I Do Think We're On The Edge

Social Democracy Does Not Represent An Ideal Future; It Does Not Even Represent The Ideal Past.

If Words Fall Into Disrepair, What Will Substitute? They Are All We Have

The Second World War Had A Precipitating Effect In That It Discredited The Empires, As Well As Bankrupting Them. Not Only Could You No Longer, If You Were A Colonial Subject Of France In Africa, Look To France As A Model Of Power And Influence And Civility After What Had Happened In The War. Nor Could The French Any Longer Afford To Run Their Empire. And Nor Could The British, Although They Were Not Discredited In The Way That The French Were.

American Social Arrangements, Economic Arrangements, The Degree Of Inequality In American Life, The Relatively Small Role Played By The Government In American Public Life And So Forth, Compares To Exactly The Opposite Conditions In Most Of The European Societies.

We Have Responsibilities For Others, Not Just Across Space But Across Time. We Have Responsibilities To People Who Came Before Us. They Left Us A World Of Institutions, Ideas Or Possibilities For Which We, In Turn, Owe Them Something. One Of The Things We Owe Them Is Not To Squander Them.