Van Jones
4.0 out of 5 stars Oblivious to the Insanity of the Two-Party Tyranny, But Worth Digesting, July 1, 2012
This is one of two books I read on the plane to DC from Seattle, the other being Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy.
Part I for me is largely a waste of time. The author is — in my view of course — delusional on Obama's success and at face value completely unwitting or unphased by the depth and breadth of the progressive betrayal of Obama aka Bush III. The author is also high on Al Gore — along with 9/11 and the root corruption of Congress that made our economic collapse inevitable this is one of my litmus tests. Al Gore took the bribe, rolled over and played dead despite the three months notice by Greg Palast of The Observer (later published in book form as The Best Democracy Money Can Buy. On the Republican side, I hold Colin Powell and George Tenet accountable for betraying the public trust, allowing Dick Cheney to take America to war on the basis of 925 now documented (Truth.dig) lies. There are no winners — no paragons of virtue — in either party, and I specifically include Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich has false flags, never really being willing to leave their warm embrace of their chosen tyranny.
Part II is slightly interesting is you do not read a great deal, a rehash of heart space, head space, the American story, and swarm theory. The rest of us call it collective intelligence, cognitive surplus, human scale, etcetera. Books to read here, vastly more detailed that the author's light once over, include Tom Atlee's The Tao of Democracy: Using co-intelligence to create a world that works for all, Jim Rough's Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People, Barbara Marx Hubbard's Conscious Evolution: Awakening Our Social Potential and so many others that I have reviewed here at Amazon–and the many more I have not.
Part III begins to return value, and I certainly agree with the author's early articulation that “America is still the best idea in the world,” but I find him hypocritical or oblivious in the extreme to completely ignore all of the broken promises, the role of money, the loss of integrity across every pillar of society.
His list of Obama's successes is in my view idiotic. While my friend Harrison Owen, inventor of open space technology and most recently author of Wave Rider: Leadership for High Performance in a Self-Organizing World tells me I am wrong about Obama, I see NOTHING positive in Obama's selling out — to include $300 million in donations STILL not accounted for, the impoverishment of America — 22.4% unemployment, 46 million on food stamps, most college kids not getting serious jobs, etcetera. No one has gone to jail for what Matt Taibbi describes so well in Griftopia: A Story of Bankers, Politicians, and the Most Audacious Power Grab in American History, and meanwhile we have an Attorney General that may be the least ethical and least intelligent in modern history.
Page 120 has an interesting chart that maps the rest of the book, distinguishing between Head Space and Inside Game on the upper half versus Heart Space and Outside Game on the lower half. The top is rational, the bottom is emotional, the left is political concept, the right is political action. Although I am positively provoked by the conclusion of the book, on balance I find it shallow. The author has marshalled some good points, but neglects the fundamentals.
The conclusion contains the following worthy of note:
Rebuild the Dream
01 Infrastructure
02 21st Century Energy Jobs
03 Public Education
04 Medicare for All
05 Make Work Pay
06 Secure Social Security
07 Return to Fairer Tax Rates
08 End Wars Invest at Home
09 Tax Speculation
10 Strengthen Democracy
These are platitudes lacking a strong strategic analytic model and also lacking the fundamentals in ethics–until we eradicate the two party tyranny, pass the Electoral Reform Act of 2012, and implement the basics as set forth by We the People Reform Coaltion (BigBatUSA – org), nothing in this book has a hope of becoming real.
Three Principles
01 Driven by local
02 Based on thrift
03 Grounded in ecological restoration
Five New Economic Casualty Groups
01 Millenials
02 Veterans
03 Home Owners
04 Long-Term Unemployed
The book would be stronger if the author took issue with all the lies that the US Government continues to publish and that the captive corporate media replay. Anyone who does not understand that the actual unemployment rate is 22.4% and that unemployment among the young and the old is closer to 40%, is a part of the problem.
I like most of his suggestions for reform, but absent electoral reform and the restoration of intelligence with integrity to the US Government, this is all a pipe-dream:
01 Retake the land
02 Slam student debt
03 Move our money
04 Caring across generations
05 Revitalize unions
06 Alternative economic models with shared access
The author's bottom line: America is not broke, America is not a crisis, it is a scam.
We agree.
The book also includes an appendix by Eva Paterson, “Truth on Van Jones versus Lies from Glenn Beck,” and I for one am very appreciative of this offering.
Anyone interested in structured summaries of the thoughts of many non-fiction authors can utilize my two master lists that were done in preparation for my last two books, one for the specialty intelligence audience, the latest (below my name) for the general public. They are easily found by searching for them as written below, all reviews lead back to Amazon.
Worth a Look: Book Review Lists (Positive)
Worth a Look: Book Review Lists (Negative)
Robert David STEELE Vivas
THE OPEN SOURCE EVERYTHING MANIFESTO: Transparency, Truth & Trust
