Re: Where are we?

Description: "I would love to see an election that splits the differences between traditional Democrats and traditional Republicans that says we have a role in the world. "

Question: When you read the newspaper or watch the news, what issues stand out for you?

Transcript: Well I mean short term, long term I don’t know; but clearly the Iraq war is a pretty big issue. And it’s not really just the Iraq war. It is how are we as the “we” – United States of America, Americans – who are right now situated as the most powerful country in the world . . . We’re never as powerful as we think. On the other hand we’re pretty powerful. How is the most powerful country in the world actually going to demonstrate leadership as we move from nation state to a more globalized world in which those boundaries . . . We can build all the walls we want; those boundaries are going to be more permeable than any human being in the human community ever could have imagined them. And that’s very unnerving. And how to function in that environment without a kind of . . . without simply returning to a kind of primal, flight-fight response . . . You know flight, we have to give up on the world and protect our . . . build everything as strong as possible because the world’s crazy and we’re the best; or a fight response, which is kind of the response we went into post 9/11. We’re gonna have to evolve past the fight or flight response. And that . . . I think globally as an American, I think that’s the most serious international issue. And that’s gonna call for tremendous discipline and very difficult questions. I’m not one of those people that believes that there’s no evil, and there aren’t times you have to go to war, and that there aren’t times you have to do difficult things. But at the same time that you’re doing those difficult things, it’s really important to ask, “What did I do to help cause this situation?” Not in a blame game, and not to justify what has been perpetrated; but simply so that you can have a better assessment on how to deal with whatever is coming down. And right now we tend to immediately blame someone else, project all of our shadows on someone else, determine that the problem is “out there”, that it’s “that evil person” – the evil is in Saddam Hussein, or the evil is in Iraq, or the evil is Iran; or in our country, the evil is in fundamentalist one side, or the evil is in pro life or pro choice, or the evil is in someone that we deeply disagree with. That’s gonna get us all killed. See it didn’t make a difference when only people had a . . . when a person had a little, you know, a stick or a rock. So big deal. You know you bothered me and I was a little undeveloped. I hit you with a rock, and maybe I killed you and it was one person dead. Now it’s not a joke. Now when people really begin to disagree with each other and don’t understand that they’re always shadow projecting – always – the kinds of power we have is a small network of people can blow up a whole building. And that’s . . . that’s really, really serious. So everyone from politicians all the way at the top to us small people right here have to always be asking this question: “How am I implicated? How am I in any way, shape, or form . . .” It may be only one percent or a little bit. “How am I somehow responsible for where ‘we’ are?” Now that’s gonna be a really hard questions for us.

Question: What should be the major issues of the 2008 presidential election?

Transcript: I mean there . . . I don’ think I have . . . I don’t think I have any wisdom about the 2008 election except to say I think it should be about what is America’s role in the world? Not . . . We ought not make this simply Iraq yes, Iraq no. We shouldn’t make it simply, you know, those of us who disagreed with Bush’s policy, the evil Bush-Rumsfeld-Chaney against the good Democrats if we had just been elected, or we were elected and didn’t take, you know . . . and didn’t with Gore . . . and didn’t take in the election. We ought not make it that because it’s a very simplistic way. It may be to get elected you have to do that, but somebody better be talking bigger. And that is what’s the fundamental role we have in contributing to improving this world and not simply thinking that if we protect our own interests the world will be okay? That’s over, and so we’re gonna have to figure that piece out. And then obviously a good way to begin thinking about that is global environment. And I don’t know. Is the environment going under quickly, not quickly? I’m not an alarmist in general. I try to be nuanced and sober about it. There’s a certain hubris in imagining we’ll destroy the world. First of all we won’t destroy the world. At most we’ll destroy ourselves. We’ll go back 40,000 years and things will start over. It’s a big difference between 40,000 years and 14 billion years. So there’s a certain hubris in imagining the whole thing is about us; but I think global environment is a significant issue. And then the third issue is a domestic issue, and that is how are we really going to deal with people who, for a variety of reasons – some their fault, some not their own fault – don’t have an equal shot? And I’m not making the democratic, liberal, socialist statement there. I’m making a statement based on there is a vision of how we want to live in our societies and our families. And I don’t know what that’s going to take. It’s going to take obviously a combination of really pushing people to levels of personal responsibility that they never imagined. That’s what Republicans tend to be right about, though they themselves don’t take personal responsibility. It will also take investment in other human beings. That’s what Democrats tend to understand, though they don’t match the investment in other human beings, and in economic and social structures, and educational and health structures. They very rarely match that investment with calls to personal responsibility. So whoever . . . I would love to see an election that splits the differences between traditional Democrats and traditional Republicans that says we have a role in the world. Sometimes it’s military and it’s always more than that. I’d like an election that’s about the global environment, and which it’s not simply people who say there’s no problem, to people who say, “Oh my gosh. New York City is gonna be flooded in, you know, three years.” That’s not a helpful debate. It’s how are we going to begin to set limits for ourselves and explore the technology that you can address some of these problems. And I’d like a debate that says there is a real need for personal responsibility from the President all the way down. And there’s a need for real investment in the structures – educational, health – that help us become the kind of human beings we wanna be.

Recorded on: 8/22/07