I read Hobsbawm's Book "The Age of Revolution" when researching for my book. It was very good and comprehensive. There he was called E.J. Hobsbawm; I didn't know he was an Eric. Good name! :-)
As usual, his observations are very astute.
Responding to the question Tristan asked, and to what the thread is about:
It may turn out the 9-11 was the catalyst. I had predicted based on my study of cycles and astrology that the USA would be involved in war in the late Summer of 2001, and a few months before I had gone so far as to state in an email to a colleague that the USA would be attacked. So I knew what was coming. I thought however that this would be a passing event and we would resume our 3T ways, which I hoped would also feature the continued rise, creative development and artful expression of the new spiritual culture in the new age, which had dawned in the Awakening. Unfortunately the powers-that-be had succeeded in the 1990s in putting our attention on nonsense, and so a lot of the potential of the times was dissipated. Now after 9-11, our creative energy has become stifled by our fears and even more conventional preoccupations. A long period until the "regeneracy" seems more likely now.
It is still possible if Bush is decisively defeated in the Fall of 2004 that a more creative period could begin for a few years, if the new leadership can get us out of the messes that Bush has created. This seems unlikely now. I did not predict that the war of 2001 would be the start of an unending period of imperialism and phoney patriotism with consequent eroding of democracy. But now that this is happening, it will take a near miracle now to reverse course this decade, considering the enormous costs that Bush policies have put upon us, in their deliberate actions to make any constructive activity impossible in America and to bankrupt the country.
Everyone should be clear though, that "terrorism," while it may function as a sort of ironic catalyst, is NOT the crisis we face. The crisis is the policies of the Bush adminstration itself. And they in turn are just the exaggeration of the policies already put in place by the Demoplicans the last 22 years-- to make America into a world-dominating empire, to end our social safety net and curtail all attempts to end poverty and inequality, to assault our environment and deplete our financial resources, to allow and promote unprecedented concentration of corporate power using slogans of "freedom," etc. Reagan started us on the road to this impending crisis, and Bush, Clinton, Gingrich et al merely led us further down the path. Now in the wake of 9-11 baby Bush is taking them into even worse and distorted directions even Reagan and Bush Sr. would not have contemplated, such as using imperial aggression as an excuse to destroy the civil liberties that make America at all worth defending.
If 9-11 is remembered as the catalyst, it will be because it sent these horrible policies into even higher gear, accelerating the arrival of the real crisis. A "regeneracy" will not appear until the real crisis is felt beyond denial; followed by a resolve to deal with this crisis. We can't be certain at this point, in fact, whether when the real crisis arrives, involving environmental and economic collapse and the possible end of democracy, that a constructive response will be made. Even further reaction and descent into fascism could happen instead, which will in turn only exacerbate and extend the problems of the real crisis. Recovery from these trends, if fascism comes, might not happen until the 2020s. The term "regeneracy" then will take on an ironic meaning, whether applied to circa 2005, or circa 2010-- as I predicted the real crisis and 4T would hit.
Originally Posted by Tristan Jones
