WANNA MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN?

I am going to write an entire opinion piece here without casting a single aspersion on the soon-to-be leader of the free world. WAIT! Don’t look away just because I’m unwilling to engage in the petty identity politics of our degenerate age. I really AM going to explain how we can (still) Make America Great Again. It is a lot easier than you might think. I have prescriptions for both our broken political system and our broken planet. Hear me out (you, too, Ivanna!).

Political Problem: Corporate Media

We have lost any sense of checks and balances in our political system — unless gridlock can be considered a “check.” What few people today seem to realize is that the poison pill that led to this mess was prescribed by the Reagan renegades over 30 years ago, though it was concocted in the right wing think tanks funded as a response to Nixon’s disgrace, with a view towards making America corrupt again.

What brought Nixon down? The Fourth Estate — which was up to that point in time the ultimate check on government corruption in this country.

And how did Uncle Ronnie destroy the Fourth Estate? That was easy. Once he had control of the Federal Communications Commission, which formerly regulated the public airwaves, he administered two fatal doses of democratic strychnine.

One: eliminate the Fairness Doctrine. Under that doctrine, any media outlet that aired a controversial political view was required to give equal time to those who had an opposing view. And if you gave a political candidate free time, as with excessive news coverage, you were required to balance that out with coverage of the other candidates. Once this eminently fair doctrine was eliminated, we got Rush Limbaugh, right-wing radio, Fox News, etc. In time, a very divided country with polarized views “informed” by ideologues, not actual news reporting. A good start, but hardly enough to destroy the Fourth Estate. No, for that, what was really needed was…

Two: remove any limitations on media ownership. Prior to Reagan’s war on democracy, individuals and corporations were limited to both the number of different media outlets they could own in any given market as well as the overall number of media outlets they could control nationally. This fostered a healthy diversity of perspectives. I can remember growing up in Chicago in a time when this diversity was clear to all: there was a Republican leaning paper, the Tribune, a Democratic leaning paper, the Sun Times, and even an Independent leaning paper, the American. Of course, they were all subject to the Fairness Doctrine, so you weren’t limited by your choice to just one ideology. And the Democratic paper in Chicago was different than the one in Boston or St. Louis.

Once media was “liberated” from responsibilities imposed on them by the government (which was premised on an understanding of how important access to public airwaves was, and the responsibility to the public interest that attended that access), it was not long at all before all the media outlets in America were owned by 6 giant corporations, and news itself became a form of entertainment rather than a responsibility to the public. Suddenly, celebrity gossip became “newsworthy,” and investigative reporting all but disappeared.

No more Nixons!

I think we can all see the disastrous consequences of this corporate makeover of our Fourth Estate. It was only a matter of time before a reality TV star would become our next president.

So the solution is as simple as it is politically difficult: bring back the Fairness Doctrine, and diversify media ownership. Even Trump claims the media is unfair! Who could object to restoring fairness in the media?

The Existential Problem: Spineless America

Do you know what really made America great? We were once a society that was centered around the family farm. That may sound nostalgic or even simplistic, but it is anything of the sort. Remember when the small family farm was called “the backbone of America”? People knew where their food came from, and how it was grown. And farmers understood the critical importance of soil, and were in tune with the weather. There was also a “cultural” component to Agriculture that is missing from Agribusiness today. Rural America was full of healthy (for the most part) communities. Today, its a vast wasteland riddled with bathtub crank and discarded humanity.

Civilization is premised on Agriculture — it’s what allowed humans to progress from a hunter/gatherer society to an urban/agrarian society. In America, and increasingly world-wide, we no longer have Agri-culture — we have monoculture imposed by giant Agri-business. And it’s no coincidence that civilization is crumbling - in no small part due to the processed foods our grandparents would not recognize, grown with over-reliance on chemicals, at the expense of healthy soil, and mechanization, at the expense of livelihoods.

Now follow me here, these next two points are critical:

One. According to the United Nations Food & Agriculture Office, if we do not drastically change the way we mass-produce food, we will lose our ability to sustain crops by 2075! The soil will have finally succumbed to all the life-killing practices, leaving only inert dirt incapable of nurturing seedlings.

