Our environmental problems are the result of 200 years of industrialization. The philosophical and technological developments that enabled the Industrial Revolution were made possible by the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment was not only independent of the Catholic Church, it opposed the authority of the Church. Therefore, the Church is in a unique position to publish a document like Laudato Si’. Environmental areas of concern form a natural connection between Laudato Si’ and Progressivism. We should build on this connection.
Who are progressives?
But who are progressives? The 21st century progressive movement is being shaped by environmental concerns, especially concerns about Agricultural Policy and Food Security. Social justice is also a concern of progressives. But it is impossible to separate social justice from environmental concerns. Progressives also oppose war. This opposition is due to the unjust character of war and its destruction of the environment.
The Enlightenment: Science and progress versus the environment
Supporters of Enlightenment ideals believed that progress and improvement of the human condition were more important than traditional institutions, and that these institutions could be discarded if necessary. The French Revolution was one result of this belief, while the Industrial Revolution was the result of the Enlightenment’s scientific advances. The belief in progress has been discredited many times in the last 200 years. Climate change is the final nail in the coffin of this ideology.
Political Classes and the Environment
The liberal middle class benefited from the Industrial Revolution. The political left survived it. Farmland was ‘enclosed’, and the former owners of that land were relocated to factory towns. They became workers. Workers became the political left in the process of surviving the Industrial Revolution. The environmental question never came up.
What about the other political faction? Conservatives, have changed their character so many times they are no longer recognizable. However, they have never focused on the environment. Conservatives have a history of forming coalitions with the Catholic Church. The Church is a political entity as well as a religion.
However, liberals and the business class are also political entities. And they are determined to stay in control. This determination requires them to ignore or downplay the environmental crisis.
With the publication of Laudato Si’, the Church demonstrates that it has an identity separate from political conservatism. Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si’ and his concern for the environment are not unexpected or surprising. What would be surprising is if an American liberal or conservative had written Laudato Si’.
The following is from pages 6 and 7 of Laudato Si’.
In 1963, Pope John XXIII addressed the nuclear threat in Pacem in Terris;
Eight years later, in 1971, Pope Paul VI wrote about his ecological concerns and “the urgent need for a radical change in the conduct of humanity;”
In 2001, John Paul II called for a “global ecological conversion;”
In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI proposed “eliminating the structural causes of the dysfunctions of the world economy, and correcting models of growth which have proved incapable of ensuring respect for the environment.”
…’the book of nature is one and indivisible,’ and includes the environment, life, sexuality, the family, social relations, and so forth. It follows that ‘the deterioration of nature is closely connected to the culture which shaped human coexistence.’ ((On Care for Our common Home – Laudato Si’, Pope Francis, pp. 6-7))
Plato has ruled the world for 2500 years through his lasting influence on philosophy, politics, and religion. It’s time we paid attention to Plato’s influence on our world. He is considered an authority on politics, even though in his lifetime, his writings were not compatible with the politics of his home country, Athens. Some of the worst attitudes of the modern world can be traced to him. He proposed a so-called link between societal ‘decay’ and race. He was also a misogynist. And yet he can’t be easily discarded. He is too much a part of us. Instead, I believe Plato’s influence has to be explored, discussed, and evaluated for its usefulness to contemporary society.
I am going to try to follow Karl Popper’s moderate approach to Plato. Popper admits there is some good in Plato’s works, but objects to specific ideas which have caused lasting damage. On page 517, for example, he talks about the mischief–a term used by Samuel Butler–done to mankind by our secondary schools and universities. These were virtually invented by Plato. In this article, I would like to discuss Plato’s emphasis on perfectionism.
Plato’s Influence and Motives
Plato took his cue from Hesiod and other early Greek philosophers, but especially Heraclitus. Heraclitus ‘discovered’, during a period of political turmoil, that every sensible thing changes constantly. He eventually became disillusioned about the changes he observed and argued against the belief that the existing social order would remain forever. But Heraclitus was not giving up on the existing social order. This fact becomes clear in another element of his philosophy with the potential for a new kind of turmoil. According to Popper, 1 the emphasis on change in Heraclitus’s philosophy was combined with a belief in an immutable law of destiny.
