I live in a part of the US (extreme upper left corner of the lower 48) where many have left the present behind, and are already living in the future.
Agriculture, gardening, and fishing are the main activities here, along with the harvesting of foods and medicines, their preparation and storage. These will be the central facets of everyone's lives within 50 years. Our concerns and poltics are mostly local; Seattle is a few hours away, and has been pretty much left to immigrants and the rich. The suburbs of Seattle are an enormous no man's land of growing poverty and dilapidation, as such places are country wide.
Gas powered automobiles are, unfortuately, still an important part of the equation of living here, although many families, including my own little unit (mom, dad, and the cat), are in the process of transitioning to a single vehicle. Also, we could easily switch fuels and go to electric vehicles without any problems.
Washington DC is very far away from Washington State, but our fruit and eggs, salmon and vegetables are right here, and all we need. Trillion dollar budgets, enormous tracts of shiny, new McMansions with three car garages equipped with Mercedes Benzes and Lexi, "smart" bombs and stupid wars, the NSA and "terrorism," these are all things we read about in newspapers today and history books tomorrow.
As far as I'm concerned, it can't happen soon enough. What an enormous load of crap American mainstream culture has become. When we were little children, we asked for something to drink and were given coca cola. We asked for something to eat and got Wonder bread. We spent our lives being processed and "socialized" in "schools," which were as much like factories as people could make them. By the time I was an adult, I was beginning to figure out what makes the world go around, that we live the lives we do because someone else profits. It took another 40 years or so for me to figure out what I'd do about it.
Living the future now is the best I can come up with. Coca cola, Wonder bread, the NSA and their "terrorist" boogey man, the war machine, "Glee" and "Gunsmoke" and TV advertising, GW Bush and B Obama, Jim Inhofe and Michele Bachmann, $60,000 gas powered vehicles and $400,000 vinyl houses, Bank of America and Golden Sacks, can all fuck off and die and go to hell as far as I'm concerned, and the world will be a better place when they do.
