Feb 3, onto the 5th week of 2005. Riding BART to work place allows for transitory reading time, granted one can tune out the noise of car and fellow passengers.
Lapham at Harpers Magazine discussed Thorstein Veblin, as a "purgative" for the coverage of post election analysis and the holiday rendering of seasonal truths. For the reader, Veblin is perhaps most remembered for Theory of the Leisure Class or one of his phrases "conspicuous consumption."
"We continue to live in a society that regards the possession of wealth is a meritorious act" (Lapham) sparked many thoughts wiling away the minutes involved in crossing under sea.
Lapham's assertion/observation
- counters personal values and practice of service rather than pursuing gain;
- as a reality for american society it can un- do the efforts of a more ecological framework of re-use, reduce, recycle, sustainable, biodiversity;
- and holds one aspect of possible explanation for the vote cast favoring the current administration.
Why would individuals vote for protecting the privilege of the upper 5% of Americans to be taxed less, pay lip service over the concern for the 46 million who are uninsured, or ascribe higher value to the lives of 1000 American heroes over the lives of the unknown thousands of Iraqis and Afghanis?
"I", too, "will be rich someday." I do not want rationed care. This war is not about Oil, it is about freedom and bringing democracy into the region, we have been told are part of the rationales to make all this seem ok.
Is the hope for striking it rich, market driven health system reform, acceptable collateral damage (death of other countless innocents) signs of a society at its apex.
No answers, no additional analysis offered, simply musings of a grey commute day. My small brain is trying hard to wrap itself around the past four years and grasp what may lie ahead in the next four.
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