Pax Gaea Human Rights World Post

Many of us of "a certain age" dream of casting aside our day to day responsibilites and running away to that great big "dream" that always hides just over the horizon. Chalk it up to mid-life crisis or Peter Pan syndrome, the vast majority put off our great ambitions to buckle down, work hard, set aside a portion of our income and hope that, when we finally get the chance to retire, we can live out that dream on those dollars we hopefully wisely invested.

This traditional paradigm had well served the aspirations of previous generations. But in an ever changing economic landscape, with the instability of the financial and job market, with it becoming increasingly difficult for the "little guy" to keep up much less get ahead, that dream of "one day" is growing more and more unlikely for so many of us. Call it a conspiracy or merely economic necessity, politics and business have seemed to come together to make it more difficult for the average person to be able to tangibly benefit from the fruits of their labor and to enjoy those twilight years in relative comfort and security.

This isn't to indict either business or politics as each is doing what it must to assure its livilihood, and that comes from a careful reading of their constituents and customers. Because we aspire, we seeking the trappings of aspiration. While we have all been caught up in pursuing the "American Dream," the interpretation of that dream has dramatically evolved over the years. Once upon a time that may have meant a simple, well built home which, with 20 or 30 years of monthly payments would be ours free and clear in our golden years. Combined with increased responsibility and regular pay raises, frugality and enough savings to put the kids through college and start them along the path of their success, one could expect to have lived that dream in a tangible, traditional way. Yet, either as a result of desire, hubris, or lack of faith in the future, it seems we've become a nation more inclined to demonstrate real or proported wealth by our conspicuous consumption and accumulation. This reality is clearly illustrated in that we've become a nation of negative savings. As the average American now spends aproximately .5 percent more than we make, attributed to easy, albeit high interest credit, it appears that the little guy is spending his way to lifelong debt and thus, lifelong work in order to pay down that debt. The last time the average American descended into negative savings was in 1933, at the height of the Great Depression.

For anyone who sits back and looks at that crushing reality, it seems that those with loftier ambitions will never get the chance to live out those put off dreams. And yet, when you see the state of the world, particularly underdeveloped countries, it seems to portend a very dark future for nations who do not enjoy a semblance of a democratic voice in their nation or workplace. For the last 200 years, America has been the model for political and economic possibility for peoples and nations with the strength and courage to stand up and demand responsive and responsible business and political leaders. If the model of lifelong economic insecurity and indebtedness is the best that anyone can hope for, what hope is there?

One answer is to realize that hitching your future to someone else's star is the least likely way to buck this hopeless trend. There is no hope for the average worker in the modern business environment no matter what value you may place in your 401-K or payroll deducted stock purchases. While no company succeeds without the hard work and dedication of the rank and file, very little appreciation is given to those who make CEO bonuses and salaries possible. While it may be true that an argument can be made that the shareholder is the true beneficiary of a company's success and that more than half of America's workers are vested in stock portfolios through the aforementioned 401-k and employee stock packages, in truth, except in the most rare of occasions, these investments give employees little or no voice in the direction of their companies nor provide applicable tangible dividends to the average working class shareholder.

One much tauted alternative prospect of wealth accumulation has been the boon of what has been euphamistically dubbed as "cul-de-sac" land barons. For nearly half a decade, many middle class wage earners have taken advantage of foreign cash unleashed into the economy by way of low interest adjustable rate mortgages. Many homeowners had abandoned the traditional American process of buying a home for a low price, shopping for a managable mortgage and working to pay off their home to have a debt free dwelling for those golden years. Rather, because of those low rates, millions have moved their money from savings and purchased second or third homes with the intention of flipping those investment properties within a short period of time for high profits. For those who were fortunate to get in early and flip frequently, there was an unprecedented boost in wealth. Hovering in the shadows, however, was the great foreboding of a real estate bubble, certain to come the moment foreign investment slowed and interest rates were forced to rise just as new construction spread like wildfire. Now, those much desired existing homes were no longer flipping at disproportionately high speed for disproportionately high prices and millions are nursing second and third mortgages with minimal prospect of selling their investment properties for the much promised dollars.

