"It is time that we face the facts of our world. Only when we understand that we must change the corporations, will we create a place our children will want to inherit. We - you and I - must learn to vote through our purchases, insisting that those who run our biggest companies - and through them, our country - abide by principles of democracy and transparency. We must turn a dream that says a few rich people deserve to make all the decisions and most of the profits into a more equalitarian one, a reality that insists on the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all. "I enter 2007 with a renewed commitment to creating a stable, sustainable, and peaceful world, to shopping less and much more consciously, speaking out with a louder, clearer voice, and taking every action I can think of to wake myself and all those I come in contact with up. I commit to enjoying life in ways that will help all the children who will be born in 2007 - for I recognize that my child and her children cannot expect a good life unless every child born today in Indonesia, Nigeria, and Bolivia has the same expectations. "I commit to holding your hand, asking you to keep me on this path, and urging you to do the same. I look forward to marching with you into 2007. " --- John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man