Wes Clark addresses "the defining struggle of our time"

Last night Charlie Rose had General Wesley Clark on as his guest for a half hour of his PBS TV show. At one point Rose asked Clark a blunt simple question; What's the defining struggle of our time? Immediately before that they had finished talking about the Middle East and were talking about the rise of China. I wonder if Charlie Rose expected the answer he got from Wes Clark:

Charlie Rose: What's the defining struggle of our time?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I, I think the defining struggle in America right now, in America, is the question of the distribution of income and whether we're going to keep the doors of opportunity open for all Americans regardless of what their family income status is, whether there's still a chance for ordinary Americans to make it to the top, or whether the screening process starts early with admission to preschool and, you know, and which elementary school you've gone to to determine-

Charlie Rose: Yeah.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: -whether you're going to make the scores to get to Harvard, to get to Harvard Business School to end up at some elite financial institution or whatever.

Charlie Rose: The kind you consult with.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: The, the kind that I'm very familiar with.

Charlie Rose: (laughs)

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: And, you know, right now those institutions are filled with a bunch of really ordinary Americans, people who come from all across, with all kinds of family backgrounds. America is a wide open society. I hope it'll continue to be that in the future.

Charlie Rose: Mm.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think that's the immediate issue really facing this country.



Both the video and transcript of the entire interview is available at

http://securingamerica.com/node/2579

This was just a small part of a very interesting discussion.

and I've been saying something similar for quite some time. Equal education is as important, in the end, as equal access to healthcare.

I wasn't expecting either education or income distribution to be Clark's "defining struggle of our time" although I know Clark feels strongly about each. So I was adjusting to the fact that Clark mentioned the increasing gap between the super wealthy and average Americans, and then he looped it back to focus on it's impact on education, a twist I didn't see coming, but I know he cares about higher education to keep America competitive, and with rising tuitiion costs...

But then I realized Clark was talking about preschools, and not even the fact that poor children need a "head start" of some kind. He was talking about the extra boost that children just past toddlers are getting which is available only to people with wealth. And the next thing you know I was getting my mind around the fact that Clark was warning that the window of opportunity to excell in life, for coming generations of Americans not born into wealth, is starting to close at age four. That startled me because I never had looked at it that way before. And it gave me a cold shivver.

He's been saying for a long while that the failure of opportunity for all Americans is the defining, existential struggle for our time, and as he's said with global warming, as well, a fundamental threat to our national security. (The past couple of years this has been in the context that terrorism is NOT the defining, existential threat we face as a nation.) I don't think he's tied it to early education so closely before, though he may have, but it fits with his train of lifetime human development concepts he believes would revive economic opportunity for all Americans and have wealth more fairly distributed in the doing.

Even though Rose hit Clark with this question in the middle of a conversation focused on other subjects, this is the big picture type of theme that Wes Clark is constantly absorbed by, looking down the road to see where the path we are on is taking us, and warning us if he doesn't like what he sees. Clark is a true believer in the positive elements of the American dream, and I believe he fears this could be a stake driven through the heart of it.

but I'm fascinated he picked that topic.

I thought he would say it was international security/relations/war/diplomacy.

In my opinion, the struggle of our time is energy, then the elections processes and political discourse (right now both are in the toilet and cripple our ability to make good decisions (think Al Gore Assault on reason)), then healthcare, then foreign affairs - although they can be dealt with in parallel.

As for the rich (investment class) vs middle class vs working class vs poverty class, I think that's something human societies have always had, always will to a certain extent. Every societal system in the history of humankind has the haves and the have-nots. It's always harder for the have-nots for a lot of reasons. I do believe it is the responsibility of the more fortunate to help the less fortunate. I also believe in a variety of ways to level equality of opportunity as much as possible and level equality of outcome as much as is just and fair.

I like Wes, but I wouldn't really exactly agree w/ what he says here.

Personally, it's my opinion that all wealth and prosperity flows from energy systems and therefore energy is always the prime issue, even though on DU it's a side forum apparently dominated by folks that want to shove nuclear power down every one else's throats. :crazy:

so I think that is why he didn't take that answer in a different direction, such as perhaps Global Warming, which is a global challange with a major American component.

I admit that I was very surprised by Clark's answer also however. Two observations based on what I know has been on Clark's mind lately from having seen him speak several times:

One, Clark is continually attempting to deflate the language of fear that the Right wing is using to justify tighter government control, less liberty, and frankly, more war. So I have heard him down play the relative threat of "the war on terror" to America. He does NOT see a confrontation with jihadist Islam as an inevitable war between civilizations, he does not play into inflated fears over Iran. Clark points out that whatever the threat from any of those directions that could possibly exist, it is minor compared to the threats that Americans lived with daily throughout the Cold War. So I think it was his intent to not tick off a standard national security threat because that plays right into the hands of the American Right.

Two, Clark is not arguing for a classless society, he is arguing here for open access to opportunity, which he feels has been an essential element of the American social experiment. He is arguing that America can not afford to lose something that we had a better hold on ten years ago than we do today, which may be even more endangered ten years from now than it is today if we don't somehow make changes. Education in his opinion is vital to America's future. Clark has said that we can not exptect to compete as a nation in the 21st century if we continue to squander the human potential of a large percentage of our citizens.

I was startled to hear Clark tie educational opportunities directly to the increasing disparity between the wealthy and average Americans however. But he is right, more and more educational advantages are linked to economic advantages at an earlier and earlier age. Clark is not only talking about the rapidly rising cost of collenge tuition that fewer and fewer families can afford. He is talking about the equivelent of an educational class tracking system, which rigs the system from a very early age to make sure that the children of the wealthy only are prepped to move up in well oiled grooves to later financial success. It really was a radical comment.

my perspective is different.

I want to emphasize I believe in equality of opportunity (I'm a rags to riches story myself, mostly because of public schools and universities). Equality of outcome is a different matter and I believe in making the system as fair as possible to all elements of society.

I agree with you and Wes.

I guess because I see classism as being timeless, I don't see it as pressing. Perhaps Clark's alarms have been triggered because it is harder to make a living these days compared to 30 years ago, despite and overall increase in societal wealth (sequestered further by the rich). Wes kinda reminds me of FDR sometimes I think.

I have one very wealthy friend who I met because he was a customer who I provided a service to. When he moves he is able to get his kids into any school he wants without regard to waiting lists or entrance criteria. If necessary he justs arranges an ample donation to the private school he wants them to attend and BAM they are in. And of course parents like that research exactly what schools to send their kids to, and those schools lavinh kids with all kinds of extra attention. Universities key into graduates of those schools for admittance partially because they have already been prepped and groomed for success, intellectually and socially.

that it currently is?

That's the defining struggle today?

Even if we concede that sitting aound the boards Clark sits on are people from a variety of faimily backgrnouds, there is clearly a problem with America today. Keeping the status quo is not going to solve that problem.

Charlie Rose injected the matter of the boards Clark now sits on, and thereby slightly changed the emphasis of the point Clark was focused on. Given that, Clark gave a good response. No one pretends that that the achievement of excellence has not always been recognized in one way or another by the human race through all of our history. WE have major league baseball, we have Tripple A Baseball, Double A Baseball, Sand lot baseball etc. To the extent that we organically sort people into peer groups, we are far better served as a nation if the criteria used for that sorting is ability, not special opportunities accessible only by access to wealth as a child.