I have read a few books of Chris, and used to listen to him on video in the past. I have moved away somewhat in recent months since I find him sort of vaguely repetitive. He is a radical journalist, and sounds almost like a die hard communist – not that I have any instinctive disdain about communists. I used to be left leaning for as long as I remember, but more like a social democrat than an out and out communist.

I am likely to read this book, or rather, listen to it being read to me, through this audio book. The reason is not so much that I expect to learn some great insight. I already instinctively agree, I think, to most things that the author has to say in this book.

Chris has been singularly critical of the American government, society and civilization, in many of his books, with a very penetrating and focussed point of view. However, I know that Chris, in all his wisdom, misses the point when it comes to describing the mistakes and sorrows of the American civilization.

He is more of often than not focussed only on the degeneration of the American system from within, and the complacence of its civil society.

He, however, does not appear to spend much time on the degenerative and corrosive influence that the US has exerted across the planet in the last few generations, in this age of American Empire. In this regard, Noam Chomsky has been far more aware of USA’s global negative impact, than Chris Hedges, in my view. Neither of them go far enough though – again in my view.

The reason for the current ongoing phase of planetary mass extinction and possible near future collapse of the life sustaining environment of the planet, is human endeavour. Humans have singularly been the greatest agents of death – a fact that others have realized and talked about. But if Hedges and Chomsky have come to the same conclusion – they have shied away from mentioning it.

In many ways, the American Civilization has set the tone and the music, for the rest of the world to dance to. Therefore, the later phase of the original human influenced era of planetary climate decline – the age of anthropocene, could now be termed the age of Americene, or some such – implying the culmination of the age of anthropocene where the American Civilization drives what remains of the planet – as the ultimate act of the human species – the homo sapiens sapiens.

Radical as it may appear to the non-plussed, this has been obvious for a long time to a lot of smart people. Talking about it, or writing about it – has not been that common though.

Another thing that Chris Hedges misses, is identifying the role of the immigrant, in the evil US Empire. He does not dwell much on the fact that the US in peacetime years, have killed perhaps upwards of 20 million people across the world on phoney wars including the recently coined expression – war on terror, a tactic that legitimizes toppling of democratically elected Governments that did not dance to the US tune an includes assassination of foreign heads of state with impunity.

He does not dwell on the fact that a lot of mercenaries employed by the US as their foot soldiers are actually immigrants that have not yet gotten the US passport but whose service would place citizenship on a fast track. This is more or less exactly the same tactic used by the Romans in employing mercenary killers in their vaunted Roman Legions of the past.

Also absent is the mention that the huge influx of legal immigrants, mostly highly skilled, are in essence collaborators and enablers of this evil empire, cogs in the wheel of the machinery that exploits the planet and runs it into the ground. Being recent converts, they are even less willing to criticize the hand that feeds them, and are more hypocritical  in their pretence of being liberal minded. Although both the liberals and the conservatives have been captured by the corporations, it is the so called liberals that are out and out war mongers and promoters of bombing the rest of the planet for whatever reason they could cook up. They appear in my eyes as the bigger groups of hypocrites in a hall full of hypocrites.

Making bombs and planes and exploding them in far off lands is the biggest and about the only real business in town, in the US. The rising tide of immigrants are the biggest enablers of this mechanism – a view that Chris Hedges fights shy of nailing in his books, as does Noam Chomsky. Criticizing the greatest reader block is bad for business.

Poisoning of the society is also not mentioned, I think, in that many words, but it does mention failure of the civil society. In many ways this is similar to the last phase of the Roman Empire., Then too the civil society was self engrossed, over complacent and oblivious to the world outside of their palaces.

However, Chris Hedges also misses the poisoning of the environment, the water, the air, the oceans, the land and the food, not to mention the medical system, with toxic chemicals and viruses masquerading as technological solutions to existing problems.

Then there are the issues of infiltrating, and spoiling, every institution created to safeguard the planet from being polluted by any single nation through hegemony. Most glaring of course is the United Nations and all the branches and twigs under it.

I do not think either Hedges or Chomsky is stupid, or ignorant of these facts. However, I understand that if you are writing a book for the express purpose of hoping to sell a lot of copies as a means of income, it does not pay to piss off your potential – liberal leaning – readership.

I understand these limitations, and do not hold a grudge against Chris Hedges or Noam Chomsky per se. They are good at what they do, even if they do not go far enough to satisfy me.

But I look at Donal Trump’s win, on apprehensions against immigrants on one side, and the disappearance of real industrial jobs on the other, and a sense of deep gloom, might have prompted folks that live far away from urban centres to vote for Trump. Urban centres are known to live within their own bubble, and are apt to see the world from their own coloured lenses, filtered and sanitised to fit their point of view, which is – they themselves are good citizens, it is only bad politicians and mad Trump, that makes America a bad country.

Another way of looking at it is – the deep state hated Donald Trump because he was a maverick and did not play ball the way a well groomed politician has been trained to play, irrespective of which side of the US political aisle he or she belonged to. Therefore, it was difficult for the system, to control Donald Trump and ensure business as usual policies could continue and progress. Trump posed a threat of toppling the apple-cart by merely being unpredictable and anti-establishment. The deep state would have to work on him overtime. To remodel him and make him heel. It is almost like breaking in a recalcitrant wild horse that does not want to have a saddle attached to its back, even less a rider sitting atop it and holding the reins. It is a horse that was likely to buck and and try to kick the rider in the teeth if it could.

It therefore paid, to have the media to stoke idea that Trump was the root of most of the problems. It helped to steer public opinion, much like a sheep dog steers sheep into the pen, into singularly hate Trump and pin all ills of mankind on him.

If the ends up with him getting fed up and doing something reckless so that he could be successfully impeached out of his chair- all the better. If not, perhaps he can be made to lose the next election. Either way, there was a chance that the horse would eventually learn to bite the bit and resign itself into being ridden.

While I do not like politicians in general, and have an extremely low opinion of anyone that has been a career politician, with very few exceptions, I did not dislike Trump quite that way. I found him to be a curiosity, and an indication that the America electoral system was entering a phase of uncharted territory. Unpredictable things are likely to happen in future more regularly than not.

I did not thing Chris Hedges would mention it though – since pointing him out as the cause of most of US’s problems is good for business, if your business is writing books aimed at the American readership.

So, the question remains – why do I read such books?

Well, these books places an anchor in my mind, first of all, that the world as I know it is truly coming to an end. Even the sixth mass extinction on its own will change the world into an unrecognizable place. But from all logic, it is not just the disappearance of living animal that is changing. Humans have greatly over-stayed the planetary welcome. It is time for most of us to go. And this century, like so many scientists are saying, is going not going to end on a business as usual track.

Books such as these are vague reminders of the greater gloom across the horizon. Instead of being depressed, one might consider all this philosophically, moving away from ourselves and watching it from far away and above, as a curious but inevitable flow of events that forever intertwine creation with destruction. Everyone comes for a brief period, plays out his or her role, and then disappears, leaving the stage for the next group.

Our time is coming to an end. Time to say good bye. Chris Hedges covers a small part of the evolving drama. Perhaps worth a read. These however, are my views by reading the sampler and editors notes. I might change my mind, or fine tune this opinion piece, after I read the book. I doubt though, that there would be any need for a major revision.

I have a notion of including these writings into chapters in the book “Lonely Road”.