Philosophy etc.

There seems to be an overblown assumption and value ascribed to social/economic worth of"middle-class" income "citizens". The now antiquated model of believing that late-modern industrialized (yet still imperialist) nations can positively i nfluence the overall economic dimensions of their respective societies by merely stimulating the financial status of one group is wrongheaded. Albeit the so-called US middle class is an amorphous group with wide-ranging constituents, it is quite limiting to overlook the ethical and social value of stimulating the economic growth of "POOR and WORKING POOR" folks. The pressures of poverty ripple throughout society in such a way that there is always a catholic effect that undermines the progress of the "middle-class" along with the (working)poor. Detroit is a primary example. Because it was assumed that the poor and impoverished communities of Detroit could be left to their own devices without "their wretche...

I have been troubled by the term/concept "center" for a while. Positions, much as time, are extremely relative, and I have wondered where one begins in order to claim a "center". Some cultures used to assume heliocentric and geocentric views of the heavens, and maintained the attendant views that the sun or the earth respectively, were the "centers". Scientific research and its outcomes disabused us both of these parochialism. We now accept that we live in a position in an ever expanding multiverse among legions of others. Considering the ambiguity of claims of political "centrality", one of the many reasons some citizens have decided to refer to themselves as progressives or, as I have, radicals is that they abhor this new "norm". Although, one may make similar assertions of the relative nature of both the latter terms, I think the pejorative political affiliations with these two terms are not fully developed and escape most of the dis...