American culture is at a turning point.
By and large, and in spite of generalizations being just that, we don’t make much in this country any more.
I say that from the perspective of being a Californian, and a former manufacturer, retailer, turned artist. To build anything in California today one must overcome great odds, and many of those are indigenously repressive due to a morass of regulations meant to make things “better” when they were originally concepted.
But no one really considered the cost to those supposed benefits. Those laws and regulations, implemented in a time of growth and leveraged spending, came at an expense never realized till now. California lost the ability to make anything. And as California goes, in many ways, so does the Nation.
Want to see happy and healthy?
Build something.
Seth Godin has this to say about fear.
You may also appreciate his piece on Momentum. You need this.
Sent along by my friend Lori. A beautiful piece from PBS.
The system we created will die hard.
Get ready.
Bloom right where you are planted. Watch what happens.
Do it: thrive.
No change in society is singular. It happens in multiple ways on many levels.
The crisis we are in is the end of the old age, and the good things the beginning of the new.
The shift won’t come easily, but it will come.
Our children and their children have a lot of work ahead of them.
Good stuff.
I see clarity in your cosmos, David!
There is a cost to everything society does in the name of progress. But, do you really want to blame “laws and regulations?” Isn’t it the lack thereof, or failure to enforce, that is more problematic?
It is nice to see Roots in Water and an Island family holding on to aina. If only others had refused to sell out to developers…who wanted only to build something in concrete. 🙂
The issue with our regulations is that they offer no benefit. The EPA does not protect the environment. Air Pollution Control does not control air pollution. They simply implement a fee and fine based system of punitive control and the cost is in turn passed along to the consumer. Nothing is made better. They DO use tax dollars to keep people employed. High cost. Low benefit. The environment pays. You pay. Wait till you see what is coming next.
It just occurred to me Gayle, you may have been referring to the Family land. Gone forever. Bitter irony eh? Aloha oe.