(00:00:00) I've had a very busy and happy day and Duluth meeting with various groups and and speaking on different aspects of the enormous changes that are taking place just today in this past week in this past month throughout the world the changes in our judgment our profound they're real they're deep-seated and they constitute altogether and enormous challenge to the United States and to US policy making clearly we're at the end of the Cold War everybody from left to right up and down agrees on that. The Cold War is Over the tearing down and parcel tearing down of the of the wall signifies and symbolizes the end of the Cold War however, as been alluded to the baggage of the Cold War is still with us. We still have a 300 billion dollar-a-year defense budget. We still have forces spread throughout the world, especially in North Asia and in Europe, we have policies in place which are predicated on a confrontation with a great power of the Soviet Union. And so there is much to be changed even though the impetus in the stimulus for the policies is gone. We still have to do the changing and the transformation to enter into the post-cold war period I think there are a number of challenges which are already existent and have been existing for at least a decade and perhaps two decades that have now coming to the fore and they're they're coming to the fore with such a rush and such obvious energy and an implication that we Americans and US policymakers must deal with these changes and deal with these implications immediately. We can't postpone it. We can't stay with the status quo. I would outline six of them to you most of them are familiar to you and then I like to get into a couple of them in some detail the first and most obvious is the change within Europe the emergence of Europe 1992 the tremendous Resurgence of the West German economy in particular. The common market countries exerting a dynamic drawn the peoples of Eastern Europe and on the economies of east Europe and we will be hard-pressed to determine what is going on there. And then to make policy changes that will position the United States to have a positive influence in that area. So that's really the number one problem. I'll come back to that in like fashion in the north Asian area the enormous success of the Japanese economy has created a regional power and a world power. That is now number one in many many categories including surplus of capital and as you know historically the nation with the largest surplus of capital, it has become the leading nation in the world Japan for many reasons doesn't want to accept that description is hanging back asserting itself. but I don't believe that that will continue so how Japan behaves in the Pacific area with China with the Soviet Union with the Lesser Asian countries will be a major issue now that the Cold War is Over thirdly and related to the Japanese issue is the development of the third world or the developing countries many parts of the world having negative gross national product increases that is to say that countries are failing and the decline is set in throughout Africa parts of Latin America and parts of Asia And what Japan does about it now that it is the Surplus Nation what Europe does about it to they have surpluses as well and trade and capital is going to be a big question in the next decade fourth. There are Regional Powers growing to the position of superpower. They are super powers or near superpowers because of the strength of their economies and because they're acquiring military capability nuclear capability high-tech conventional military capability that threatens their neighbors. We can list them off Brazil Israel South Africa Iran Iraq in the Pakistan these are nations which are achieving strength both economically and militarily can measure to where we were ourselves perhaps 20 or 30 years ago how those individual cases are handled will require a lot of Ingenuity and diplomacy by everybody. Then the obvious problems of the environment which is the fifth area that will come to the fore now that the Cold War confrontation is over and finally and most importantly the question of what kind of a society we are as Americans as the United States. What kind of a country are we going to create for ourselves or recreate for ourselves, you know, as long as we had the Cold War it was pretty easy to Define ourselves. But what by what we were not we're not those guys we were not that repressive stalinist Society. We were not a centrally planned Nation. We were Americans but we always defined ourselves perhaps subconsciously sometimes consciously as by in terms of but by what we were not rather than but what by terms of who we really were and I think now that the pressure of the Cold War confrontation is over. It's going to become more poignant for us more difficult. We're going to To start thinking a little bit more consciously about who we are what our responsibilities are to our fellow man in the United States. And then what our responsibilities are as a nation now in considering these six areas, I think there are three general principles that we really want to keep in the Forefront of our mind as we analyze each of the problems and as we come up with Solutions the first principle is that obvious but not so obvious a few years ago that economic social and political arrangements and relationships are the determining factor in deciding and nation's security and not military. The second one is that in the solution of problems, whether they be domestic or International the solution has to be inclusive. It can't be at the expense of others that's again easy to say, but if you look back over the history of the last 10 or 20 years both in this country and in our Ships with other countries we have often times go on the path of exploitation. We have often gone the path of saying well what's good