Dusk or Dawn... What's Your Call?

"Are we headed for Renaissance or Ruin?  The future is up to the individual. When the human spirit rises, everything changes!"  - Gerald Celente 

Gerald Celente, founder of The Trends Research Institute in 1980, is a political atheist. Unencumbered by political dogma, rigid ideology or conventional wisdom, Celente, whose motto is "think for yourself," observes and analyzes the current events forming future trends for what they are – not for the way he wants them to be.  Celente has earned his reputation as "The most trusted name in trends" by accurately forecasting hundreds of social, business, consumer, environmental, economic, political, entertainment, and technology trends. 
 
I recently had the opportunity to however briefly rub electrons over the radio with this man, Celente, one of the folks I have been keeping my eye on for some time, in attempts to make sense of the general unraveling of things.  Donna McElligot of the CBC has been growing some big stones, as evidenced by inviting this man on her call-in show, "Alberta at Noon."  For Celente tells it as it is.  Far be it from him to deliver the normal mandated mainstream pablum most of us are fed by an establishment that would have us all their infant call-children.  I was hoping some spare grey stuff might come spilling down the line from his brain-box and anoint me.  He did not disappoint.  He had plenty of spare wisdom for us all. 

Celente is, as we just mentioned, a "political athiest," like myself.  Someone who sees Big Politics as a spectacle increasingly removed from the real world, a self-serving sideshow much like the practice of law has become, law having not coincidentally spawned the overwhelming majority of our leaders.  Like the legal process, an impediment more often these days than not, or at best, just another business like any other - a casino, say, or an escort service.  At worst, an infestation.  I'm sure our First Nations, a people who'd been doing quite nicely managing their own affairs sustainably for millenia, viewed it that way once upon a not-so-distant time, if not still.  A political atheist is someone who may remind you, "Don't cast your ballot on a dung-heap and expect not to be delivered a shit-beetle."  A political atheist is someone who refuses to lend legitimacy to illegitimate people and their illegitimate processes, created by themselves for themselves, through willful participation in that process.  A political atheist is someone who recognizes that much as we'd like to be able to make the monsters go away through the simple act of dropping an "X" into a box, free then to slip back into peaceful slumber, it doesn't work that way.  Not for long, anyway.  Clearly not now.  But as this is the case, how then will it work, "going forward" as we so like to say these days?  It's an understatement to point out that we need to know this.    

I was driving into town to get a thousand pounds of oats when Celente was announced as guest of the call-in show.  Appalled at the idea that we might blow this rare chance to cut through the dryer-lint of usual mainstream discourse, that the discussion would be steered towards such trivial matters as the "unfair portrayal of the Tarsands," or worse, "what do you think of the fact that we are golfing in Alberta in February," I got right in there to see if I could not help massage things towards the much-needed wake-up call I knew this man, given this opportunity, could deliver.  I needn't have bothered.  He needed no help from me.

Celente's message for us was both ominous and inspiring.  Here are the highlights:

•   If there is war in Iran, it will be the beginning of WWIII.  This will be bad for civilization.  It will be great for the energy sector.  It looks right now as though this is where things are headed;
  
•  Forget Politics, the current system is leading us somewhere we do not want to go - the future is in the hands of the individual, making decisions and taking action locally;
  
• The human spirit is the root of greatness - we can achieve another Renaissance if we lift our spirits out of the mercenary gutters they rot in at present;
  
• If we keep on the current path, however, with the economic bottom line our God, ruin is where we are headed;
  
• The future of the family farm is one of the bright trends of the day, but we've got to abolish the draconian laws we've put in place as impediments restricting free farm commerce (farm-gate sales)... 
  
• Make sure you have an escape plan - you don't want to be caughtin an urban centre in a time of real crisis...

Celente pointed out that those who didn't see our current crises coming were looking to the wrong people, to the specialists lacking in necessary scope.  I would concur.  It seems to me a given that we not listen to any economist lacking a broader education in the workings of natural systems or the history of human civilizations, for example - they are not equipped for their job.  If you've been doing your digging outside the mandated media placed within our most convenient grasp, it's pretty clear where we're headed, and has been for generations.  This was one of the primary motives behind our founding Thompson Small Farm, and now The New Farmer School.  For as Celente, a martial black belt trainer, points out: 

"The first rule of Close Combat is to attack the attacker. Action is faster than reaction. The same holds true for the future. You know the future is coming … attack it before it attacks you." 

Dusk or Dawn?  It's your call, and mine.  How will it be made to work, now?  It will work like this: buy local, augment your skill-set, embrace your neighbor, nurture your own community, make your own decisions, know your farmer.