"Socialism"

Benevolent redistribution of wealth to benefit the relatively powerless and disfranchised in societies is obviously a very difficult and constant work in progress. It's especially difficult because many of the really powerful and wealthy want the redistribution of wealth and power to continue in their direction--as easy-to-generate "funny money" which can be used to exploit Nature and poor humans, and used to stoke the fires of "new" growth from Natural Capital, ... and do it on the backs of poor Human Capital (disfranchised and relatively powerless).

Barack Obama and a Democratic Congress after this 2008 election could be a great step toward curbing rampant conversion of sustainable Natural Capital to inappropriate Built Capital (e.g., war machines/tools/infrastructure; equipment to "Drill, Baby, Drill"; a luxury wardrobe for Sarah Palin; ...) in the U.S. and the world, and toward the effective building of sustainable Social Capital and robust Cultural Capital.

(See www.ncrcrd.iastate.edu/pubs/presentations/flora/pres.html for some great and truly positive presentations by Dr. Cornelia Butler Flora, Director, North Central Regional Center for Rural Development, Iowa State University.)