What's essential? W-F-E-V:
I find that there are four things which are fundamental to life and society, and
I encourage folks -- especially young people -- to grab onto these issues and hold and work
them for the long-term - for many generations:
Water - Food - Energy - Voting
Water.
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Water. Clean water, forever reasonably accessible, is essential;
for drinking, all domestic and ecological needs, agriculture, and industry (generally in that order).
Life cannot be, without access to water, which makes fresh water resources a prime target
for dominant control by those who would control the populace.
Already, major corporate interests are - very diligently and very quietly, succeeding
in gaining control of world-wide fresh water resources.
Water supplies must remain clean, and a public commons!
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Food = agriculture.
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Food = agriculture. For maybe 8,000 of the last 10,000 years, communities produced
their own food - but for the last 2,000 years, industrialized agriculture,
complemented by relatively cheap transportation from field to market,
has largely replaced "local" food production.
Major corporate interests have had notable success in gaining control of
world-wide food resources.
Water and energy are both key inputs to the agricultural-grocery complex -
and both are on track to such corporate dominance.
Just try to imagine the change in grocery prices and availability, when
the cost of water and energy for agriculture and transportation quadruples or more,
as they become scarce or subject to monopolistic control. Everything is interconnected and interdependent.
More local food production - thus local distribution, is essential for survival of our culture. |
Energy.
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Energy. For the last hundred years "energy" has meant "oil & gas" - petroleum fossil fuels extracted
from the ground - but it never was petroleum before that and again won't be, in just a few generations as we hit "peak-oil".
Modern life cannot operate without energy, which makes fossil fuel resources also a prime target
for dominant control by those who would control the populace.
Already, major corporate and political interests have had notable success in
gaining control of world-wide fossil fuel resources.
There are indeed other energy sources - solar, wind, nuclear and others - but all seem now to have significant limitations
in either safety, quantity or cost.
Research and development in energy alternatives to fossil fuels is essential. |
Voting system integrity.
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Voting system integrity. For the last 2,000 years, what we call democracy -
the power of the people - is year by year at more substantial risk.
So long as the people have the ability to control their own destiny,
through the majority rule of the popular vote, major community systems will be
obliged to serve the people, and respond to the needs and wishes of the public.
But when those same major corporate interests have control over the water, energy, food and
counting of the votes of the people, I see a return to a dictatorial dominance
not known for thousands of years, but which had indeed been present when
an emperor controlled the water, energy, food and voice of the masses.
Critical for society is a voter-verifiable paper ballot, human readable without an interface,
and verified with at least random audits of the paper at every election. |
WFEV may not be a neat acronym, but it is the key to an equitable and sustainable humanity.
Just try to imagine a society without the ready and fair availability of any one of the four!
Marian Beddill
Bellingham Washington - 2005
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