Feedback and Critical Commentary on

"Renewing the American Experiment"
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by David C. Korten

Richard Conlin, Seattle City Council Member and Board Member of the Positive Futures Network

I think you are exactly right about the importance of the story and how it has been seized on to persuade people to go along with things that they would otherwise not embrace.  I would particularly look to the issue of what is prosperity as the key, because I think that most Americans, while they worry about some of the other thing, are fundamentally level-headed and capable of taking many things in stride as long as they feel secure in their households and communities (and I don't think most Americans see terrorism as personally threatening -- but they do see medical costs and the weird medical care system, the deterioration of the schools, etc., as personally threatening).

Therefore, I see this as the central myth to challenge, and I think that it is also the myth that ultimately embraces so many of our other values that the challenge is also unifying.  But it is relentlessly pushed, and we must have very credible counter-arguments.