The race to the bottom is a socio-economic phrase which is used to describe government deregulation of the business environment or taxes in order to attract or retain economic activity in their jurisdictions. An outcome of globalization and free trade, the phenomenon may occur when competition increases between geographic areas over a particular sector of… Read More
In my search for understanding of why life-capital at the planetary and social levels of life organisation are being spoiled and deprived while money-capital in terms of the money indices like the global GDP and stock markets continue to increase over time, I am beginning to believe that we have a global corrupt system in which public office and public resources (life-capital) are being captured and abused by private entities for private money-capital gains. I will be using as my ground of understanding Prof John McMurtry’s life-value analysis in this discussion to shed light on this global corruption that seems to have its hands working behind the scenes invisible to the majority of us.
Over the past two decades of my study of and my practice in medicine, I have always been perplexed by the disconnect between the principle and the application of the proverb, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Given the meteoric rise of non-communicable physical, mental and social diseases and the cost of their treatment and their burden to society, I would have guessed that policy makers would have made health promotion and disease prevention a top priority, and resources locally, regionally and internationally would have been invested in elucidating the determinants of health promotion and disease prevention and implementing the wisdom of that enlightenment.
Truth be told, much has been discovered over the past decade on adverse childhood experiences and the long-lasting effects on physical, mental and social diseases. Also Sir Michael Marmot and his collaborators have investigated the social determinants of health and have shown unequivocally that social gradients of inequality in terms of access to the basic means of life growth and development does in fact affect life expectancies and disability-adjusted-life-years. Given this trove of empirical data to guide our policy and decision makers, one would have thought that major steps would have been taken at the local, regional and international levels to remedy the social deficiencies in our homes, our schools and workplace environments. This would then serve to minimize adverse childhood experiences, (in addition to the adverse experiences of the adolescents, adults and the elderly) and would also serve to optimize the social, economic and political environments to produce enabling policies that would inform and encourage healthier lifestyles and behaviours. Read More
“Natural capital’ is an understandable attempt to put a value on our living planet and all the services it provides for us, writes John McMurtry. But it fails by measuring nature in dollars and cents. We need to develop a new concept of ‘life capital’ that must be preserved from exploitation and degradation no matter… Read More
What I hope to do in this article is to use what insights I have gained so far from my expertise as a medical specialist in terms of diagnosing and the treatment of diseases and see how far I can go in applying Professor John McMurtry’s life-value compass to the insights I have discovered along the way. I will draw heavily on my article, The Secret to a Healthy Nation – in-depth article based on presentation given at Operation Rescue’s fundraiser on October 3, 2015, and the critique of it by Prof McMurtry in The Secret to the Ill-Health of Nations.
The secretive jurisdictions of international financial centers which claim to be essential for capital growth and development, like state communism, is going to be the downfall of corporate crony capitalism, as both support conformity and rigidity of ideas in a top-down hierarchical pattern as “efficiently” as possible. This is done without challenge from outside; hence the stifling of genuine innovation and genuine resilience and ability to adapt to new knowledge of our destructive potentials in all of life’s spheres of influence and concerns, hence producing the persistent lack of truth and reconciliation and healing of all of the maladies of humanity and the planet. If this is not a form of globalised supranational “communism” now on steroids, where there is pervasive reverse projection, where the meanings of our labels have been tranmorgrified and no longer mean what they are supposed to mean any more, then I don’t know what is!
For example, do we really still have a “free market” and “democracy” anymore? Aren’t these ideals now usurped by the diktats of the financial-military-corporate media-digital collusive complex which now reign supreme where we have concentration of wealth and power at the top? When The Establishment preaches freedom of choice, freedom of mobility and freedom of privacy, are they talking about freedom for entitlement of theirs at the top, while relegating those of us at the bottom to a form of mental, social and debt slavery? Where is the genuine democracy and freedom in that? Should we not have by now an intelligent system that matches unused life resources to unmet life needs by the supply and demand principles of the free market? What about the genuine ability of the electorate to chose a leader of their choice without the rules of engagement being gerrimandered to maintain the power structure in the first place? Where is the economic and political justice in all of this? Again I stand by my claim that the only difference between state communism and corporate croney capitalism is not one of kind, but one of degree and scale, and the reverse projections that the latter creates to block out the obvious consequences of our life destructive and human indignifying machinations.
What we need to do now is heal the wounds of this life-destructive operating system at all levels, and rebase our global reserve money system on life-capital sequencing. This would help us to transition from a system where self-preservation based on petrodollar recycling supremacy or national security trumps (pardon the pun) life-capital recycling or global security. All of our trade deals and wealth management exercises and rules of engagement can now be rebased and re-coupled on building mutual understanding, mutual respect and mutual caring for all life capital – past, present and future. This would then assist us in moving from a petrodollar recycling dictatorship and catalyse the creation of a more democratic, or better yet, a meritocratic world, where the global insecurity of the world no longer exists, and the raison d’être for 1) wars, be it on drugs, cancer, obesity, and terrorism, and 2) inequality-creating wealth management strategies need never rear their ugly heads again.
If you have been following the recent posts closely, you would have noticed that much effort has been made to show that our life-blind prescriptions have been singularly responsible for most of the political and economic debacles in terms of their mismanagement of our “household” in their respective spheres of influence. Professor John McMurtry’s book ‘The Cancer Stage of Capitalism:… Read More
I deal with suffering, dying and death almost on a daily basis. On my ward rounds with my students at the hospital, I always think to myself or ask my students if the suffering or premature death of this or that particular patient could have been prevented. I have alcoholics being re-admitted over and over again… Read More
“The Lord’s Prayer is Christianity’s greatest prayer. It is also Christianity’s strangest prayer. It is prayed by all Christians, but it never mentions Christ. It is prayed in all churches, but it never mentions church. It is prayed on all Sundays, but it never mentions Sunday. It is called the “Lord’s Prayer,” but it never… Read More
Source: Holt-LunstadJ, Smith TB, Layton JB (2010) Social Relationships and Mortality Risk: A Meta-analytic Review. PLOS Medicine 7(7): e1000316.
https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1000316