After Heraclitus, philosophers including Parmenides, Democritus, Plato and Aristotle dedicated themselves to solving the problem of a changing world. Both Parmenides and Plato relegated this world to a phantom-like existence. They theorized ‘that the changing world in which we live is an illusion and that there exists a more real world which does not change‘. (p. 127) In other words, the world we live in is just a copy of that perfect world. The world we can’t see is more real than the world we live in.
The Capture of Western Thought
One wonders how, in 2500 years, this has not been identified as blatant trickery. How odd that we never get around to questioning the relevance or theoretical usefulness of perfection itself. How strange that no one objects to their world being superseded by an ideal world in Plato’s head.
It is true that Plato didn’t invent the idea of perfection. Previous to the ancient Greeks, Hinduism saw perfection as its primary spiritual goal. But in the Western world it was Plato’s realm of perfect things that influenced Christianity.
Plato wrote that one had to transcend the imperfection of reality; Aristotle defined perfection as potential being fully realized and expressed; St. Thomas Aquinas concluded from Aristotle that perfection should be one of Christianity’s highest goals.
Plato’s ideas have also mingled with Jewish and ancient Greek mystical cults to create the tradition of Western mysticism, including Hermeticism and Gnosticism, Theosophy, Freemasonry, and some forms of modern Paganism. In addition, Theosophy influenced the early Western perception of Tibetan Buddhism.
Plato’s Influence on Education and Career Choices
Fortunately, context is becoming more clear regarding the effect on individuals of perfectionist beliefs. In an article entitled The Illusion of Perfection, Robert Fritz acknowledges that perfectionism carries built-in assumptions that remain unquestioned. For example, he questions Richard Bach who said, “There is such a thing as perfection… and our purposes for living is to find that perfection and show it forth…”
One common result of this belief is the responsibility it puts on people to strive for unreachable or undesirable goals. “It reminds me of what Lucy said to Charlie Brown when he told her that we are here to help others. ‘What are the others here for?’ She asked.” (as cited by Fritz)
Fritz’s article follows perfectionist thinking to its cultural conclusion. “Schools give their students aptitude tests designed to measure their abilities. Then, guidance counselors sit down with these students, and give them advice. Their advice usually suggests pursuing a career based on their aptitude. If the student is good at math, become an engineer; if you are organized, become a manager...”
In this way many end up in careers they never cared about because they thought they were obligated to develop their talents and abilities without regard to other possibilities.
Another result of this approach is that many people believe they can’t learn and develop unless they already have gifts to develop. And if they do have gifts, their identity becomes tied to this purpose. They think they are defined by how well they develop their gifts. Since there is no way to reach the ideal of perfection, there is no way to win.
Democratic Utopias
If may be that the idea of perfection can be discarded without any great loss of culture or history, but we don’t know that yet. We haven’t explored it thoroughly enough. Democratic versions of utopianism also exist. For example, Sir Thomas More’s book, Utopia. In addition, American colonists created several utopian communities. They all emphasized spiritual perfection, although they differed in their beliefs. From the American example, we can see that the meaning of perfection differs from one group or individual to another, and also from one era to another.
Today, it is assumed that ‘the American Dream’ is economic. However, that is not how it started out. “The concept of the ‘American Dream’ was created by Puritans in the early 18th Century American colonies. It was also based on the idea of perfectionism. Puritans viewed this New World as a fresh start from the old World of Great Britain and strived to create a society of elite people held under the highest standard of God.”
Harold Kaplan said ‘humanist aspirations’ are the dominant American intellectual tradition. 1 But an abstract notion of democratic humanism is only part of the story. Kaplan explains democratic humanism in the context of writers of the American classics: Emerson, Thoreau, Cooper, Poe, D. H. Lawrence, Hawthorne, Melville, Whitman, Twain, and Henry James. They composed the American classics and the poetry of democracy, and in their works we see hints of the strange continent that confronted them. Kaplan deciphers their experience through the historical context, their own letters and the works of European sympathizers. Their response to this unique time and place was to create a body of literature recognized today as the American Classics.