Does that not sound like a major crisis to you? Why do you suppose our government and media have not sounded the alarms? Umm… oh yeah. Monsanto, Dow, Archer-Midlands… Corporate media…

Two. As if that UN report was not scary enough, we have the confounding problem of climate change. If every country lived up to its obligations under the Paris Climate Accords, which seems increasingly unlikely, we would see a rise in global average temperatures of about 3.5 degrees celsius. Of course, we are already seeing such elevated temperatures in places like Alaska, so what is important to appreciate here is that what global temperature actually measures is instability (heat is a measure of chaos, as in water molecules reaching escape velocity on your stove). Scientists predict that wild swings in weather patterns at a +3.5C degree world will mean that we are no longer capable of sustaining crops.

Double whammy! But WAIT — it’s not too late.

Here’s the GOOD news! The solution to 1 & 2 is the same ~ conversion to regenerative agro-ecology. Let me make this as simple as possible, and amaze you in the process. This will change the way you think about the climate crisis.

If we shut down all fossil fueled power plants tomorrow, and converted all our transportation system to renewable energy, but did nothing to change the way we grow crops, the climate crisis will not be abated. There is already enough carbon in the atmosphere to ensure 40–50 years of continued warming, likely getting us to 3.5c or more (as methane is released). But…

If we did nothing to address fossil fuels, as President Trump promises, but converted Agribusiness farmlands to small, family run agro-ecology farms (e.g., organic farms, though there are other forms of regenerative agriculture), not only would we be healthier, not only would rural areas of America become community-oriented again, but the increasing health and productivity of the soils that results from such a conversion would reverse climate change by taking the excess carbon out of the atmosphere!

Isn’t that GREAT? And isn’t it… CONSERVATIVE??? Wouldn’t a true conservative, a principled Republican, get behind a drive to resurrect the family farm? Wouldn’t you think every religious interest in America would think this was a great initiative?

Of course, it would mean breaking up Big Ag. And in truth, Republicans and Democrats alike are hostage to Big Ag every bit as much, if not more, than they are to the fossil fuel industry. So as many will undoubtedly point out, we can’t Make America Great Again until we get the money out of politics. But here’s the rub. If everyone who cared about America and the future of our children decided that this was the way to go, we actually have a way of demanding it be so without writing our representatives.

It’s called “consumer demand.”

If we could utilize social media with networking support from groups like 350.org to effectively get the word out to people to stop buying commercial produce altogether, demanding healthy organics with no chemical residue, to stop buying commercially processed and genetically modified foods as much as feasible, and to stop buying meats from factory farms (which is where most chemically grown and GMO grains are consumed), then two things would happen. First, the price of healthy foods would start coming down as supply chains increased to meet increasing demand. And two, the conversion of Big Ag farmlands to smaller family farms would speed up (it’s already happening, as people demand more and more healthy produce). And, of course, as people register their distaste for factory farmed animals, the demand for meat will be met by smaller farms that utilize more humane animal husbandry practices. Win/Win!

This kind of consumer-driven revolution in the food industry could very well save our civilization. That is not hyperbole. Just ask the United Nations Food & Agricultural Office. It could save our culture by revitalizing rural America, and creating millions of new jobs as mechanized agribusiness is phased out and “smaller is better” agriculture is phased back in, giving people healthy alternatives to soul-sucking minimum wage jobs, and bringing people who are no longer counted as unemployed - because they’ve dropped out of the market - back into functioning lives and communities.

Doesn’t that sound Great?

Of course, eventually we’ll still have to transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources, but this kind of agricultural revival movement would give us the necessary breathing room to make that transition, and offer a much more viable long-term solution, due to the growing carbon sinks that would result from restoring healthy soils.

Perhaps of equal importance, it would give average Americans a reason to feel good about themselves and their communities, and hopeful about their children’s and grandchildren’s future prospects. That used to be what we meant by the American Dream ~ the idea that things were getting better for us all. But uncontrolled corporate growth and unregulated corporate media have combined to turn that dream into a nightmare ~ not just for us, but for people everywhere who are suffering at the hands of Agribusiness imperialism and other forms of corporate exploitation of people as resources.

If this makes sense to you, please share it any way you like. You do not need any further permission. We’re all in this together, and we will only get out of this mess together. For more information on the soil solution to the climate crisis, I encourage you to look into the newly formed Regeneration International.