Sooner or Later Our Children Will Ask: "How Did This Happen?"

[marmar]

Published on Saturday, June 18, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

Sooner or Later Our Children Will Ask: "How Did This Happen?"
“Sweetheart, I Guess We Just Forgot”

by Thomas S. Harrington


That it hasn’t happened yet, continues to amaze me. But sooner or later it will. Sooner or later our children, saddled with our debts, our endless wars and the ever more onerous demands of a predatory “national security state”, will turn to us in large numbers and ask how it happened. They will want to know how the many millions of us who were lucky enough to grow up in the American middle class of the 1960s and 1970s, let it come to this. They will want to know why we who enjoyed personal freedoms and opportunities to “find our bliss”, opportunities that they can only dream of, decided to leave them with a world structured, most of all, by fear and dread.

The smooth talkers among us—and there are many—will no doubt start by explaining just how complicated life really is, how processes over which we “have no control” such as globalization and terrorism, have chipped away at our good life and left them holding the bag. They will repeat over and again, and in one form or another, that these were “natural” and/or “unforeseen” developments that simply overwhelmed the ability our existing institutions. In other words, as they sit in the 4,000 square foot house they did not really need, a house that, in fact, no one really needs, they will paint themselves as victims of history.

They will of course being lying, to their children, and more importantly, for the umpteenth time, to themselves.

If they were really interested in have a profitable dialogue with their children, something that might actually begin the process of delivering us to a better place, they would start with something simple like: “Sweetheart (or Buddy), I guess we just forgot”. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/06/18-2

[xchrom]

1. i would tell them to go ask the 'serious people'. cause i sure as hell didn't want it this way. nt

[n2doc]

2. Giant K and R! Excellent article n/t

[OHdem10]

3. We cannot let the smooth talkers get away with "things over which

we have no control." Leaders of all Major Industrial
Countries set Globalization in place. Globalization
was not visited upon us from on high or from some far
away planet. It was invented, designed and put in
place by leaders. Likewise it can be modified and
adjusted when so desired.

Former Prime Minister UK, Gordon Browne has written
a book illustrating what he believes to be the answer
to the Current Crisis. I am going to oversimplify, but
it means all countries getting together and redesigning
especially the TRADE POLICIES to benefit everyone. This
would be starting point. IMO, until something is done
regarding Trade Policies, we will just sink further into
oblivion.

We cannot let them get away with saying it is out of our
control. What they are really saying is We chose to do
nothing about it. We like the Aristocracies and Oligarchies
we are building around the world.

[HelenWheels]

4. Too uneducated to know

With the way the Repukes are destroying public education our kids will be too uneducated to understand. And the Repukes are already changing the history books to tell it their way and not the true way.

[starroute]

5. How about telling them that the good life was based on exploitation?

The American dream was a fraud from the beginning, based on the premise that by keeping most of the world poor and suffering you could enable a majority of people in a few favored countries to enjoy the kind of advantages that had previously been confined to aristocrats.

In the long run, something good may yet come of that illusion. If we manage the planet's resources wisely, distribute life's necessities evenly, and keep our eyes on what really matters, it may eventually be possible to have a world where everyone has not only the basics -- food, shelter, medical care, education -- but sufficient leisure to express themselves creatively. And if that happens, we can credit the American dream with putting the idea in people's heads.

But at the moment, it's still all make-believe. And right now the make-believe is catching up with those who bought into it most blindly.

[The Second Stone]

6. Because we voted to make the rich a lot richer and everyone

else a lot poorer. We let the interests of business take priority over the interests of freedom.

[midnight]

7. K&R