyvillegas31@gmail.com
To: pbjflorida@googlegroups.com; smaxwell@orlandosentinel.com; ckavalec@valenciacollege.edu; Junebug49@comcast.net; mamabear888@gmail.com; kerryp817@bellsouth.net; arnp189@cfl.rr.com; pennyvillegas31@gmail.com; robinmarie27@att.net; bbobsan2@aol.com; siddhisatori@yahoo.com
Here's a columnist with guts.
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/blood-hands-obama-mitt-nra-article-1.1119049--
Penny
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jim belcher <jimbelcher350@me.com> Jul 23 08:19PM -0400
Miguel,
I agree we need help.
I think that "too busy" and "stretched too thin" are smoke screens we use for protection. Collaboration requires opening up, baring one's soul, being vulnerable. Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change.
Imagine the time we would save if we worked together instead in competition.
We consider that admitting we need help is a sign of weakness -- quite the opposit. It takes courage to come out from behind the protective screen of "I can do it myself."
When the social, economic and environmental systems around us collapse we will have more incentive to start turning to one another. Even then there's no certainty. We could just as well turn to violence and chaos; we know that road better.
jim
Michael Rodriguez <fireryphoenix@hotmail.com> Jul 23 09:28PM -0400
Yeah. In order to turn to one another we need to practice that vulnerability that you mention. Like you stated, we are more prone to violence and chaos. Maybe it's different in countries like Norway, but I don't see the culture of violence changing anytime soon in America.
Sent from my iPhone
Abhinav Dwivedi <abhinavd45@hotmail.com> Jul 23 06:17AM -0400
Worth reading and pondering over.
With high regards,
Abhinav Dwivedi
From: SIARAM@aol.com [mailto:SIARAM@aol.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 22, 2012 8:31 PM
To: siaram@aol.com
Subject: Birth of a Caste in America?
· Cinema Rasik: Birth of a Caste in America?
Birth of a Caste in America?
http://cinemarasik.com/2012/07/21/birth-of-a-caste-in-america.aspx
Few books get the attention and acclaim that has been given to the book by Charles Murray titled "Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010". The book, in the author's own words, "deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes in white America over the last century."
In an Op-Ed <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/08/opinion/reforms-for-the-new-upper-class.html?_r=1> in the New York Times on March 7, 2012, Mr. Murray outlined "four steps that might weaken the isolation of at least the children of the new upper class." He admits that these steps "won't really make a lot of substantive, immediate difference,", but there "may be.. a symbolic value in these reforms". He concludes the Op-Ed with:
* "The haves in our society are increasingly cocooned in a system that makes it easy for their children to be haves."
This sentence rang a bell. The bell got louder as we read The Opportunity Gap <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/opinion/brooks-the-opportunity-gap.html?_r=2&hp> , an opinion by David Brooks of the New York Times. In his opinion piece, Mr. Brooks discussed the research of Robert Putnam of Harvard, research that Brooks described as "horrifying":
* "Putnam's data verifies what many of us have seen anecdotally, that the children of the more affluent and less affluent are raised in starkly different ways and have different opportunities."
* "Richer kids are roughly twice as likely to play after-school sports. They are more than twice as likely to be the captains of their sports teams. They are much more likely to do nonsporting activities, like theater, yearbook and scouting. They are much more likely to attend religious services."
* "...poorer kids are less likely to participate in voluntary service work that might give them a sense of purpose and responsibility. Their test scores are lagging. Their opportunities are more limited."
The bell began tolling with what Brooks wrote next:
* "Affluent, intelligent people are now more likely to marry other energetic, intelligent people. They raise energetic, intelligent kids in self-segregated, cultural ghettoes where they know little about and have less influence upon people who do not share their blessings."
What did our bell toll for? A Caste System. Yes, not a "class divide" as many have described it but the birth of a Caste in America. Specifically, a new "Brahmin" Caste in America.
The Etymology of "Caste" & its Development
Today the word "caste" is so intertwined with India and "Hinduism" that hardly anyone remembers that it's origin is European. The British coined Caste from Casta <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casta> , an Iberian word (mainly Portuguese & Spanish). Casta means lineage, breed or race. According to wikipedia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casta> , casta is derived from the older Latin word castus, implying the lineage has been kept pure. If you want a pure example of Casta, look at the Saudi "Royal" family.
The British applied the Caste concept to the social strata they saw in Indian or "Hindu" society. There is nothing in "Hindu" texts to suggest a heredity-based segregation of society. At its formative stage at the beginning of known time, Vedic society described 4 professions or "Varna" - Teacher-Priest, Warrior, Commerce-Trader and Menial Labor. But these were pure Varna or professions. Several Vedic Sages came from the lowest economic and social strata of society. The prevailing dictum was "all are born as Shudra (menial class); it is with education that one becomes twice-born (upper class)".