for us is good for us and it will somehow or another the eventually good for third world countries, if we grow rapidly if we build up our industrial plant if we have a large car industry somehow or another this is going to be good for third world countries not necessarily. So again in this country, we have followed a path of Taxation policies and financial policies and regulation policies, which essentially says if the upper classes and the and the business classes and the well-off do better and better if there are more and more rewarded somehow or another this is going to read on to the favor of poor people other people that somehow the investment that's generated the growth that generated will trickle down and eventually help other people. I I think those policies are viable any longer. I think in order for us to deal with these six major areas. We're going to have to have a more inclusive way of dealing with our society and with other societies and the third principle it seems to me is its go sort of follows. The second is that the solutions are going to have to be not Solutions imposed by anyone power. They're going to have to be multi to not multilateral multinational that is to say we're going to have to think not in terms of negotiations with another country, but try to think of larger units of negotiation. Well, let's be a little more specific about the two areas that I think we should concentrate on tonight first the European situation and secondly our own situation at home. in Europe, there are many people who would like to see the status quo preserved, you know was the caricature when Lawrence eagleburger at the state department said Gee, you know, the Cold War was pretty good because things were so stable and predictable and we could depend on the confrontation with the Soviet Union and that was a Nostalgia that I think he was unfairly criticized for I think he was simply ruminating but it was an insight into the official mind and I think there are many people today some some people of Good Will who would like to see East Germany improve and strengthen itself the two blocks NATO and Warsaw demilitarize but leave behind this kind of split in Europe between East and West in order to keep the to Germany's apart to reduce the dynamic nature of the German society and to keep a kind of balance in Europe that The status quo and I don't believe there's a chance that that will be that will succeed. But by and large if you talk to policy makers today, I think that's what they would prefer their preferred scenario. I don't think it's going to happen. And the reason is because in Europe, there's such Dynamic and such fast changing pressure is taking place that it's just not going to be possible for that to happen. Most particularly East Germany is really over the two countries are going to unite whether it's through a confederation or whether it's through actual unit reunification. The economies are going to get closer and closer together in the societies will get closer to closer together. Then what can happen. Well, there are two scenarios in which the solutions are really worked out on the continent of Europe (00:10:33) and and and the Soviet Union say from urals to the Atlantic (00:10:38) Ocean one scenario. Is that the Western economies? Especially West Germany will be so powerful. And so (00:10:45) is (00:10:46) that they will pull into their orbit East Germany Hungary and possibly one or two others Czechoslovakia, perhaps Poland perhaps not but in any event pull in the best of the economy's if you will from the Eastern Bloc leaving the Soviet Union with one or two of their satellite or formerly satellite nations, Romania, Bulgaria Poland and creating a split but a new kind of split with a very extremely Dynamic European Bloc and this more oriented towards Asia Soviet Union Block the problem with that is I think if that happens and there are very strong Tendencies right now that are you know, West Germany is moving very rapidly to stake out a (00:11:32) position in East Berlin in particular and in East Germany, generally, it reports of (00:11:38) West German bankers and real estate people (00:11:40) buying up land now in East Berlin the the (00:11:44) German market and It had a 3% increase in its value last week as opposed to other markets, which had a decline in the value. The German economy is hot and one of the reasons it's hot is that they are an acquisitive mood and they're acquiring already parts of East Germany. So this scenario of a very strong Germany allied with Western European nations, and the best of the Eastern Bloc isolating the Soviet Union is likely to bring on pressures in the Soviet Union (00:12:14) for a return to a more nationalistic inwardly looking and (00:12:19) perhaps, you know back to Brezhnev and that sort of politics not back to Stalin but (00:12:25) back to a more conservative politics in the Soviet (00:12:29) Union. (00:12:31) If this happens, we're we I think we have problems in like fashion. There is another tendency which is that the West Germany and might make some kinds of alliances towards the east they may see their future not being in the west with France and Belgium and Italy and England but towards the east larger markets markets that are undeveloped Market say that they can control West Germany has lots of capital (00:12:56) they can create business and industry and and demand in Eastern (00:13:01) Europe and Soviet Union. So you begin to get a Soviet Union German condominium to the exclusion of Western Nations. This also creates provis problems both of those scenarios the split taking place in different parts all taking place on the continent itself. I think have enormous potential problems. (00:13:27) It's going to be very competitive to us, and we're going to have to work. Very hard to be part of that process. We will have to bring things to the table