David Korten: "Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth"

As President Barack Obama reveals more details of his $825 billion economic stimulus plan, we turn to David Korten of YES! Magazine. In his new book, Korten argues that the nation faces a monumental economic challenge that goes far beyond anything being discussed in Congress. He writes that now is an opportune moment to move forward an agenda to replace the failed money-serving institutions of our present economy with the institutions of a new economy dedicated to serving life. http://www.democracynow.org/

Swine flu, Bird flu 'never happened': Probe into H1N1 'false pandemic'

Swine flu is under scrutiny once again as pharmaceutical companies are being accused of hyping up a false pandemic. The Council of Europe is putting the virus on its winter agenda which is now underway. The Council of Europe's Head of Health also claims the World Health Organisation colluded with major drug companies and changed the definition of pandemic. Doctor Wolfgang Wodarg says it ensured maximum profits, but no risks, for the firms. Now, countries like Britain, France and Germany have stockpiles of vaccines lying unused, as infections spread far less than the panic surrounding it.

Jan interviews David Korten, author of "The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community." In his book he explores the question of what it means to be human. He finds that there are two paths the human race can choose: to continue our current practices of environmental degradation and increasing global poverty, or to bring forth a new human era grounded in the principles of the Earth Charter.

From the model of domination (and love of money) to the community of life (David Korten and Earth Charter) http://www.davidkorten.com/system/files/u4/ECMomentumConfPresentationJune09.pdf

Interview with David Korten on his new book Agenda for a New Economy by Mirian Vilela, Executive Director of Earth Charter International
http://www.davidkorten.org/

GREAT TURNING author David Korten ( http://www.thegreatturning.net/ ) explains how - if we can awaken from our collective entrancement with a false story of our past - a country successfully designed to be ruled by the wealthy few can be transformed into one really governed by We the People.

Chalmers Johnson, author of Blowback, Sorrows of Empire and Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic , talks about the similarities in the decline of the Roman and Soviet empires and the signs that the U.S. empire is exhibiting the same symptoms: overextension, corruption and the inability to reform.

Chalmers Johnson is president of the Japan Policy Research Institute, a non-profit research and public affairs organization devoted to public education concerning Japan and international relations in the Pacific. http://www.jpri.org/

Are We Rome?: Fall of an Empire, Fate of America

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5127043717385594397

Cullen Murphy editor at large, Vanity Fair

Esteemed editor and author Cullen Murphy ventures past the pundit's rhetoric to draw nuanced lessons about how we might avoid Rome's demise.

The rise and fall of ancient Rome has been on American minds from the beginning of our republic. Today we focus less on the Roman republic than on the empire that took its place. Depending on who's doing the talking, the history of Rome serves either as a triumphal call to action, or as a dire warning of imminent collapse.

Working on a canvas that extends far beyond the issue of an overstretched military, Murphy reveals a wide array of similarities between the two empires: the blinding, insular culture of our capitals; the debilitating effect of corruption; the paradoxical issue of borders; and the weakening of the body politic through various forms of privatization. Most pressingly, he argues that we most resemble Rome in the burgeoning corruption of our government and in our arrogant ignorance of the world outside: two things that are in our power to change. In lively, richly detailed historical stories based on the latest scholarship, the ancient world leaps to life and casts our own contemporary world in a provocative new light.