Everything is coming apart. Nothing works anymore. We move from one crisis to another so fast that the word has become a description of our whole way of life.
We are in a period of major social disintegration. The economy is rapidly being destroyed by the twin devils of unemployment and inflation. Despite the proliferation of government regulations, our water becomes dirtier, our air is harder to breathe, and our land poisoned--all from the massive wastes of a consumer society. Even our bodies show the consequences of a polluted environment as one out of every four of us now is afflicted with cancer, the plague of our technological age. Meanwhile, the number and sufferings of the poor mount daily throughout the nation and the world, as a privileged few grow ever richer.
The resources of our finite world are reaching their limits as we who were charged to be stewards have instead been exploiters. Yet despite our dwindling resources, we now spend more than half of our public monies to increase our military arsenals. Constructing the most sophisticated and lethal weapons of war the world has ever known has required precious human and material resources, undermined the economy, and escalated the prospects of war. And now, war will be total.
It is a period of political withdrawal and instability. Politicians are suspect. The country hasn't had a president serve two terms in 30 years. Only half of those eligible in the last presidential election even bothered to vote. The standard reason: "It doesn't make any difference." The major institutions of government, business, and labor generate no confidence. Corruption is assumed on every level by a cynical public. Self-interest and apathy are the two poles of public life.
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