Up From Socialism: My 60-Year Search for a Healing New Radical Politics (Bombardier Books/Post Hill Press, edited by Adam Bellow, distributed by Simon & Schuster). I have a confession to make. I am a horrible person. I am asking you to do something I haven’t done myself. Maybe because I’m lazy and cowardly. Or too busy. Or the wrong person. But if you are hungry to change the world, and heal all the horrific wrongs you see in society, you need to read Mark Satin‘s latest book. Available now on Amazon Because as he readily admits, he has tried and failed at that probably more times than a ..read more

OUR NATION IS struggling. The left and the right are tearing each other apart. Meanwhile, none of our major domestic and global issues are being properly addressed. We desperately need a new political perspective for the 21st century, one that can unite and heal this nation. And we need a political movement backing it up. Instead, many of us are buying into an agenda that would neither unite nor heal us. It’s all around us now. Forget balanced budgets. Condone illegal immigration. Defund the police. Don’t go hard after street crime. Don’t institutionalize the mentally ill. Dismantle the nuclea ..read more

Fits in with the Radical Centrist mantra of “loving your enemies to death.” I can imagine being a true believer in Hamas… / If I knew a cure for this horrid compulsion, I would have used it. But from what I can see of the … If I Were Hamas: An Exercise in Empathy ..read more

Ari’s Top 5—A Perpetual Purpose Trust A revolution is to create new truths about human beings and society. There is no proof really that the road you are taking is the “true” one.  You have to make it true.m While the phrase “giving away the store” is usually used to connote poor negotiation skills, in our case, “giving away the store” is actually a big, big win. It’s an uncommon, but wholly uplifting, way to handle the long-term succession of the organization that remains true to the way we’ve tried to manage the business since we opened all the way back in 1982.  …make businesses ..read more

Continued from Part 2 After hearing Carrie tell the story of Alex, the alien who became US President in this reality with an October 32nd, I sat there stunned for several minutes. Both at the radical shift in my entire concept of the universe — and at her amazingly concise summary of such an extraordinary series of events! “Did you really just figure all that out while you were watching TV?” I asked. She actually blushed when I said that. I couldn’t help noticing this made her several notches more attractive than I had initially thought. “To be honest, most of that was cribbed from his Wikiped ..read more

Continued from Part 1 An hour later I am sitting In a coffee shop with the girl, Carrie. I don’t remember ever seeing her before, but that is hardly unusual in a university of 50,000+ students. Also. she isn’t exactly my type, I note with a wistful recollection of last night’s redhead. But, she might be the only human being in this reality who won’t question my sanity. Plus, as an early riser, she seems way more on top of things than I am. Maybe she has some idea why we both woke up in a world where it was October 32nd, and an alien was President of the United States. So, after the first round ..read more

Maybe I drank too much. Okay, yeah, I definitely did drink too much. I woke up with the mother of all hangovers. But that still isn’t enough to explain what happened. Maybe it was the witch. But of course, she couldn’t have really been a witch. Just a sexy redhead in a store-bought witch’s costume. Perhaps she cast a spell on me, but that’s hardly unusual at a sorority Halloween party. She didn’t even take me back to her room or feed me a potion. I’ve gone over it in my mind a hundred times, and I still can’t find any way to pin it on her. Still, there’s no denying Something must have happened ..read more

Freedom was the rallying cry of the American Revolution. And that vision of Freedom is truly God’s gift to the world. But the worm in that apple of Freedom was always the word “personal…” Personal Freedom — as practiced by many Founding Fathers — included the right to keep slaves, oppress women and minorities, and avoid accountability for the harm we externalized — never mind the command to love our neighbor as ourselves. In practice, if not in theory, it meant only freedom for the powerful. Of course, the opposite error is Communal Authoritarianism — rejecting all forms of meritocracy in the ..read more

Asymmetric information is the key enabler of structural injustice In the absence of information monopolies, the only competitive advantage is asymmetric virtue Transparent ecosystems inevitably outcompete information hoarders Notes from August 20th, 2021 Datocracy Podcast Human Intelligence Augmentation vs Artificial General Intelligence Rational as a subset of the Real The Legal System is the execution engine of Legal Code (cf US forking from English Common Law) Trust is the irreducible element of systems Transparent History Transparent Incentives Voice vs Exit (“take my data and go ..read more

Andy Stanley 5 questions Christians should ask before decision – The Christian Post First, people should ask themselves, “Why am I doing this?” Second, it’s important to ask, “What story do I want to tell?” — in other words, think “ultimate rather than immediate.” Third, he advised asking, “Is there a tension that deserves my attention?” The fourth question believers should ask is: “What is the wise thing to do?” — “In light of my past experience, what is the wise thing for me to do? — In light of my current circumstances and state of mind, what is the wise thing for me to do? — In light of m ..read more