will have to be imaginative will have to take some risk will have to have initiatives and we'll have to start now because we're being excluded very rapidly. I say this because it's in our national interest and I also say it because it's in the world's interest. I don't think you want to have the development of strong Regional powers in and the (00:13:55) absence of international organization. I think Japan is (00:13:58) obvious. I think Europe will be (00:14:00) another one in order for us to be a player. (00:14:04) We're going to have to get our own house in order. We're going to have to dramatically and with with some hard choices before us we're going to have to reorganize our own economy and our own Society. I said the other night and I say it again set it to a different audience that the United States is ready now to To experience the Democratic movements which are going on around the world to the movement for democracy is going to have to come here. It's not as if we weren't in the 18th century one of the principal developers of democracy and it's not as if we're not a democracy today we are but in many ways our Democratic traditions and our Democratic institutions have atrophied and we're going to need a renewal in order to equip ourselves to deal effectively in the world from this point on how that Democratic renewal takes place we can speculate on and talk (00:15:08) about but I'm (00:15:10) sure it's going to have to take place because what we need to do in this country is reorganize our national priorities as Michael said with the 300 billion dollar defense budget, it's just not good enough. (00:15:23) You can't have a (00:15:24) 300 billion dollar defense budget and hope to accomplish any of the investment needs that the And knows about in each of us could (00:15:32) could name whether it's housing (00:15:35) revitalizing our technological base training our Workforce repairing our cities the infrastructure needs of the countryside. You name it fighting AIDS fighting drugs fighting crime on and on and on the list is long and it requires a Teddy on any level enormous amounts of capital resources and intelligence brain power and we're going to have to devote that kind of energy which is going into the military budget. We're going to have to devote it to these civilian purposes and we're going to have to develop it in a way that involves Citizens We're going to have to come up with with really new forms of participation whether it's the workplace whether it's the community whether it's the congressional district, we're going to have to from the (00:16:27) bottom up (00:16:28) through the Democratic process. Begin to take control if you will of the of the major decisions that are being made in this country as to how we use our resources who benefits and for what purposes are the resources being used. This will lead to some (00:16:45) form of American (00:16:46) National planning. It won't be like the swedes and it shouldn't be like the old Soviet planning and it shouldn't be like the Japanese. It should be American. It should constitute itself in the people. There's plenty of constitutional (00:17:01) Authority for having a much more aggressive a (00:17:04) citizen activity in determining what our national goals are and how we use our resources the First Amendment calls for the right of the people to petition the (00:17:13) government to me. That's the instrument. I would use to build some kind of (00:17:18) system which engages people in legitimate and and real decision making about how we use our (00:17:26) national resources and by national resources. I not (00:17:29) only mean tax money. I mean our capital structure. (00:17:32) I mean how we use our air and our land and how we treat our labor and how we deal with each other as human beings (00:17:40) because ultimately if we don't behave as I said in the listing the principles if we don't behave in a way that includes people both inside this country and in the whole globe, then we are doomed it seems to me for continued confrontation in different manners if we if we look at Europe and say well let the West Germans do it. They'll figure it out with or without the Soviet Union. We're simply going to recreate a regional monster that we history tells us has been there for a hundred years. If we don't do the same thing in the north Asia, if we don't try to get some kind of accommodation between ourselves the Soviet Union the Japanese Chinese if we don't withdraw our troops and forces from there and use that money for positive economic and social development, we're going to let that area be dominated by Japan and To me that's just asking for the same problem all over again. And if in this country we simply let our Rich get richer and the middle class stagnate and decline if we let the poor sink into poverty and perverse Behavior with drugs and crime in the like we were simply asking for some kind of awful confrontation down the line. So we're going to have to think Anew we're going to have to think together as a people. We're going to have to create new forms. We're going to have to demand a new set of priorities for this country. We're going to have to be act very politically we're going to have to demand things of political leaders and create our own political leaders. And if we do we have a chance it seems to me to move into the next Century as a player in the world as a player here at home being being a nation that has something to say for itself that defines itself in its own terms that can act as a model and that can participate with other nations including Creating a peaceful and environmentally sound economically growing and socially just world. (00:19:38) Thank you very much. I'll tell you what, but I've laid out a broad panoply of issues and a strategy (00:19:55) for for dealing with with the (00:19:57) change that were undergoing (00:19:59) and