Prophetic heed on the food crisis

Was Tilford Gaines - "former vice president and economist of Manufacturers Hanover Trust" (now known as the Chase Manhatten Bank or the investment firm JPMorgan Chase Bank) - an economic prophet? Does his words in 1975 give us insight on what to expect in light of the current food crisis that is experienced in the developing world?

In Communication and Cultural Domination, influential author Herbert Schiller quotes Tilford Gaines:

“To return to the fundamentals, the question that the conservative economists are increasingly asking themselves is whether or not the market enterprise system that has worked so well for us [that will be the US] for 200 years is, in fact, a viable system. As we look realistically at the history of the world during this 200 year period we see it spotted with episodes of severe depression – the 1930s was by no means our first serious depression – with periods of growth interspersed between these depressions. Under the political autocracy that has characterized the world governments through most of the time until the Second World War, the bargaining position of the workers who are most sadly affected by theses depressions has been weak that there have not been, as a general rule, serious political disorders accompanying the depressions.
We must now ask ourselves if the twenty-five to thirty years since the Second World War might not be an unusual period. We have prided ourselves during this episode upon having solved the problems of instability that have plagued capitalist economies throughout their history. But in fact have we not just been living during a period of unusual stability supported on the one hand by a strong U.S. economy and on the other hand by cheap natural resources from developing countries? If the worst should happen, if the recovery is only a temporary interlude during which price inflation will once again accelerate leading to a more serious recession in only a few years, and if this is accompanied by food shortages around the world, what might the prospects be within nations and among nations for not only economic stability but international political harmony?” (p.19) (bolding of text added)

Let’s see: Price of crude oil is now over $120 a barrel (“price inflation”). US perhaps already in recession. Mix in the food crisis (“food shortages”)...increasing instability! More war on the horizon? Like the world need any more of it.

Like a friend of mine mentioned over the weekend: If the Food and Agriculture Organization did not see this coming, then they are indeed incompetent. Senegal’s president suggested that FAO should be dismantled. I cannot help but to agree.

By the way, didn’t Fidel Castro warn the world of an impending food crisis in 2007 already? Makes you think...

The gift of oratory

There is this notion that traditional cultures with their oral customs are not as advanced as western cultures with their written customs. Is it possible that Barack Obama is not just a fusion of the two cultures, but is highlighting the equal importance of these two customs? How else does one explain his rising star power? It is not just his award winning publications or his personal story that is drawing people to him. Perhaps more importantly, it is his ability to tell stories that give people like Chris Matthews “crawling feelings up [their] legs”. In the recent TIME magazine article where Obama talk about his mother, he is quoted as saying that “what is best in [him, he] owe to her”. I have no doubt that that is true, after all, Stanley Ann Dunham raised and shaped his ideals. But what is lost in this discourse is what he gained from his father. A friend of Obama Sr., who is quoted in the same TIME magazine article, described him as “oratory”. “’Everything was oratory from [Obama Sr.], even the most commonplace observation.’” Obama Sr. was African, and with that he had the African gene story telling. In most African cultures, the histories of individuals, families and the entire communities were passed down orally. When you had the gene of storytelling, you were responsible to invoke the aspirations, struggles, and yes, the hopes, of the families and communities. Sitting around the fire, was always accompanied by storytelling. To this day, when there are family gatherings, you always have that uncle(s) or aunt(s) that starts with: “remember the time…” and that have us laughing and crying. Many African people (in the “motherland” or in diaspora) have this ability of storytelling. Martin Luther King Jr. certainly had that. Barack Obama Jr. certainly has this. I have no doubt in my mind that this oratory gift that he has, he inherited from his father.

Hope for First Nations

I am sitting at bridgehead feeling a bit low on energy. Looking out of the window, I see four First Nation men looking haggard. They are dirty, skinny and above all, hangover or perhaps more accurately, still drunk. I cant help feeling sorry for them. I wonder how they got to be the way they did. Do they really have such a low self esteem or self hatred that they feel it is better not to feel at all. It makes me feel helpless? It makes me feel upset. It makes me feel helpless. How do you assist? Where are the leaders of this community? Is it time to change their rhetoric? Not to focus on the wrong of the past. But perhaps to focus on the future. Their rhetoric reminds me of that of African- Americans who focus on the past. But they have a new leader- who not only serve them but serve all Americans. Their new leader is focusing on the future. Is that the kind of leader that the First Nations is lacking?

Old media vs. New media. Translation: “Past vs. Future”

I have frustratingly been looking for an outlet to publish my articles, which might be sometimes long and winding. I managed to get 3 published in three different papers and in two countries. It gets a bit annoying because I feel I have so much to say; rhetoric that I think might make people think twice. I became disillusioned, but this morning I read Chez Pazienza’s blog where she talked about being fired from CNN because of the content of her blogs. Despite feeling abandoned, or perhaps even just being mad as hell, Chez Pazienza decided to take on the big bad wolf herself. Her weapon: new media. Can she win? My bet is on her. Look at Obama’s resurgence against Hillary, which is all possible not just because of new media, but also a younger technological savvy demographic group that will only increase in numbers. In Assault on Reason, Al Gore hypothesised that we will be looking back decades from now and grasped that television was just a transitional period to the age of information. I am inspired again. This will be my outlet.