At 21:07 01/06/2003 -0400, you wrote:
I admit that I am a welfare state idealogue. With the collapse of religion,
the family, respect for government, etc., social cohesion is in tatters.
Perhaps cross-subsidization with rights and obligations might be of help.
Maybe not.
Yes, the breakdown in social cohesion is the worst tragedy that has befallen mankind. But please don't blame free-trade ideologues, globalisation, or capitalism or any other ism. These have existed ever since the dawn of mankind when a fellow spent time and effort in making a flint arrow-head (capitalism) and then traded it for some yellow ochre from a fellow in the next tribe (free trade ideology).
By accident, we have discovered pretty cheap coal, cheaper oil and absurdly cheap natural gas, particularly in the last two centuries. This accident by itself hasn't changed capitalism or global free trade (sailing, using the wind, has always been cheap) but it has made personal travel and commuting to work so cheap that it has destroyed the balanced, largely self-disciplining communties of the past which lived and worked in close proximity.
I despair sometimes why more people don't realise what the real cause is for most of our present-day problems.
Keith Hudson, 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath, England