the effect of the Democracy movement in the world and and it's a strategy of that. I hope some political leaders will follow but there are a lot of (00:20:10) questions on how to get there and I'm sure somebody's got some questions about it. Not even one. Oh, yeah a lot. Sure. Yes right (00:20:21) here. (00:20:32) Question is are there any political leaders that one can identify (00:20:36) that would talk this way I guess. I think in the in the last election the the person who came closest with Jesse Jackson, I think I don't really want to get into the pros and cons of Jesse Jackson as a person or as a candidate but his substance what he talked about was was really reasonably close to this. He I have two problems with him on the substance one. He compromised the soon as he began to think he was going to be president. He began to talk about a restraining the military budget rather than cutting it and the second problem I have with Jackson is on the substance is that I don't I don't believe that he gave sufficient due to the problems of the emergence of Japan and Germany has great Powers. I think he simply overlooked that whether he did it by choice or just his knowledge of it. I just don't think you can (00:21:43) And (00:21:44) ignore the tremendous strength of these two great Powers. They are now the leading powers on the face of the Earth in terms of productivity investment standard of living and surplus capital and Jackson didn't really talk about that. So that said I think Jackson the last time around was the only one who had came close nowadays Jackson doesn't speak too much to these issues. He's got his hands full and deciding what to do about Washington DC. I know there isn't anybody in the Congress or in the in the white house or in the state houses that speak this way and there are very few citizen leaders who talk that way Bill coffin being a notable exception and a wonderful exception, but I think it's going to have to come from people. I think I think it's going to have to come from groups like yourselves either formally or not informally simply in one way or another demanding. This agenda or some version thereof be the agenda of the United States. I mean you take any subject environment. There's a whole list of things that can be done on admissions on fuel efficiency. The swedes have a hundred miles to the gallon car. You know, that's the way to solve the air pollution in the global warming problem. There are things that are already existent that we know about that. I think if citizens somehow or another demanded of their politicians some politician will come along and say hey there's obviously a big Market out here for this kind of thinking I guess. I'll be the standard Bearer or I'll think I'll be a leader about it. The leaders will catch up with the people surely there is evidence in the polls lots of evidence. We took a poll others have taken polls that show the people want change that they are prepared for it that they know the nature of the change that they want. They know where they want the money to be put they want to have a say in it. They want to be involved. They want to be thinking about They're going in a common Direction. The polls are poignant reading when you read them and I think it's going to come from local leaders when I said leaders, I meant local leaders as well as the obvious National ones. I think to get little closer to your point your (00:24:01) question. (00:24:02) We're at the beginning now of a presidential cycle, you know, we've been through the first year of the four-year cycle and that means now that boom the bell rings and all the candidates start 492 and you'll see them especially in Iowa. They were already seen in there but I think my strategy is to encourage people that when the candidate comes into town, you know here comes Bill Bradley into Iowa he wants to you know, tell everybody what he thinks. I think the first thing is to say senator. We're delighted you're here. Let us tell you what we think should happen. And and confront the candidates as they cross the state border saying delighted you're in Minnesota. Here's what we minnesotans are at least this group of minnesotans think about things and what this and and I bet you they'll be you'll find that the candidates will be surprised to be confronted. They'll be knocked off their pins a little bit and I think you may see you may be able to change politics that way, you know, I was listening to public radio coming across the plains of Iowa, I guess from Ames. I forget where I was last couple of days. But any event if there was a talk show about the Congressional pay raise. And I was amazed how how really emotional the callers in were about the pay raise and person after person would say it's not like they shouldn't have enough money to live on but what in the world do they do and they're not responsive to us and they're not doing the job and all those things. So there is a mood in the public. I think that says that these incumbents in Washington are not in touch with their constituencies with perhaps some exceptions and that they're not doing the job. The problem is that the system as you all well know is such now that once you get elected with the PAC money with the money that you get from a trade associations lobbyists, you can build up a war chest of hundreds of thousands of dollars within months weeks so that when the next time comes around On your incumbency is protected Senators who get elected D'Amato and New York has seven million dollars in the bank is election is three years away. It's a it's an enormous enormous money game that that we can't even imagine. I told the story today that at sitting at a table in Washington with three or four nice guys who were members of the house and one guy said casually to the other say are you packed (00:26:52) out? (00:26:54) They've developed their only