Socialism as a Cure for Exceptionalism
(COMMON DREAMS) Paul Buchheit, November 16, 2015— The form of ‘socialism’ embraced here is more accurately a social democracy, “a compromise between the market and the state.” Our American exceptionalism derives in part from neoliberal and neoconservative demands that we be unconstrained by domestic or foreign governments.
Environment: Drones Dropping Seeds Rather Than Bombs
China has planted 66 billion trees since 1978 in an effort to stem desertification. Their ‘shelterbelt’ program, which has shown mixed results, has its origins in a project implemented right here in the U.S., in the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s, when the FDR Administration planted a thousand-mile line of trees to fight erosion on the Great Plains. The plan worked. In recent years, millions of federal dollars have been committed to restore and manage longleaf pine forests.
The planting of trees is a simple, effective, earth-saving, job-creating idea, especially if military resources were to be diverted to the endeavor. A company called BioCarbon Engineering hopes to plant billions of trees by using drones to disburse seedlings.
Capitalism equates to profit-making, and profit-making abounds in the fossil fuel industry. But cooperative energy solutions await us in solar and wind, which are expected to provide 100 percent of our energy needs within a few decades, if the will of the people prevails over market forces.