If there is a mystical chord in democracy, it probably revolves around the notion that unexpected music can resonate from politics when people are pursuing questions larger than self... I have seen that ennobling effect in people many, many times- expressed by those who found themselves engaged in genuine acts of democratic expression, who claimed their right to define the larger destiny of their community, their nations.
William GreiderMaybe the reason some folks lag behind in our free enterprise system is because they depend too much on the free part and not enough on their own enterprise.
William GreiderIf one benefits tangibly from the exploitation of others who are weak, is one morally implicated in their predicament? Or are basic rights of human existence confined to the civilized societies that are wealthy enough to afford them? Our values are defined by what we will tolerate when it is done to others.
William GreiderDemocracy begins in human conversation. A democratic conversation does not require elaborate rules of procedure or utopian notions of perfect consensus. What it does require is a spirit of mutual respect-people conversing critically with one another in an atmosphere of honesty and shared regard.
William GreiderThe quest for homeland security is heading ... toward the quasi-militarization of everyday life ... If danger might lurk anywhere, maybe everything must be protected and policed.
William GreiderIf everyone has to be a watchdog in order to make government work, then the foxes will also volunteer to serve.
William GreiderThe rich nations of the world are acting like ancient usurers, lending money to the desperate poor on terms that cannot possibly be met and, thus, steadily acquiring more and more control over the lives and assets of the poor.
William GreiderCreating a positive future begins in human conversation. The simplest and most powerful investment any member of a community or an organisation can make is to begin with other people as though the answers mattered.
William GreiderThe burnt odor in Washington is from the disintegrating authority of the governing classes.
William GreiderThe ways in which people treat animals will be reflected in how people relate to one another.
William GreiderDemocracy is held captive, not just by money, but by ideas - the ideas that money buys.
William GreiderThe great multinationals are unwilling to face the moral and economic contradictions of their own behavior - producing in low-wage dictatorships and selling to high-wage democracies. Indeed, the striking quality about global enterprises is how easily free-market capitalism puts aside its supposed values in order to do business. The conditions of human freedom do not matter to them so long as the market demand is robust. The absence of freedom, if anything, lends order and efficiency to their operations.
William GreiderWhen self-important people and powerful institutions are governed by illusion, history has a way of biting back.
William GreiderObviously, people with low or even moderate incomes could not afford such savings rates, and even diligent savings from their low wages would not be enough to pay for either retirement or healthcare.
William GreiderOur values are defined by what we will tolerate when it is done to others. Everyone's sense of virtue is degraded by the present reality. A revolutionary principle is embedded in the global economic system, awaiting broader recognition: Human dignity is indivisible. Across the distances of culture and nations, across vast gulfs of wealth and poverty, even the least among us are entitled to dignity, and no justification exists or brutalizing them in the pursuit of commerce.
William GreiderIf you think about it, Washington's overwhelming power in the world is founded on death, the awesome arsenal for killing people.
William GreiderThe trauma of 9/11 stimulated infinite possibilities for worry - some quite plausible, but most inspired by remote what-if fantasies. A society bingeing on fear makes itself vulnerable to far more profound forms of destruction than terror attacks. The "terrorism war", like a nostalgic echo of the cold war, is using these popular fears to advance a different agenda - the re-engineering of American life through permanent mobilization.
William Greider