lingo about getting this money. Are you packed out which meant have you reached your limit on the money that you can get for speaking engagements and so forth. So I'm very pessimistic that you can turn people out of office on the Congressional house level Senators, possibly because it's a more exposed seat and the power of citizens can be more directly affected the higher you go. The more chance you have of affecting change presidential level is I think where change can happen and we're citizen groups can really affect can affect that. The money is fairly more or less equal between the two the primary process at least allows you to to affect a candidate in a much more direct way and the presidential candidate must respond to these kinds of issues. I am very pessimistic at the House of Representatives level slightly less pessimistic at the Senate. Our level and I think the attention should be paid to the presidential level Les aspin, the chairman of the house subcommittee on armed services had a really miserable quote in yesterday's paper you said well, he said we've seen the end of the deficit driven defense budgets, which is the last three or four years and next year. We will see a Gorbachev driven defense budget. This is the chairman Democratic chairman of the armed services (00:28:25) committee. (00:28:27) He is in effect surrendering his own intelligence and his own responsibility by saying well the deficit problem restrain the budget over the last four or five years and maybe next year because of Gorbachev. We'll have to cut it in some way. This is really pathetic. This is not leadership in any way and of course the Republicans are just as bad as Aspen. So I don't expect terribly much from the house or the senate or the administration in this regard. You have a huge budget with huge commitments with underpin with strategies which are outdated and I don't see any major change in the nature of that budget until there is a change in administration a change in political Outlook in the white house. It will have to be comparable it can happen. I mean look where we were at the end of the first two years of the Carter Administration. The defense budget was really restrained Carter was talking about minimal deterrent he was talking about withdrawing troops from Europe and North Asia and then the committee and the present danger absolutely beat him up around the ears and he reversed field and began to be the bill the budget up and when Reagan came in he just made it soar out of sight. So that it is possible with a change in political atmosphere and mind you the committee and present danger is about 50 people very powerful people, but about 50 people and they really turned around the entire United States Congress and the administration and the US public on the issue of military spending. So it was more than 50 people here in the room, but it is possible to change but it isn't going to be changed by the present people in Washington. They're going to cut back on SDI a little bit. They're going to maybe you know string out the B1 bombers and and the stealth and the and the D5 and the all those instruments they will bring back maybe twenty or thirty thousand troops from Europe. They'll wait for the negotiations and you know, the negotiations may bring in time more substantial reductions, but for initiatives for taking a fresh look at what our real defense needs are. It won't happen in the present (00:30:56) circumstances. Well, (00:31:02) your question was who's making trade policy and as at this point, it's the administration and it's a its attempt to be free trade which sounds good, but the problem with free trade is that in my judgment and this is a general answer and subject to lots of footnotes caveats, but we have seen the development of international economy. We've always had one but we've seen it in a pronounced fashion since World War 2 with the technology and quick trading Communications. We see that you can move money around the world like the velocity is something like 25 times the productive value gets moved around financially every day, which is an enormous exchange of financial instruments. And we see that the development of it of an international population people who may live in the United States but to do business in Europe and Japan and have their allegiance to a newly developed International Economy sort of a zone right around the temperate areas of the world. Now these people by and large some of them are very nice people these people very large by and large are concerned with making profit and doing business in this Zone. They're not concerned about the health of the United States economy. They're not concerned about whether people have jobs and so forth and so on they're concerned about doing business in this Zone in like fashion. They're not concerned about the poor poor nations of Africa or Asia or Latin America, they don't do business. Maybe they do a little raw material business with them, but they're not part of this trading and finance Zone that's around the world. This is a development the integration of the world economy. not the global economy but the world economy this is a development which is very very dangerous and we are seeing what's happened here is in the United States we're losing any sense of national solidarity we're not we don't care so much about what happens in the country because you know we're doing business in different ways so free trade is really a way of saying how you can facilitate American corporations are American Nationals to do business with other National companies and multinational companies that have their own their own their own goals and their own rewards that are not necessarily for the benefit of a particular Nation or for the globe as a whole so trade policy is which gets you to labor policy which gets you to Environmental Policy is one in which