CORPORATIONS

Notes on Corporations

... But laissez-faire is critical for today's aggressive corporations because they cannot operate at their gargantuan level without almost total freedom. Corporate businessmen cite as their biggest enemy, government. They see GREED as a solution rather than a problem. They despise the push for equality as a death-knell. They refer to justice as something the envious dreamed up. For them democracy is no more than a bright tinsel wrapping to be torn off the moment it poses any real constraint around their freedom.

... colossuses of indifference "of such power as to weaken government's ability to control them," so that "corporations now govern society perhaps more than governments do."

"For in a world where anything or anyone can be owned, manipulated, and exploited for profit, everything and everyone will eventually be."... every corporation's Achilles heel is concealed in its original incorporation papers.

... management assumes that workers operate from a philosophy of self-interest. The next step is distrust, because management starts thinking the others will try to achieve its self-interest at company's expense... assumptions of self-interest eventually lead to fear... Naturally in fear-based groups there is no trust. Instead, owners and managers aggressively demand loyalty.

Achilles heel of these massive companies is in their articles of incorporation. Under the law, a company's articles can be revoked and it has to cease doing business. Should 'three strikes' be applied to corporations as well? Some corporations do damage. Some are persistent violators of the public trust. Perhaps three convictions (or three public interest law suits lost) should be the limit, and their corporate articles revoked.

Some corporations have now grown gigantic, actually becoming global forces with more power and resources than some countries... they float above the world's constraints... They are alien to the notion of democratic responsiveness, internal or external. In the universe of corporations everything focuses on the acquisition of resources, labor, and markets. These are the sources of power. Inside corporations Equality hides her face... In democratic America most corporations are iridescent examples of autocracy, thriving on soil where the Constitution guarantees everybody's freedom and equality... First, we are all educated to look elsewhere, for instance to unchecked government, as the primary threat to freedom. Second corporations make and sell our creature comforts, so we can't tamper with them without threatening our prosperity. Third, we feel powerless. The concentration of corporate power is inverse to people's feelings of personal power. Fourth, we see no alternative.

Their rules of engagement are Darwinian... corporation ownership of the MEDIA... Corporations exist for profit, so 'the news has become a commercial product'.
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REVOLUTION
You say you want a revolution
Well, you know
We all want to change the world
You tell me that it's evolution
Well, you know
We all want to change the world

/ C - - - / - F - - / - C - - - / 1st, 2nd / F G7 - - - /

But when you talk about destruction
Don't you know that you can count me out
Don't you know it's gonna be all right (3x)

/ Dm - G6 - / Dm - BbC A - G - / C - F - / / C - F - G - - - /

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution
Well, you know
We're doing what we can

But if you want money for people with minds that hate
All I can tell is brother you have to wait / Don't you know...

You say you'll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well, you know
You'd better free your mind instead

But if you go carrying pictures of chairman Mao
You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow / Don't you know...
All right, all right...

ARTIST: The Beatles
TITLE: Revolution
Lyrics and Chords
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Comments
I'm sure to some people, Mao doesn't sound to bad today, when compared to the 'scary world' we are now living in with its bleak future of corporations, greed, materialism and consumerism... and debt... running rampant and wild. One has to wonder, 'are there any more sane people left to save us... or is it to late?'

They say, 'corruption is merely a nasty word for the autumn of a people'... Well, the leaves have gotten pretty thick since the Beatles. Don't you think?

"You say you want a revolution,
Well, you know...


... legal loan sharks (banks, credit card companies, etc. ie: Corporations) will eat us out from within.

G-R-E-E-D

... As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer we drop our pretences to humanitarian democracy, instead salute material excess, accept Darwinian business ethics, and pin up as our national polestar the most powerful corporations...

GREED


Men do not envy the gifts of others, their skill, or the love of their women; they only envy each others' money.