These were many of the driving factors behind my bold decision to abandon my well paying, middle management job, put my home on the market, and give in to my plan to pack up the family, relocate to Southern Mexico and write the Great American Novel and Screenplay. Having invested the last 22 years of my life on behalf of a number of multi-national entertainment and broadcast companies, it has become painfully obvious that, because of my ethics, because of my refusal to dehumanize the management process for the sake of saving the company a dollar or two and my firm conviction that corporations disproportionately benefit the few while exploiting the masses and for willingly playing their part to maintain the cycle of debt of servitude through low wages, minimum benefits and increasing costs to the rank and file for the sole purpose of enriching the few at the top, it was time to check out and put my economic and political theories into action.

I am a firm adherent to the belief that all power structures, government, business and religion, have evolved into tyrannical structures with the sole intent of controlling the masses and enriching and entrenching the power of the leadership. That noble notion of democracy, as so eloquently voiced and penned by America's forefathers, and bled for by the patriots who suffered the deprivation of our Revolutionary War, are systematically being stripped from us by a merger of the three magisteria of power. The average American has always faced the attempts by the one of more of the powers attempting to dominate our thoughts, minds and wallets, but never before have we seen such a malicious alignment of all three with the sole intent of establishing a modern form of vassal servitude.

President Eisenhower admonished us to beware the military-industrial complex. I think he only got it half right. I believe since the first vestiges of human civilization, an endless battle to subjucate the masses has been waged against the common man. I think that, in order for a very elite few to control the overwhelming masses, it has been their driving ambition to divide and sub-divide segments of the population to breed hate, fear and discontent and to instill a belief that it is the sole purpose of the so-called "other" to defeat, convert and destroy you. Without fear and chaos, the masses have no reason to need leadership so they convolute and manipulate the random, the coincidental, the impersonal and the natural into constructs of malevolent planning, sinister intent and supernatural design set in motion to personally assault those who are the source of displeasure to that construct. We see this played out daily in the proclamations from Wall Street and in quarterly conference calls, on the floors of congress and from the sabbath dais. The sole purpose of these proclamations of absolutism is to fuel discontent in any perceived other and to entrust the proclaimer in our unquestioning trust and fealty.

Thus the very foundation of Pax Gaea. While the name does suggest the lofty ideal of "Peace On Earth", the intent goes much further towards the greater ideal of establishing a basis of universal humanity that confronts and questions the agenda, need, futility and counter-productivity of centralized power. Based on the scientific theory of Pangaea, which puts forth the notion that all of earth's land masses were, at one time, a super-continent, forced apart by plate tectonics, Pax Gaea proceeds forth from the notion that mankind, by nature, is one body forced apart by mighty forces. Whether that dividing force was natural, supernatural or manmade is a point of debate, but one undeniable truth is that profit and power rises from those voids of division and disunity.

Pax Gaea has the sole ambitious goal of bringing the people of the world together. In our natural state humankind is united through our commonality. It has become obvious as the body of knowledge grows that, even in isolation, mankind developed language, math, art and science upon a fairly consistent timeline. So what unseen forces drove us apart and what can we do to combat those negative forces that bar us from our natural state of unity?

In my choice to unplug from "The Matrix," I am allowing myself and my family to enter into the unfamiliar with the firm belief that I will discover the truly familiar. This novel that took shape in my mind 14 years ago as I drank in the two hour crossing of the Pamlico Sound for my first time, was rooted in this sense that I had been there before. I have had similar experiences in all my travels throughout my life and have puzzled over that tendency of familiarity in a new and strange place. While there may be a number of sound theories to put forth on the subject, my insatiable apetite for reading, my love for maps, my inherent curiosity in everything, perhaps there is some deeper, more spiritual explanation that make me seek and find that sense of place wherever I may roam.

This story has lived in my mind for all these years awaiting me to take the time to bring it to life. While based upon a particularly swashbuckling part of our early American history, the underlying theme provides a basis to show that, through our demands to be free from monarchial dominance, we set in motion the belief that the common man is the greatest force of nature. It is a story that needs to be told and will provide the impetus and resources needed to begin that process of bringing first the American people, and with them, our far flung fellow humans together. For once we are inspired to come together, we will set in motion a gravitational force that nothing can tear apart.

posted by Dave Carroll @ 7/02/2006 07:17:00 PM