we're going to have to A new way third way, we cannot be isolationist. We cannot be protectionist. We cannot be economic nationalist nor can we simply say well, we're in a national we were part of this Zone because that zone is excluding for people under develop people. It is exploiting in many cases poor people in underdeveloped people have to come up with a third way. We're going to have to develop kinds of post Bretton Wood organizations post IMF organizations post World Bank organizations that can factor in environmental standards proper growth social justice labor rates and trade and finance. This is a huge job. I recommend to you a marvelous (00:34:33) essay. Which (00:34:36) is in three parts that we published by Walter Russell Mead if you're interested in the subject called the United States and the world economy. It's available in reprint form. It was originally published in the journal and if anyone would like a copy of this or for that matter (00:34:54) a copy of the world Policy Journal (00:34:58) Or the copy of American priorities in a new world era which was a special project. We did last spring to talk about this switch and National priorities. If you just write down on a little piece of (00:35:10) paper, whether (00:35:12) it's the journal or the American priorities or the international economy essay and your name and address will be paper for one or all three. I'll send them to you when I get back to New York and in the hopes that you will subscribe to the journal. Another question good audience fun. Yes, sir. Yes. Yes. We yeah, the question is who is concerned about this issue of the the international economy that goes around the northern temperate zone and its lack of attention or its disregard or even exploitation of poor Nations poor countries Poor People's is there any organization such as International agencies at the UN specialized agencies that have concern for this the the the agencies at the UN that deal with development or excuse me? Our Mighty aware of this problem do very good studies the UN for whatever one thinks about its abilities to deal with governance questions in the world is an excellent place for research and for analysis and statistics. They are probably only placed and and they do worry a great deal about it. The problem of course comes Is that the as long as major Nations do not themselves pay attention to it? It doesn't get front and center. That's the great thing frankly about Gorbachev speeches is that he is his point of view is consistent with a concern for other nations. He has objective conditions in the Soviet Union which are going to prevent him from exercising that point of view for many many years. They have all they can do to renovate their own economy. Let alone help anybody else but his point of view is a good one. And if he speaks out continue to speak out this way. It does put pressure on other leaders Japan in particular, which is a surplus nation and West Germany, but ourselves as well. The overseas Development Council in Washington is another excellent group that works on the subject (00:37:30) area. Can't see too. Well with the light here. (00:37:35) Yes, right in the middle. The question is do they do that to save the economy or help the economy that is certainly a major element in their behavior. The is known to everybody in the room that the military industrial complex which was President Eisenhower's phrase is is extremely powerful. They have defense contracts and nearly every congressional district and the pressures to keep that money flowing from Washington. It's our national planning instrument the Pentagon and it is not only in the fact that they spend 300 billion dollars of federal money, but they are planning the Industrial Development or parts of the Industrial Development of the United States. DARPA is the only Federal planning agency. It's a defense planning agency and that's crazy. It's not accountable. It's as goals which are not the same as the societies and Congress goes On with it. Japan's military budget is just over 1% Now. They they are one of the reasons that they're doing. So well is that they have over the last 25 years devoted their brainpower their resources their managerial skills to you know, all the things we drive and listen to so they they have reaped the rewards of making products and that are useful to people no Japan is stayed out of by and large the military development business. Although there are signs that they want to get into it. Now, they want to develop their own fighter plane and that sort of stuff Iowa has something called the Iowa business for peace and it's men and women representing about a hundred and fifty companies and their their big deal. It's not little businesses big big stuff and they took it upon themselves to say that the that this was a subject Security in general was subject. It was too. It just to be left for the people in Washington and they were going to educate themselves and then make their views known to whoever would want to listen to them. Of course because they're so big in their community. So influential they've had a lot of influence. I don't know whether in Minnesota. There is such a group. There's a Benz group of business Executives for National Security, but quite frankly Ben's for all the good things. It does in worrying about procurement and Corruption it often seems that bends is simply trying to make the Pentagon more efficient and more and more cost-effective, which is Noble Enterprise, but it's not the same thing as looking at missions and strategies and we're using the money for do you really need the money which is what the Iowa group is is concentrating on. I don't know if there is another Minnesota group apparently not (00:40:22) One here good (00:40:26) and then one back there somewhere, okay. Well, as a question is I had earlier today talked in another place