Humanism and America’s Citizen Poets
“How does one define humanism then? In the American context the necessary assumptions were that man was both the first cause and the final end of his experiences and that he has in some unmentioned respect a dominance over his history, his present state, and his future.” (p. 3)
Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman were citizen poets. But this is also true of Melville and Hawthorne, who had opposing temperaments. They were all critics of their civilization, but beneath the criticism was a deep allegiance. ‘If we have a moral tradition that supports democracy, it is largely their creation’. (p. ix)
The Metaphor of the Frontier
The ancestors of these authors had arrived on the American continent with their heads full of the old world. By the 18th century, they were finally ready to formulate a debate with that world and distinguish themselves from it. This might account for the way American culture developed on a parallel track with native culture. They wrote about the native inhabitants, but they were obsessed with the burden of creating a new, non-European culture.
Kaplan says that in some respects, modernity came to America at the beginning of its history. ‘The frontier supplied the best historical metaphor for both crisis and inspiration in a world without sovereign moral authorities’. These American authors ‘faced the deep insecurity of a quarrel between man and his civilization’. They took the cultural initiative of defining the terms of their own freedom, and for that reason, they seem like an avant garde for the modern consciousness.
The Poetry of Democracy in Debate With the Old World
Democracy was part of the debate with the old world. And freedom. And morality. And it wasn’t confined to American writers. That’s also true today. Hannah Arendt, for example, interpreted Hermann Melville’s Billy Budd as a rebuke against the French Revolution. That may be what Melville intended. However it seems to me that when conservatives disapprove of the French Revolution, they are trying to erase it from history, and that is more troubling than the Revolution itself. And Arendt was a conservative.
An important contributor to our conversation is Chris Hedges, who often quotes Hannah Arendt. Hedges often quotes Melville’s Moby Dick as well. This is fitting because Hedges is a Calvinist, as was Melville’s mentor, Nathaniel Hawthorne. In our conversation, we are fortunate to have Hedges’s view of the American Classics in addition to that of Harold Kaplan and others. We need all of these voices and literary sources together to orient ourselves and our democracy in this time and place.
Billy Budd
The following is Harold Kaplan’s commentary on Billy Budd. This is a spoiler alert. If you haven’t read Billy Budd, you might want to read it before continuing.
“In fact the ability to appreciate him (the ‘Handsome Sailor’) is what marks the line between good and evil, faith and despair… It is clear, from such expressions, as well as the longer development in Billy Budd, that the ‘Handsome Sailor’ was a man who reflected for other men their best sense of themselves...
“The effect is to say that the ‘Handsome Sailor’ is universal in his humanity, and superior at the same time. He is, significantly, a democratic hero in another sense. In his various embodiments he is associated with revolutionary action, with mutiny, and the over-throw of authorities… The tension between resistance and conformity dominates the long development of the theme, a point which fulfills expectations for a democratic hero. In the last complete incarnation, Billy Budd cheers for the ‘Rights of Man,’ but also dies affirming Captain Vere.” (p. 189)
It may seem surprising that Hermann Melville is a model for our contemporary neoconservatives. They appreciate what they see as Melville’s superior resistance to authoritarianism. I hope we can look at these authors through our own eyes and decide for ourselves what they were trying to tell us about our world. Maybe we can also expand on their vision.
Was the Enlightenment democratic? According to Harold Kaplan, Americans accept without question the effects on the United States of the Reformation and the Enlightenment. He wrote:
“We do not question that the twin roots of American national history were the religious revolution, which broke the Catholic hegemony, and the secular Enlightenment, which finally broke the traditional political structures, monarchical and hierarchical, of Europe…” (p. 14)
((Harold Kaplan, Democratic Humanism and American Literature, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1972, p. 14)) (T
When I first started thinking about the social effects of America’s mythology, I questioned the religious basis of the Enlightenment. Now I’m questioning its democratic basis.There is no question that the Enlightenment made the United States possible. But there have always been concerns about its effects. Are we capable of talking about these concerns in the Enlightened United States?
The short answer is, not necessarily. One faction of our enlightened forefathers, the federalists, wanted a continuation of Britain’s monarchy with a king-like president. Others wanted to create a new kind of government unlike Britain’s. Unfortunately, the new-government faction lost the debate. The best they could do was add the Bill of Rights to curb federal power.