Fast forward about 1,000 - 1,500 years and come to Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador to the Mauryan Court. In his work, Indica, Megasthenes describes a fluid class system of 7 professions.
Does Economics Create 'Caste'?
India was an aggressive, invasive society until about 800-900 CE. The golden age of India is described as between 200-600 CE. In purely economic terms, the pie kept getting bigger for Indian society during these centuries. The corollary of such economic growth is upward social mobility. Just look at America's secular growth period from 1945 to 1975. This was the period during which the American Middle Class was established, during which new European immigrants became a part of the American mainstream. This was the period of upward social mobility in America, a period in which children of working class parents had open and equal opportunities.
India turned inwards around 800-900 CE and "Hindu" religion focused on the meaning of after-life. India stopped collecting wealth from its neighbors and other countries in its trading neighborhood. India's global trade shrank and the pie stopped growing. Slowly Indian society began the transformation of professions or Varna into hereditary entitlements - children of priests-teachers automatically became priests-teachers, children of traders became traders. As a result, children of menial laborers were forced to become menial laborers.
According to Professor Robert Shiller of Yale, such transformations were discussed by George Akerlof in his 1976 article "The Economics of Caste and of the Rat Race and Other Woeful Tales,". Professor Shiller discussed Akerlof's views his recent book, "Finance and the Good Society <http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9652.html> ":
* "People who belong to a higher caste realize the immense economic advantage provided by their membership in that caste...They favor their own caste in business and reject those who do not belong to the caste."
* "Business communities can be caste-like.... Those who have gained admittance to such a community value their connections and favor others in the caste in their business activities and financial dealmaking."
* "In a modern society a "caste" may be defined in terms of connections to a specific business culture, or in racial or sexual terms, or it may take form among graduates of elite colleges..." (emphasis ours)
* "So instinctively, one shuns outsiders and reconfirms the existing concentration of wealth and power."
An example of these points was provided by Charles Murray in his New York Times Op-Ed <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/08/opinion/reforms-for-the-new-upper-class.html?_r=1> :
* "The children of the new upper class hardly ever get real jobs during summer vacation. Instead, they get internships at places like the Brookings Institution, the American Enterprise Institute (where I work) or a senator's office. It amounts to career assistance for rich, smart children."
An American "Brahmin" Caste!
Charles Murray studied America from 1960 to 2010. According to David Brooks, Robert Putnam studied the period from 1975 to 1995. This is the period during which American manufacturing began to lose ground, when jobs for the newly created middle class became less paying and began disappearing in some cases. Income and benefits, which had risen steadily from 1945 to 1960-1970, began contracting.
When the financial bull market began in 1982, investment capital became more important than labor. Investment capital places a premium on higher education, on conceptual & mathematical skills. These skills are far more easily transmitted to children by college-educated parents. In other words, a "Brahminification" of America began to occur.
This process has accelerated in recent years, in the technology-telecom wave in the Clinton Administration and then in the globalization wave & in the housing bubble in the Bush Administration. High quality schools became the norm in wealthy neighborhoods and provided greater access to elite universities while students in failing schools in low-income neighborhoods saw their education opportunities diminish steadily. During these recoveries and in the intervening recessions of 2000-2003 & 2008-2010, the size of the education-economic pie for American "Brahmin" class increased while the share of the non-college class decreased.
The culmination of this 'high education' class into a caste was neither described by George Akerlof nor by Robert Shiller. It was articulated eloquently by David Brooks <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/opinion/brooks-the-opportunity-gap.html> :
* "Affluent, intelligent people are now more likely to marry other energetic, intelligent people. They raise energetic, intelligent kids in self-segregated, cultural ghettoes where they know little about and have less influence upon people who do not share their blessings."
Remember that casta or caste means lineage. This is why a class becomes a caste when people in that caste end up marrying within that caste as a standard practice. So, is today's college-educated affluent class becoming America's "Brahmin" Caste? It sure looks like it.
jim belcher <jimbelcher350@me.com> Jul 23 09:56AM -0400
It is good to see this research surfacing in print.
For decades sociologists have been tracking the fragmenting of community and the increased sense of separation and isolation (and hence powerlessness) we all feel. I think the acts of violence we are seeing has a lot to do with this. Our basic human psychological and social needs are not being met... So people erupt.
