Ch 1. The True State of the Union

"Somehow we've weathered and witnessed
a nation that isn't broken
but simply unfinished"
-Amanda Gorman, youth poet laureate

Despite the many challenges that face us in the modern world, we are living in a truly privileged time. Technology in fields such as medicine and transportation has made our lives safer and more convenient than ever before. According to historical data site Statista, the life expectancy in the United States was twenty years longer in 2020 than it was a hundred years before in 1920 (O’Neil, 2022).

Despite our seemingly privileged existence, however, there are some huge and incredibly complex problems that must be addressed. For those of us concerned about the climate, it can be like watching the world explode in slow motion. Disaster isn’t just coming, it’s already here.

It’s easy to see why climate change isn’t given its due attention in the US. There is a grocery list of problems that seem more immediate. The US has more of its own population incarcerated than any other country (World Population Review, 2023), with more than 2 million prisoners nationwide (per data released in October 2021 by World Prison Brief). This number is equivalent to 25% of the world's total prison population. The USA also has an incarceration rate of 629 people per 100,000. This is the highest rate in the entire world.

According to a LendingClub survey (Dickler, 2023), 64% of the US population lives paycheck to paycheck. And all of that wonderful medical technology comes at a high price. The number one cause for bankruptcies in the United States is medical expenses (Cussen, 2023). Millions of Americans live without healthcare, vacation, or sick leave. For the first time in a hundred years, life expectancy has begun to decrease.

With all these problems, you might think that climate change can, and perhaps should, take a back seat. Unfortunately, climate is so intrinsically intertwined with the daily lives of Americans there really is no separating the two. Whether it’s the impact of more powerful storms on the economy of vacation destinations, or extreme temperatures causing mass heat casualties, the effects are being felt more strongly every year. 

Considering the true state of the union, it can seem daunting to even begin trying to solve all these problems. However, by concentrating on four key areas, consider the possibility that we can begin to reverse these disturbing trends. Let’s call them the Four E’s.

Economy

“It’s the economy, stupid.”

– James Carville, 1992 on the Bill Clinton campaign trail.

There’s no getting around the fact that money makes the world go around. Even in ostensibly “communist” countries like China, commerce and the economy are treated like the vitally important entities that they are. In fact, the only country that doesn’t treat the economy with the importance it deserves is North Korea; and 40% of their population is living at starvation levels (Macrotrends, 2023). With that in mind, let’s look at the economy in the United States.

Income inequality has been a recognized problem for over a hundred years. In fact, it was a major campaign point during the 1912 presidential election between Taft and Wilson. The troubling thing is that income inequality continues to get worse. The gaps between the wealthy and the ever-diminishing middle class are getting wider (Kent-Ricketts, 2020).

If income inequality just happened, like a meteor shower or other phenomenon we have no control over; it would be bad enough. However, the current state of inequality is not an accident, it has been engineered for hundreds of years via official and unofficial means (Moore, 2015.) 

We are taught by economists and the media that billionaires like Elon Musk have some superpowered combination of genius, hard work, and gumption that gives them the ability to accumulate massive wealth when in truth, the system heavily favors those who are already wealthy.

The economy in the United States isn’t just unequal. It’s also incredibly fragile. Just one tweet from Donald Trump caused the Dow to plunge 450 points in a single day.

“The United States has been losing, for many years, 600 to 800 Billion Dollars a year on Trade. With China we lose 500 Billion Dollars. Sorry, we’re not going to be doing that anymore!”

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 6, 2019, Twitter, now X.

Trump’s careless vitriol led to a massive sell-off, which caused stock prices to plunge. When the stock market crashes, it’s not the upper one percent who suffers. Instead, companies cut jobs, reduce costs by slashing health insurance or pensions, and in general, cause suffering in order to get the share price back up to please their investors. 

Energy

“The solution to climate change is staring us in the face. It's energy policy. If we pursue a global clean-energy economy, we can cut dramatically the amount of carbon pollution we emit into the atmosphere and prevent the worst impacts of climate change.”

– John F. Kerry, USA Today, 2015.

When it comes to electricity, the United States gets precious little of its power from modern systems like wind or nuclear power. Instead, it relies primarily upon energy systems developed during the Second Industrial Revolution. It breaks down like this (NAS, 2023.)

Natural gas (31.8%)

Petroleum (28%)

Coal (17.8%)

Renewable energy (12.7%)

Nuclear electric power (9.6%)

The problem with the first three listed, which also make up more than 66% of the US’s total energy production, is that they are both inefficient and lead to pollution and greenhouse gasses, all of which are contributing to climate change. 

Ecology

"If the environment is a fad, it's going to be our last fad… 

We are building a movement, a movement with a broad base, a movement which transcends traditional political boundaries. It is a movement that values people more than technology, 

people more than political boundaries, people more than profit."

– Dennis Hayes, Earth Day, 1970.