Although we might wish the anti-federalists had been successful, they were part of the same class as the federalists. One result of their class outlook was that they did not see a problem with inequality. They accepted slavery in particular.
American Politics versus Enlightenment Governance
As stated above, America’s government is an Enlightenment creation. In this light, it was interesting to discover that during the 2016 presidential election that we are not allowed to elect our chosen presidential candidate. After loudly objecting to our defeat, most of us accepted our limitations, unlike the Trump faction. That’s who we are.
Trump
Trump’s base apparently missed that demonstration of how democracy works. He used our act of good will to promote himself. Now we are observing billionaires and Freemasons trying to claw back democracy, and Trump’s supporters don’t bat an eye.
You could say the aftermath of the 2020 election has been a Free-masonic temper tantrum. And it’s not going away. Freemasonry is part of our political history. The important lesson here is that our system offered no protections against a candidate like Donald Trump.
Biden
On a positive note, the Biden Administration has responded to many of our demands. It’s not what we envisioned in 2016. We thought a complete change of direction was needed to address climate change and the shortage of resources. But the truth is, no politician, including Bernie Sanders, can run a campaign on a platform of lower living standards and personal sacrifice. And this is what we need. If some mythical self-sacrificing candidate were to win anyway, the markets would remove him in short order.
However, Biden’s political situation has been complicated by events in Palestine. As a recipient of AIPAC money, he supports Israel’s attack on Gaza. In addition, AIPAC is threatening to primary any political candidate who criticizes Israel’s bombing campaign. And our government does not object. Perhaps the most worrying part of this is that it is taking place over the objections of people all over the world. This is another lesson about American politics.
Class Structure Was Here From the Beginning
America has always had distinct social classes but no one bothers to explain how this came about. Immigration, of course. Groups immigrating to the colonies included Puritans (religious fundamentalists), Quakers (religious liberals), and Borderers. This last group wanted personal liberty without interference from society or government. But the largest group of English immigrants to the United States arrived between the years 1642 to 1675. They consisted of 45,000 Cavaliers of King Charles I, and their indentured servants. They had lost their former status in England because they were on the losing side in the English Civil War. However, they remained royalist, Anglican and Aristocratic.
Some say they wanted to re-create in Virginia the hierarchal, farming society they had left behind. When their servants began to die, the Cavaliers’ descendants imported African slaves. Cavalier immigrants included ancestors of George Washington, James Madison, James Monroe, John Marshall, and other first families of Virginia.
The descendants of the Cavaliers only stopped supporting the Stuart kings during the reign of Charles II. They turned against Charles because he appointed his own people to offices in Virginia and gave cultivated land to his favorites, among other injustices.
Summary
Was the Enlightenment a democratic movement? Not as much as it could have been. It seems Ben Franklin was not quite honest when he said democracy is ours if we can keep it. It is reasonable to question our form of government and the Enlightenment ideals that made it possible.
When Recep Tayyip Erdogan defends Gaza , that’s the least of his worries. He defends Gaza as World Energy Markets die. Erdogan is one of the few leaders in the Middle East to openly criticize Benjamin Netanyahu for his callous bombing campaign. In addition to providing hope for Gaza in her ongoing trial, Erdogan also reminds us that the Levant has seen better times. Palestine was under Turkish rule for four hundred years prior to the days of the British Mandate of Palestine. Apparently, Erdogan has not forgotten this long-lost child of the Ottoman Empire. On November 29, after Netanyahu continued to spew his vile threats at Gaza, Erdogan called Netanyahu the ‘butcher of Gaza‘.
Control of gas and oil supplies is an important focus of Israel’s U.S. ‘protectors’. It appears this is a large motivation for the bombing of Gaza. The story of Gaza’s natural gas field and the U.S. military are missing in reporting of the bombing of Gaza. A natural gas field was discovered off the Coast of Gaza in 1999 by BG Group, a multinational oil and gas company headquartered in Reading, United Kingdom. And this gas field is not the only one on Israel’s radar.
Secret U.S. military base(s) are also missing from the story of the bombing of Gaza
It has come to light that the United States has a military base in Israel. This was reported in the Jewish Virtual Library. JVL sources were listed as Barbara Opall-Rome of the Defense News and The Washington Post. The Post’s article is no longer on its website. Actually, there is more than one. The chronology is complicated and will be discussed in more detail below.