A new structure of belonging is possible. I am hopeful but not optimistic. I am not sure we are up to the task. Please prove me wrong.
jim
Michael Rodriguez <fireryphoenix@hotmail.com> Jul 23 06:19PM -0400
"The children of the new upper class hardly ever get real jobs during summer vacation. Instead, they get internships at places like the Brookings Institution, the American Enterprise Institute (where I work) or a senator's office. It amounts to career assistance for rich, smart children."
This is exactly what is happening in my job. The children of managers and directors get the internships (every summer). Those others who may be equally or even more intelligent don't have the same good fortune. The placing of managers' and directors' children in good paying summer internships in top companies is done in the open without shame and with no explanation to regular employees. I consider this as "Affirmative Action" for the wealthy and well off (who are overwhelmingly white in the major corporations), but it's hardly mentioned in the media. The phrase "Affirmative Action" only applies when African Americans or other people of color desire a chance to attend universities and work in businesses that the priviledged have always had in this country. Yet, Affirmative Action for the disadvantaged is being rolled back (watch next year's Supreme Court ruling on this) while the placing of the upper class's childen in prominent schools and businesses is increasing.
Excellent article Abhinav! Thanks for sending!
Miguel
From: abhinavd45@hotmail.com
To: abhinavd45@hotmail.com
Subject: {PBJFlorida} FW: Birth of a Caste in America?
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2012 06:17:40 -0400
Worth reading and pondering over.
With high regards,
Abhinav Dwivedi
From: SIARAM@aol.com [mailto:SIARAM@aol.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 22, 2012 8:31 PM
To: siaram@aol.com
Subject: Birth of a Caste in America?
· Cinema Rasik: Birth of a Caste in America?
Birth of a Caste in America?
http://cinemarasik.com/2012/07/21/birth-of-a-caste-in-america.aspx
Few books get the attention and acclaim that has been given to the book by Charles Murray titled "Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010". The book, in the author's own words, "deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes in white America over the last century."
In an Op-Ed in the New York Times on March 7, 2012, Mr. Murray outlined "four steps that might weaken the isolation of at least the children of the new upper class." He admits that these steps "won't really make a lot of substantive, immediate difference,", but there "may be.. a symbolic value in these reforms". He concludes the Op-Ed with:
"The haves in our society are increasingly cocooned in a system that makes it easy for their children to be haves."
This sentence rang a bell. The bell got louder as we read The Opportunity Gap, an opinion by David Brooks of the New York Times. In his opinion piece, Mr. Brooks discussed the research of Robert Putnam of Harvard, research that Brooks described as "horrifying":
"Putnam's data verifies what many of us have seen anecdotally, that the children of the more affluent and less affluent are raised in starkly different ways and have different opportunities."
"Richer kids are roughly twice as likely to play after-school sports. They are more than twice as likely to be the captains of their sports teams. They are much more likely to do nonsporting activities, like theater, yearbook and scouting. They are much more likely to attend religious services."
"...poorer kids are less likely to participate in voluntary service work that might give them a sense of purpose and responsibility. Their test scores are lagging. Their opportunities are more limited."
The bell began tolling with what Brooks wrote next:
"Affluent, intelligent people are now more likely to marry other energetic, intelligent people. They raise energetic, intelligent kids in self-segregated, cultural ghettoes where they know little about and have less influence upon people who do not share their blessings."
What did our bell toll for? A Caste System. Yes, not a "class divide" as many have described it but the birth of a Caste in America. Specifically, a new "Brahmin" Caste in America.
The Etymology of "Caste" & its Development
Today the word "caste" is so intertwined with India and "Hinduism" that hardly anyone remembers that it's origin is European. The British coined Caste from Casta, an Iberian word (mainly Portuguese & Spanish). Casta means lineage, breed or race. According to wikipedia, casta is derived from the older Latin word castus, implying the lineage has been kept pure. If you want a pure example of Casta, look at the Saudi "Royal" family.
The British applied the Caste concept to the social strata they saw in Indian or "Hindu" society. There is nothing in "Hindu" texts to suggest a heredity-based segregation of society. At its formative stage at the beginning of known time, Vedic society described 4 professions or "Varna" - Teacher-Priest, Warrior, Commerce-Trader and Menial Labor. But these were pure Varna or professions. Several Vedic Sages came from the lowest economic and social strata of society. The prevailing dictum was "all are born as Shudra (menial class); it is with education that one becomes twice-born (upper class)".
Fast forward about 1,000 - 1,500 years and come to Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador to the Mauryan Court. In his work, Indica, Megasthenes describes a fluid class system of 7 professions.
Does Economics Create 'Caste'?
