Month: September 2008

Uncategorized

One’s-self/En-masse

September 9, 2008 Shawn P. Wilbur
“One’s-self I Sing,” by Walt Whitman ONE’S-SELF I sing—a simple, separate Person;Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-masse. Of Physiology from top to toe I sing;Not physiognomy alone, nor brain alone, is worthy for the muse—I say theForm complete is worthier far;The Female equally with the male I sing. Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power,Cheerful—for freest action form’d, under the laws divine,The Modern Man I sing.
Uncategorized

Time to free ALL the political prisoners

September 7, 2008 Shawn P. Wilbur
{Immoderate thoughts on the eve of my return to the corporate retail world. . .} Denver and the Twin Cities taught us very little we didn’t already know, I suspect, but the experiences, even for those of us who only experienced them vicariously, ought to have drawn in some big, fat exclamation points and underlines on what we already knew, but had imperfectly internalized. We can predict at this moment that the next round will be moreso, in almost every way. No matter who wins the elections, there is little chance that the climate of intolerance of dissent will change, […]
equitable commerce

Sidney H. Morse’s alternate history of equitable commerce

September 5, 2008 Shawn P. Wilbur
Tucked away in the pages of Liberty, Sidney H. Morse, Josiah Warren’s literary executor, contributed an odd item, a kind of “what-if” history of Robert Owen’s New Harmony, as if, at the critical moment, Josiah Warren’s equitable commerce had been the model for continuing on after the failure of the original project. The story, Liberty and Wealth, may be the very best introduction I know of to Warren’s thought as filtered through another individuality. There is a difficulty in dealing with Warren’s writings, since he insisted that, in practice, equitable commerce must be based in a complete individualization of interests […]