Israel is claiming rights to several gas fields, but who really owns them?
Several gas fields have been discovered off the Mediterranean coast in recent decades. In fact, while the Israelis were bombing Gaza, Israel granted twelve licenses to six companies to explore for natural gas in that area. Total oil and gas reserves were valued at $524 billion in 2019.
But did Israel have a right to award these licenses? According to a UN report, Israel is not entitled to all of the gas. Some of the reserves are in the occupied territory of Palestine. Much of the rest is outside of national borders and should be shared with relevant parties. In fact, the UN report questioned whether Israel has a right to any of it. After all, the gas fields took millions of years to form and the Palestinians occupied the entire territory of Palestine for thousands of years before the Israelis arrived.
The question of the hour is, who owns this particular gas field off the Gaza coast? It won’t be surprising to anyone that the majority owner, the Palestinian people, have no access to its income.
Gaza swims with sharks
The Palestine National Authority has maritime jurisdiction up to 20 nautical miles off of Gaza’s coast. This is according to the Oslo II Accords. The PNA signed a 25-year contract for gas exploration off the Gaza coast with BGG in November 1999. Long story short, Gaza ended up with nothing. Here are the details as described by Rachel Donald of Planet Critical.
Ehud Barak
Palestine’s Prime Minister at the time, Ehud Barak, authorized BGG to drill the first well in July 2000. And of course, BGG struck gas. Then Palestine and Israel began to negotiate. They agreed on a deal that was thought to be fair to both Israeli demand and Palestinian supply. But then…
Arial Sharon
Arial Sharon became Prime Minister. His government rejected a supply deal between the Palestinian gas field and the state-owned Israel Electric Corporation.
Tony Blair to the rescue
Enter UK Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2002. As a result of Blair’s influence, Sharon agreed to negotiate an agreement. He agreed to take an annual supply of 0.05 trillion cubic feet of Palestinian gas for a period of 10 to 15 years. But in 2003 Sharon decided the money might be used for terrorism. So he changed his mind.
Hamas scuttles a new deal with Ehud Olmert
Ehud Olmert’s government made a new deal with the Palestinians that was supposed to start in 2009. Israel would purchase 0.05 trillion cubic feet of Palestinian gas for $4 billion annually. However, the 2007 Battle of Gaza changed the deal again. This battle began when Hamas took control of the strip. They supposedly did this because they wanted to increase the original 10% Palestinian share in the BGG deal.
I have no inside knowledge of Hamas’s motivation. However, In my opinion it is curious that an attack by Hamas also justified Israel’s 2023 bombing campaign. In both cases Israel benefitted by claiming entitlement to self-serving retributions. In 2023, Israel took the opportunity to award exploration licenses off the Mediterranean Coast. Now back to the saga of Palestine’s gas field.
Israel nullifies the 1999 contract that BG Group, the Palestinian government and the PNA agreed to
An Israeli team of negotiators was set up by the Government of Israel to formulate a deal with BGG, bypassing both the Palestinian government and PNA. This nullified the contract signed in 1999 between BGG and PNA. However, in December 2007, BGG withdrew from negotiations with the Israeli government.
In 2008, Israel belatedly tries to restart negotiations with BGG
In June 2008, the Israeli government recontacted BGG to urgently renegotiate the deal. But it seems this was a cover for at attack on Gaza, which was already planned. The UN report states: “The decision to speed up negotiations with BGG coincided, chronologically, with the planning of an Israeli military operation in Gaza, whereby it would appear that the Government of Israel wished to reach an agreement with BGG prior to the military operation, which was already in an advanced planning stage.”
Israel confiscates Palestinian gas fields in 2008 invasion of Gaza
The invasion of Gaza by Israel in December 2008 brought the Palestinian gas fields under Israeli control—without regard for international law. Israel’s government has been dealing with BGG ever since. The UN estimates billions of dollars in loss for the Palestinian people.
