We are in the mists of a world crisis, one the likes of which has never been seen before. It is a crisis caused by the staggering number of people inhabiting the planet earth, by their concentration, consumption and behavior. This is the reason for global warming and for our current economic crisis; there simply are too many people in the world to provide everyone with the resources needed for a high quality of life, that the majority exist deprived, surviving from day to day, on what little they may forage from a world rich, yet never meant to host such a sea of humanity.
In the event you ever wondered what two million people looked like, you got the opportunity to witness this on January 20, 2009, at the inauguration of Barack Obama, when the National Mall in Washington, DC, became the gathering place for a sea of humanity. This celebration of the masses, this jubilation, the fact that it could even occur, was the direct result of our current crisis, the over population of out planet Earth.
It may seem as triumph that one man may rise to power from his families humble beginning, to become President of the United States, to be swept into office by the people. Yet it is this very mass of humanity which is causing the world's problems: global warming is a direct result of over population as is the lack of resources to feed, to fuel and to provide for the needs of humanity.
Two million people congregated into the National Mall may see a lot, yet it is but a drop in the bucket of the number of people currently inhabiting the planet Earth. As I write the population of the world is a staggering 6,755,270,279 at 12:45 GMT (EST+5) Jan 21, 2009. The population of the United States is 305,656,842 at this same instant in time.
These are staggering number. Yet the numbers are increasing at an alarming rate. You can actually watch the world's population clock tick, by visiting the US and World Population Clock web site. It is this constant, steady increase in the number of people that is the indirect cause of such world calamities as global warming and an economy which not able to provide for the ever increasing number of human souls now inhabiting planet Earth.
By the time you read this, my figures will be wrong, as the numbers will have increased. So too will have increased the magnitude of the problems which must be fixed. This is why it is impossible to expect one man, Barack Obama, to be able to fix either America's problems or the world's problems. Our problems are too great to be fixed by one man; they can only be fixed if we all give a hand.
You see, what is ironic about the nature of this particular problem, is that humanity can only fix the problems that its numbers cause by working together. The alternative is strife and struggle, is conflict and war, is death and destruction upon a scale the world has never witnessed before. Yet if we harness the sea of humanity, there is no work too great to be achieved, no goal too high, no mountain top we may not climb together.
The masses of humanity which congregated in the National Mall on Junuary 20, 2009, to witness the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States are at once both the source of the problem and the key to fixing what is wrong with our country and with the world. Yet those masses are only the tip of the iceberg: globally the numbers of people and the magnitude of the problem is 3,378 times greater than the number of people gathered in the National Mall on that fateful day Barack Obama took office!
These numbers are important as they serve as a starting point. Only if we recognize the magnitude of the problem can we begin to fix that problem. Perhaps if you take the vision of 2,000,000 (two million) people in the National Mall and multiply that by 3,378 can we begin to comprehend the sea of humanity which is over populating the planet Earth; thus can we begin to grasp the magnitude of the problem.
It is this vast sea of humanity which requires food, which requires energy, which is in competition for all the resources of the world. This is why we are being plunged into the abyss of global warming, of starvation for food and energy, of unemployment and depravation. Only by harnessing the masses, putting everyone to work, can we hope to pull ourselves up, dust ourselves off and emerge from the present crisis victorious.
We either do this together as a nation, we either do this together as a world of nations, of we will parish. That in a nutshell is the jest of the situation. Barack Obama cannot succeed alone; only those masses which swept him into office, working together can solve our nations problems, and only those masses of the world which exist yet are unseen, to great to gather into any National Mall, can solve the world's problems through their collective labor, not bent upon the destruction of each other, but upon making the world a better place for all of humanity!
Thus I challenge the people of the world to come together at this moment, to weigh and measure the problems which we as a humanity face, to take that measure and set high goals, to with that measure work toward those goals that all God's children may live in peace and harmony with food on their tables, with clothing, shelter and work they can take pride in, that none are left out in the cold, in the rain or in the weather, that all have a home, a community, an education and life's work -- that whatever the differences in faith or allegiance, all may work together as one humanity to provide the best possible life for not only for ourselves and our children, but for all God's children!
Terry Lynch
21 Jan. 2009