Karl Hess: Presidential Speechwriter Turned Homesteader

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PLOWBOY: What about our cities? Will they all collapse during the coming decentralization? Will all their residents scatter in the countryside?

HESS: Of course not. What will collapse in the cities are the central governments. And, as City Hall goes under, the local neighborhoods will reappear. People who want to stay in our urban areas will be able to get along quite nicely in a closely knit neighborhood.

City people, in fact, can organize locally much easier than folks who live out in the country simply because they're closer to each other. Residents of urban areas can establish cooperative production and distribution facilities. They can set up community banks. And, as you know, our experiments in Washington's AdamsMorgan area have shown that even a densely inhabited, lower income city neighborhood can be very nearly food and energy selfsufficient.

PLOWBOY: Then despite your distaste for Big Government and Big Business, despite your sadness at the way we've raped the natural resources of this continent and the rest of the world, despite your differences with the Internal Revenue Service, and despite having your nose rubbed in the lethargy, crime, misuse of power, and other ills of our society despite all this, you're still optimistic about the future of the United States?

HESS: Yes. By and large, this is still a healthy country. Healthy because of the people who live here. Oh, we've got a few bad apples crooked politicians, people corrupted by the welfare system, and rich parasites who are loafers and high livers-but they're still not the majority. Go to any small town in America and you'll find that most of the people there are generous, trusting, honest, and hardworking they still have the virtues of their grandparents.

I haven't lived everywhere in the world, but I've traveled a lot and there aren't any people-anywhere-better than Americans. I'm willing to bet on it and I think that this is a glory of a place to live. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else.

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