The military base(s)
According to the Jewish Virtual Library and Defense News, there is a new U.S. military base located at the Israel Defense Forces Air Defense School near Beersheba. When construction began in 2017, its stated purpose was to support a contingent of soldiers who would operate systems to help Israel defend against rocket and missile attack. In this base, the plan was for U.S. soldiers and Israeli airmen to be living and working side-by-side. But these articles also mention a U.S. independent facility in the same general area of Israel’s Negev desert.
Pentagon awards contract for expansion of the joint base in August 2023.
The dates reported by the various websites are confusing. I believe construction of the joint U.S. and Israeli facility began September 16, 2017, while Donald Trump was in the Whitehouse. The JVL says ground was broken for the initial construction in 2017. And this one seems to be the one that was expanded in 2023. But before this base was built, the U.S. already had a military base in Israel.
Making sense of the dates
The Intercept says the Pentagon awarded a multimillion-dollar contract for construction of a base in August 2023. However, this contract must have been for its expansion, because the JVL and Defense News says construction was begun in 2017.
At that time, the U.S. had another military site independent of Israel that was not the subject of an expansion. The Intercept was able to report the monetary value of this older site because it was mentioned in an August 2 contract announcement by the Pentagon. The intercept reports that this site is a $35.8 million U.S. troop facility.
The two sites share a code name
The U.S. military has operated this independent facility for more than a decade in the same general area of Israel’s Negev desert, according to the Jewish Virtual Library, Defense News and the Intercept. But Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw of the Intercept report that both sites are part of code-named Site 512.
The Americans operate the independent site without an Israeli presence. Its purpose is to house the U.S. AN/TPY-2, an X-Band radar that is integrated with Israeli search and track radars to augment early warning in the event of ballistic missile attack from Iran. The Intercept article specuates that these sites did not warn against the Hamas attack because they were focused in Iran.
One of Israel’s Iron Dome systems is in the U.S.
One of Israel’s operational Iron Dome systems is now in the U.S., according to the Defense News article. It is competing with U.S.-proposed systems as a possible solution to the medium and short-range air defense requirement.
If you’ve wondered during the last twenty years at the overheated rhetoric of both Israel and the Western powers, Dr. Stephan Sizer will connect the dots in a video entitled The Historical Roots of Christian Zionism, It’s Theological Basis and Political Agenda. According to Sizer, Christian Zionism is the culprit behind the militant turn. Christian Zionism explains everything.
We have high expectations for Israel. Are they realistic?
Judaism or Zionism?
We are outraged about the behavior of Israel toward the Palestinians. At the same time, atrocities that are happening in other parts of the world don’t demand our attention. Apparently, we have high expectations for Israel. The question is, are these expectations realistic?
Jeffrey Sachs says Ukraine is a lost cause. Please watch his interview regarding Ukraine. The United States’s maneuvering has led step by step to war and the destruction of Ukraine. The entire Russia/Ukraine War is the result of a U.S. regime change venture, courtesy of U.S. neoconservatives, namely, President Biden, Victoria Nuland, Anthony Blinken, and Jake Sullivan.
When Victoria Nuland first discussed replacing the Ukrainian president, she was motivated by the fact that President Yanukovich had passed a neutrality agreement to head off war. The Biden administration chose war instead. Nuland’s meddling is common knowledge–her phone call was intercepted by the Russians and replayed in the U.S. Even so, there were several opportunities to avoid this war before it started, and the Americans refused to try.
On December 17, 2021 President Putin put on the table a draft U.S. Russia security agreement to avert the war. The agreement called for several things but the most important was an end to NATO enlargement. Jeffrey Sachs urged Biden to negotiate at that time, but the U.S. declared that the expansion of NATO is none of Russia’s business. Subsequently, Zalinski called for negotiations based on Ukraine’s neutrality, but the U.S. blocked negotiations.
This video lays out in more detail the reasons Jeffrey Sachs says Ukraine is a lost cause. The transcript is included in the video notes. Please take note of the steps that must follow the end of hostilities for true peace with Russia.
This article is an acknowledgement of grave disorder in the halls of our government. It is a kind of disorder that can’t be set right by judgement, scolding and condemnation. It can only be addressed with blessings and prayers. This is a desperate call for blessings and prayers for a disputed land. Nothing less will do. But first the problem must be described.