about developing a decentralized democratic planning process in the United States. You know, that's small (00:40:47) project (00:40:51) and I've and the question is is it realistic and is it realistic in a society in which you don't have expertise at every level or even literate right? I want to First say that I think there is plenty of reason to think that It is not only a necessary development in the United States, but it is a probable development that there will be some kind in the next 10 years some kind of an effort (00:41:28) from (00:41:30) coming from below probably but perhaps the system from the elites as well to to have a more participatory democracy. I I'm going to get a book by Professor doll at Yale. Excuse me who talks about the third Democratic Revolution on the first one was the Athenian democracy and the second one was the 18th century democracies of which we were part and now he says it's time for another wave of democratic. (00:42:07) Development (00:42:08) that will manifest itself in some ways now, that's the sort of theoretical abstract historical basis for thinking that what we're seeing around the world in this quest for democracy and freedom is not going to be just confined to societies that we have associated with repression. I think it's going to spread any you can look at the rise of green parties in Europe as another example of people wanting a local sense of participation. So I think it's going to come I don't know quite what form it will take. I think as I say, I think it's perfectly constitutional. It's in the right to petition the tough question you ask is how can you do it when we have a society of of well in New York City fifty percent of the kids who graduate are illiterate from high school 50% of the ones that (00:43:02) graduate (00:43:04) and you know the dropout rate is about 60% New York city, so, you know you talking about a very few people coming out of New York City school system that can really read or write beyond the eighth grade level. So it's a good question. I'm a real Democrat. I don't think people have to be expert I think people use common sense. I think complicated questions can be put in simple ways and in clear ways that don't require phds shouldn't say that in the college necessarily, but but I believe it's so and I think that if if the if the questions posed are pertinent to the lives of people, I don't really know that the level of formal education or even the letter of literacy if I'm understanding your question correctly is really in the end Jermaine, they'll always be somebody who can read the instruction book and then then from then on its more common. Cents more a matter of desire and and the end more men of democracy. (00:44:12) You know, it's one vote one (00:44:14) person whether the person's illiterate or not or homeless or not. last question in the rear gentleman in the rear Yeah, the question is, you know, the 60s things looked as though they were going to develop into some sort of new pattern new revolutionary pattern and then that sort of faded away and now you have a objective situation is probably worse for a lot of people and yet you have this sort of seemingly calm on the surface and not terribly much motivation to change things. I think probably get into trouble here, but I think probably and I was marching all that I think probably the 60s turmoil and marching was probably more of a of an elite function than we think maybe history will tell us better that is to say the people who marched in the Civil Rights movements and went South and then Free Speech earlier then if any War probably were an educated Fairly narrow slice of the population not to say there wasn't terrific and it was right that had happened and there was right for people to be more expected that there would be some follow through and something would happen as a result now, I think people are quieter, but I think they're feeling much worse. I think the decline in standard of living since the since the 70s has been has been dramatic the statistics are that between 46 and 73 the average family income went from 14,000 to 28,000 doubled to the mid-70s. And then from the mid-70s to today it is the average family income is stagnant so leveled off about 26,000 and it's just those slips and goes up a little bit slips again and hidden in that average figure is the fact that the top five percent or 20 percent top quintile. I'll in the top 5% dramatically. So have soared income averages have gone up dramatically and in the bottom 25% has been a dramatic drop and in terms of numbers more people are dropping than by far than are gaining and most people are wallowing and just doing a little bit better a little bit worse than each year and that I think that feeling of I'm not getting anywhere the future is not going to be good. My kids are not going to do as well as I did or my grandparents did relatively speaking in terms of how they feel vis-à-vis the Rich and Famous and all the stuff that's pervade on the media. I think that that is a deeper feeling than in the 60s. I think it's more underlying. I think it's more capable of being organized in a or triggered in a in a determining way as opposed to the 60s. I was delighted when the 60s came along I was happy that I could do the things that I'm sure all of us did and one. Another but I always had the feeling that we were a small group that the mass of the society was saying who are those crazies with the long hair and all that and now I think this is a much more generalized feeling in the population for the poll data certainly shows that that people are not expecting about the future. They're terribly concerned about the future. They want change and it's going to be a more dramatic and it's going to happen in a way that I can't predict but I think is going to happen in the (00:48:02) 1990s. I hope so. (00:48:05) Thanks very much.