Crowsnest Centre Plebiscite

The following is a speech I gave at the Crowsnest Centre Forum in 1999, back when I was on council. With the Centre and our community of communities future on the table, to be judged again by a plebiscite this coming September, I think what was said back then is still pertinent today. Judge for yourself:

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Crowsnest Centre
I'm going to start off by reading a line from a 3 year old report submitted to council by a former CFO (Chief Financial Officer) concerning the Crowsnest Learning Centre "If I was to attempt to supply a potential $ value of required subsidization from the local taxpayer that amount would stagger the imagination."

I believe we have to listen to the taxpayers of our community including Roberta Donkin who's letter to the editor of last week hit the nail on the head, in my opinion, when she said, …

Nestor Chorney made a very good presentation to council the other week, as have many others over the past few months. But let me tell you, we cannot allow "passion to overrule logic and reason". Logic and reason dictate that we cannot continue squandering taxpayers money on a lost cause and that the educational consortium belongs in a school, especially in lieu of the fact that we presently pay over 2.1m in school taxes for that very purpose and especially when several schools in our municipality are running at less than 50% of capacity. Sorry for the inconvenience, but that is life. We must move on and so must you. It is time to let go of the past and get on with the future.

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That was almost 10 years ago, and the tap has been allowed to continue to pour out taxpayer dollars at an astronomical rate over the years of its existence. Some members of council want this waste to continue. Ask yourself, what is their agenda?

For they must have an agenda the rest of us don't know about, to fight so ardently for a building that was past its prime 25 years ago, when it was given to us, and in fact is nothing more than an antiquated and run down 'old hospital'... that is an energy-burner in more ways than one.


For those who are resistant to change, remember this:
... the universe is in a constant state of change and becoming, and there is no moment of fixity, or being; there is only a state of becoming.

Cleverness vs Intelligence

Cleverness pursues its own little aims. Intelligence sees the larger whole in which all things are connected. Cleverness is motivated by self-interest, and it is extremely short-sighted. Most politicians and businesspeople are clever. Very few are intelligent. Whatever is attained through cleverness is short-lived and always turns out to be eventually self-defeating. Cleverness divides; intelligence includes.

The above quote was taken from Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth. I believe it speaks volumes about politicians and business people in general, as well as more specifically about our local ones too. Some of whom think they are 'clever' in avoiding you personally, your ideas/suggestions/advice, but most importantly avoiding any responsibility or accountability for the past, or with dealing with the future. Burying their heads in the sand like an ostrich is their preferred modus operandi. Clever, but lacking real intelligence. :-(

What this community needs is not more 'clever' politicians and business people, but 'intelligent' ones.



"Work for a great idea, and you arouse ideas in your own mind. Great ideas produce great thoughts, and great thoughts produce greatness in humanity. A person is exactly what one thinks oneself to be. Therefore, the one who thinks great thoughts must necessarily attain greatness, and the simplest way for anyone to form the habit of thinking great thoughts is to work for great ideas."

Consumption

Wise consumption is much more complicated than wise production. What five people will produce, one person can very easily consume, and the question for each individual and for every nation is not how are we to produce, but how our products are to be consumed. – John Ruskin



Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being. - Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

What we need

This week's letter to the editor in the Herald 'A question posed to everyone in the Crowsnest Pass?' was well written and is worthy of attention and consideration, especially from our members of council.

Many people both inside and outside our community are looking for change. Are we going to see it? Judging from the lack of response from my earlier posts, it doesn’t look good. We have councillors who like to pose questions but never offer answers, or take the steps that are needed and necessary to turn our community around. In other words, they can talk the talk but cannot walk the walk (even when they have a `majority` on council. :-o ) So sad! :-(

It looks like those who are good at ‘filibustering’ are short on actually doing something, so that those people like the writer to the editor have no reason to move here. Why should they? When even those who have sacrificed a great deal over the years for this community, are shunned, ostracised and literally starved out of their homes, because they dare to speak the truth that no one wants to hear, especially the politicians. That`s why I say, what are they really good for? Talk is cheap, action is everything. What we need is less talk and more action! That seems to be asking for a miracle in itelf. :-(



Behold the believers of all beliefs! Whom do they hate most? Him who breaketh up their table of values, the breaker, the law-breaker: - he however, is the creator.

A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.