By David Sellers
Get ready for a hard reset. There may not, and probably should not, be a back to normal or business as usual. A perfect storm is brewing and has been for generations. Now with the virus, global warming, business models changing, worldwide poverty, excessive income and wealth disparity, seeing the minority stranglehold being lifted, millions in concentration camps and many nations bracing for military intervention, cyber-attacks and over population are bending all the rules, as well as political entanglements never seen before in the U.S. It has explosive power that we may not be able to ignore.
For example, many in Vermont see a reduction in population, fewer students in the schools, bitter high local taxes and cascading reduction in available resources and cash. The temporary infusion of trillions of dollars will help many of us through this hump. Many are not going to recover. However, with longer global vision, some, such as the World Bank, see the population migration coming at an enormous scale and sooner than we think. The drain from the cities where people want out, and realized they can work at home see northern New England as a target, Chicago is a target, as is anywhere near the Great Lakes.
All these as they gain focus and choices emerge suggest and even mandate that any decision that impacts community without this longer view should be on hold, an example is the closing of schools and consolidation, closing our colleges, etc. We have proven resilient as a species, even though we seem to need violence and willingness to treat others as less than ourselves.
Now, the time has come to readdress all of it. The momentum is so enormous that hesitation is not an option.
We rewrote the playbook in 1776. It is now being rewritten in segments all across the globe. In rewriting the playbook, it is clearer and clearer that the European settlers (and our ancestors from that source) need, to recognize and take into account that a foundation of our current wealth is based on the kidnapping of Africans to do our work without pay and in slavery conditions, and the land that was settled was actually owned and treasured by the Native Americans. It was stolen through genocidal tactics. There will be no health here without the compassionate understanding that the basis of our wealth and place in the U.S. has this foundation. It must be taught, understood, remedied and restructured for the long haul. That FACT without climate disaster and virus closure is surely thousands of years.
Sellers lives in Warren.