India was an aggressive, invasive society until about 800-900 CE. The golden age of India is described as between 200-600 CE. In purely economic terms, the pie kept getting bigger for Indian society during these centuries. The corollary of such economic growth is upward social mobility. Just look at America's secular growth period from 1945 to 1975. This was the period during which the American Middle Class was established, during which new European immigrants became a part of the American mainstream. This was the period of upward social mobility in America, a period in which children of working class parents had open and equal opportunities.
India turned inwards around 800-900 CE and "Hindu" religion focused on the meaning of after-life. India stopped collecting wealth from its neighbors and other countries in its trading neighborhood. India's global trade shrank and the pie stopped growing. Slowly Indian society began the transformation of professions or Varna into hereditary entitlements - children of priests-teachers automatically became priests-teachers, children of traders became traders. As a result, children of menial laborers were forced to become menial laborers.
According to Professor Robert Shiller of Yale, such transformations were discussed by George Akerlof in his 1976 article "The Economics of Caste and of the Rat Race and Other Woeful Tales,". Professor Shiller discussed Akerlof's views his recent book, "Finance and the Good Society":
"People who belong to a higher caste realize the immense economic advantage provided by their membership in that caste...They favor their own caste in business and reject those who do not belong to the caste."
"Business communities can be caste-like.... Those who have gained admittance to such a community value their connections and favor others in the caste in their business activities and financial dealmaking."
"In a modern society a "caste" may be defined in terms of connections to a specific business culture, or in racial or sexual terms, or it may take form among graduates of elite colleges..." (emphasis ours)
"So instinctively, one shuns outsiders and reconfirms the existing concentration of wealth and power."
An example of these points was provided by Charles Murray in his New York Times Op-Ed:
"The children of the new upper class hardly ever get real jobs during summer vacation. Instead, they get internships at places like the Brookings Institution, the American Enterprise Institute (where I work) or a senator's office. It amounts to career assistance for rich, smart children."
An American "Brahmin" Caste!
Charles Murray studied America from 1960 to 2010. According to David Brooks, Robert Putnam studied the period from 1975 to 1995. This is the period during which American manufacturing began to lose ground, when jobs for the newly created middle class became less paying and began disappearing in some cases. Income and benefits, which had risen steadily from 1945 to 1960-1970, began contracting.
When the financial bull market began in 1982, investment capital became more important than labor. Investment capital places a premium on higher education, on conceptual & mathematical skills. These skills are far more easily transmitted to children by college-educated parents. In other words, a "Brahminification" of America began to occur.
This process has accelerated in recent years, in the technology-telecom wave in the Clinton Administration and then in the globalization wave & in the housing bubble in the Bush Administration. High quality schools became the norm in wealthy neighborhoods and provided greater access to elite universities while students in failing schools in low-income neighborhoods saw their education opportunities diminish steadily. During these recoveries and in the intervening recessions of 2000-2003 & 2008-2010, the size of the education-economic pie for American "Brahmin" class increased while the share of the non-college class decreased.
The culmination of this 'high education' class into a caste was neither described by George Akerlof nor by Robert Shiller. It was articulated eloquently by David Brooks:
"Affluent, intelligent people are now more likely to marry other energetic, intelligent people. They raise energetic, intelligent kids in self-segregated, cultural ghettoes where they know little about and have less influence upon people who do not share their blessings."
Remember that casta or caste means lineage. This is why a class becomes a caste when people in that caste end up marrying within that caste as a standard practice. So, is today's college-educated affluent class becoming America's "Brahmin" Caste? It sure looks like it.
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Michael Rodriguez <fireryphoenix@hotmail.com> Jul 23 03:09PM -0400
I just read this. This is what I stated yesterday in response to the Colorado shootings. The link to the whole article is below.
"Here you have the explanation of why our ruling elites do nothing about climate change, refuse to respond rationally to economic meltdown and are incapable of coping with the collapse of globalization and empire. These are circumstances that interfere with the very viability and sustainability of the system. And bureaucrats know only how to serve the system. They know only the managerial skills they ingested at West Point or Harvard Business School. They cannot think on their own. They cannot challenge assumptions or structures. They cannot intellectually or emotionally recognize that the system might implode. And so they do what Napoleon warned was the worst mistake a general could make—paint an imaginary picture of a situation and accept it as real. But we blithely ignore reality along with them. The mania for a happy ending blinds us. We do not want to believe what we see. It is too depressing. So we all retreat into collective self-delusion." - Chris Hedges
Blaise Pascal wrote in "Pensées," "We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us from seeing it."
Hannah Arendt, in writing "Eichmann in Jerusalem," noted that Adolf Eichmann was primarily motivated by "an extraordinary diligence in looking out for his personal advancement." He joined the Nazi Party because it was a good career move. "The trouble with Eichmann," she wrote, "was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal."
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_careerists_20120723//
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