Empire and Uprising

I am privileged at present to have a fairly uneventful life and (for the moment) reasonable healthcare. When someone shot the CEO of a health insurance company last week, it re-ignited a conversation about healthcare in the USA. The Commonwealth Fund, not known for radical left-wing notions, summarizes our situation like this:

Health care spending, both per person and as a share of GDP, continues to be far higher in the United States than in other high-income countries. Yet the U.S. is the only country that doesn’t have universal health coverage. The U.S. has the lowest life expectancy at birth, the highest death rates for avoidable or treatable conditions, the highest maternal and infant mortality, and among the highest suicide rates.

We are also notable for ignoring signs—even in red letters, even when we sit directly in front of them. Whether or not that implies incipient anarchism, I cannot say.  

A Buddhist teacher with whom I studied in South Africa published last night a lengthy but thought-provoking essay in which she says “We stand at the crossroads between the cataclysmic death throes of empire and the emergence of a fledgling yet centuries-honed anti-colonial rising.” She is British by birth and offers a chilling vision of US leaders and Kier Starmer as exemplars of “Late-Stage Colonial-Predator-Capitalism.” She offers hope for that rising with warnings that it is unlikely to be non-violent. Worth a look if you’re searching for signs of a spiritual revolutionary movement and are a patient reader. She also offers a Zoom call focused on Gaza as critical to the changes. The Zoom is happening Saturday, free and open to people around the globe.