The Texas blizzard of 2021 led to a collapse of the state energy infrastructure system. More than 200 people died because they froze to death in one of the wealthiest states in the wealthiest nation in the entire world.

An argument can be made that the Texas blizzard was so bad because of climate change’s effect on the weather system. Climate change is overwhelming our energy delivery systems and basic infrastructure. Not just in the US, but all over the world. Many people in Texas are again, at the time of writing, facing potentially deadly situations as record heat waves drain their power grid, resulting in rolling blackouts.

According to new research, we’re on the verge of ecological disaster. By the year 2042, the Earth may no longer be habitable for many of its native species (Cardenas, 2021.) Many of us would like to turn a blind eye to climate change, but we can no longer afford to do that. The time to act is now.

With the imminent threat of global warming posing an existential danger to humanity, you would think that we would be pulling together; however, as it turns out, not so much, which brings us to the last of the four E’s.

Equality

“From the equality of rights springs identity of our highest interests; 

you cannot subvert your neighbor’s rights without striking a dangerous blow at your own.”

– Carl Shurz, 1865 speech.

If you ask a random sampling of Americans what kind of government they have, many will answer on reflex, “democracy.” It’s partly true, in that the US is a democratic republic. In the US, we elect representatives to handle the day-to-day duties of government for us.

However, not everyone agrees that this is true. In fact, a recent study conducted by Princeton University Prof. Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Prof. Benjamin, concluded that the United States is ruled by a wealthy elite few, while the regular citizen has little to no power (BBC News, 2014.)

In political science terms, this form of government is known as a plutocracy. This study was done nearly 10 years ago, however, and now there is an emerging theory that the US is headed toward authoritarianism (Mcdonald, 2022). 

 According to Steve Levitsky, a professor of government at Harvard University, America is shifting toward authoritarianism.

“To call a party democratic—committed to democracy—they’ve got to do three basic things: They have to unambiguously accept election results, they have to unambiguously renounce violence, and they have to consistently and unambiguously break with extremists or antidemocratic forces, I think the Republican Party now fails these three basic tests.”. (Benson, 2023).

 It’s not partisan or biased to point out that one political party is responsible for the book bans in Tennessee and Florida and the attempts to put the Ten Commandments in every public school in Texas. It’s not fake news, either, but a concerted effort to erode the power of people to determine their own government and replace it with faux-Christian nationalism.

You have to ask yourself: Is this the kind of world I want my children to grow up in? A world where the indefensible is defended, corruption is seen as a virtue, and forces conspire to take away our most basic rights? 

The purpose of part one of this book is to break the stranglehold that our current culture has on our minds, one clawed finger at a time. We need to challenge some of the bad assumptions and bad beliefs, based on faulty evidence, that keep us tied to these outdated and malignant systems.

The most pernicious of those beliefs will be addressed here in the first section. We’ll move on to debunk more ideas and beliefs in the course of parts two through six. In order to do this, we must get a bedrock of sanity under our feet, upon which we can build something real, lasting, and good.

Where do we go from here?

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with but a single step.”

– Proverb.

It’s a daunting question. Where do we go from here? And what does a so-called “better world” even look like? Opinions on these questions are varied. Here’s my take on what a new, better world would look like, and why.

Let’s take a look at those four E’s again for just a second.

A new, anti-fragile co-operative economy. The current system creates inequality. We need a system that is equitable, democratically run, promotes employee ownership, a living wage, pension, and provides access to affordable services like health care and housing.

We need a decentralized, cooperatively owned renewable energy infrastructure. Green energy with a minimum of environmental impact, with as close to zero marginal cost as can be attained. We need to craft our new energy system in a way that takes into account our planet and promotes a healthy relationship with the earth. 

With regards to ecology, regenerative ecological practices have been used successfully for centuries, particularly by indigenous peoples. If we combine these traditional practices with new green technologies we can shift our relationship with the planet to one of stewardship and not exploitation. With the right combination of ecological practices, we can do more than just stop global warming. We can reverse it.

In order for equality and democracy to survive, we need a system based on factual, true information and shared values. We need citizens who are engaged with their government, both civically and socially. Why should the upper 1% be the only ones with access to our political leaders and supreme court justices?

In order to effect change, we need a direction and a plan and some way to get there. So, what’s the plan?

The good news is: humanity doesn’t have to start from scratch on these problems. We already have solutions to our problems, like regenerative agriculture, and green energy sources, and cars that eschew fossil fuels entirely.

“Just when you think you’ve got all the answers, I start changing the questions.”

– Roddy Piper, Saturday Night’s Main Event

We need to ask new and different questions of ourselves and take a hard look at the assumptions we have made and continue to make. It’s obvious that we need new thinking, because if the old ways worked, we wouldn’t be in the mess in which we’ve found ourselves.

An old adage says you can’t solve a problem with the same thinking that created the problem. That’s what this book seeks to delve into. How many of our assumptions are, in fact, wrong?

In the next section, we’ll talk about the status quo and how it contributes to the problem.