>>What democracy? The two party system of the US? The preference based system of Australia? What democracy? (The list goes on) There is no and was no democracy — its all a smokescreen.

Fully agree – anything short of localised participatory involvement of the masses in politics is not democracy at all. Short of the kind of grass roots movements I’ve tried to write about and inspire people with, we don’t have democracy at all.

>May I ask what this has to do with Permaculture?

Um… having the president of the world’s largest economy bought and paid for by corporations whose extract-and-compete basis is the very enemy of the permaculture concepts of self-sufficiency and cooperative labour has absolutely everything to do with permaculture. By trivialising this as being of no interest or relevance to permaculturists only prolongs the present state of permies not getting involved to change political systems to reflect the localised needs of people and place.

By saying ‘what has this to do with permaculture?’, we’re saying – just ignore what’s happening at the highest, most systemic levels to destroy permaculture and leave these people to get on with the task of destroying people and place as quickly as possible for profit.

If the alternative to our present political state is a relocalised participatory democracy, then how does ignoring these profit- and extraction-based political events encourage people to do what needs to be done to change the system?

It doesn’t.

We need to be fully aware of what is going on. These posts remind us what we’re challenging, and remind us of the mammoth task we have before us if we’re to move this world onto a sustainable platform.

Don’t ignore it. Rather, consider and discuss how to fix it.

May I ask what this has to do with Permaculture?