h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

One of the many wonderful features of tribal councils is that they mimic legislatures or boards of directors. They do not follow the interpretation of non-participation representing disapproval.

This doesn't keep people from expressing that disapproval. Some tribal councils have been elected with as little as 20 percent or less participation. Such councils are hardly representative, however, that doesn't stop them from legislating or advancing the interests of the occupying power.

On the otherhand, they are the only organizations the government will officially recognize.

A similar approach is pursued at the international level elsewhere. There are many instances where governments have been essentially specified by the United States as legitimate, with or without the approval of the local population. It is often arduous to dispute such specifications. A few do though and have over the years forced the United States to recognize them, usually because it was too costly for the USA to keep proping up puppet regimes.

That rarely, if ever, occurs with domestic nations. There simply isn't sufficient military might to force the United States to vacate its plenary power.

When we come to appreciate that, except for the labels, the United States is pretty much an example of a sixteenth century, semi-medieval commonwealth, things become a little more comprehensible. In the USA, the government has assumed the authority of the king, ruling by divine right. That's about the only difference.

Steve, going back to your point "So please join me in voting YES for the NO vote." I do agree with that under one practicality: if there was a box on your ballot paper saying "None of the Above" then that would work but by merely not voting you are leaving your fate and everyone else's in the hands of politicians you obviously do not agree with.

It is lovely and idealistic to think that if we don't vote then someone would sit up and take note - but reality is different. If you don't vote, those assholes in power just think "well, if they don't care enough to vote, we'll just do anything we want". Just look at what Bush and Blair have been up to.

Even if you placed a vote for one of the joke parties like 'The Monster Raving Looney Party' then that would display your distrust of the political mainstream. Again I think it is a mistake to think that there are only two parties worth voting for in Britain and the US. The minority parties are only minorities because people think they are too small to make a difference. Obviously though, if everyone voted for the Greens or Socialist Workers (just examples) then they would have a larger political base and may even overtake the 'main' parties.

If every single person didn't vote as a protest though, and no party received any votes at all, then all that would happen is chaos and anarchy - and there are too many nasty bastards out there who would take advantage of an anarchic state. There's no way that would be better than even the crap we have at the moment. The only other options that would come to pass under this type of protest is that the country would be controlled by those powers not unswerable to politicians and their parties - the armed forces. Do you want to live under a military power?

Though, I do have to admit that if they DID have a ballot choice whereby you could OFFICIALY voice a vote of 'no confidence' in any political party, then I would mark my cross. Then the powers that be would hopefully have little choice but to rethink how they run their lives.

Maybe Abbi, yourself and me should take 'em all on - "Beware the HooToo Party - the party of the Righteous Rambling, Ranters!"......aha!, we could call it the 'Triple 'R' Party", it's got a ring to it, eh?

Whoops!

"Then the powers that be would hopefully have little choice but to rethink how they run their lives"

What I meant to type was " Then the powers that be would hopefully have little choice but to rethink how they run OUR lives"

Well, we can hope, can't we? But of course hope and a buck will get you a city bus ride somewhere.

Now, I agree that voting minority makes exceptional sense. I don't in any wise consider such a vote wasted. I agree with Analiese that voting majority party is a wasted vote if those parties do not represent one's political position.

That said, we probably need to address the issue of participation. If people don't participate, it doesn't necessarily mean they're apathetic. It might mean they don't agree with the form of coercive government that everybody else seems to find essential for insuring human life, liberty and property. In fact, I would question whether it insures any of those things except for a privileged few.

Be that as it may, I suspect a return to more local control of populations and resources would be preferable to trying to fix the current large scale system, which by its very size, tends to be neglectful of its duties to all the people.

Arguments relating to exigent circumstances are often marshalled to justify coercive, majority rule, mass population government when in practice local decision making, consensus and small scale collective action seem to provide better security against acts of pirates or even God.

That's essentially what small, fringe political parties attempt to do but their communities of intellectual interest don't quite have the same compelling nature of clan or geographical interests.

Then there's the persistant fear of so-called Balkanization. This term seems to derive from the situation that existed immediately prior to the first world war involving the Empire of Austria Hungary and its former subjects. Thus, it's a poor thing on which to base political theories that criticize local control.

Empires don't insure peace and tranquility. They insure oppression and exploitation. That's what they're for. Any warfare that arises out of that is a direct response to that oppression and exploitation in most cases or suppressive actions taken by the offended majesty.

Indeed if everybody were organized locally instead of nationally or internationally, except as a means of keeping peace in a council similar to the United Nations without the influence of so-called Great Powers, we might have a ghost of a chance of achieving true peace simply because no one would be powerful enough to break the peace with impunity.

Therefore, the enemy is not the disaffected Balkanizers necessarily but the privileged few who aim to keep their privileges and will stop at virtually nothing to insure their suzerainty over the rest of us.

It might work IF a % of the population has to vote for it to count OR as in our state it takes 51% of any amount of voters to win. It is more expensive, but with campaign reform it could easily be done

Well I do not know about you but I have been no angel and pretty much proud of it, it has helped to shape me. I have commited no theft or violent crimes. I would never make it in politics, although true confessions if done early and thoroughly have not hurt some!

We could be running mates. Maybe the US should have a Brit officially on board and the UK an American officially on board. They would be more likely to have to answer to their own travesties by at least tattling on each other

Ooops simulpost

Right!

"if everybody were organized locally instead of nationally or internationally, except as a means of keeping peace in a council similar to the United Nations without the influence of so-called Great Powers, we might have a ghost of a chance of achieving true peace simply because no one would be powerful enough to break the peace with impunity."

I see what you're getting at now, Monkey Chief and agree completely - though how does one go about creating such a system outwith the current norm when the world seems hellbent on globalisation (or global destruction)?

I want to know that too
How does it get turned around?
That pesky *capitalism gone wild* is in the way I think.
It is corporations and the enviornment folks that started using Global.

I must admit I had resigned myself to the Global way of a more kind humanity. It is not the ideal model, by way of Analiese and Steve I understand more about why.

We've been kicking this around for ages. If we had the answers, there wouldn't be no globalization.

So what we've tried to do for ages to convince people that the promises of globalization which is really just colonialism retreaded are essentially false and serve only the privileged few. That's a tough sell for most people. The promises are just too enticing, tempting or whatever. They've got a better chance of looting the house in a casino but they still buy into the lies. They still think they got a prayer and enough are allowed to win to perpetuate the myth.

So, that's what people live by, with however this persistant suspicion that they might not have considered all the downsides and that they just might be getting ripped off in ways they can't even comprehend.

They are getting ripped off though in very fundamental ways they feel everyday but blow off because well you can't fight the system right?

But local control versus global control is what it's all about. Family versus government. Freedom versus tyranny. Peace and love and cooperation versus coercion and intimidation and war and conquest.

And it's not like this is the first time in history that this sort of thing has been addressed. I just read about that awful crusade that Simon d'Monfort launched against the Albigensians in the 13th century. It was done mostly to plunder the south of France that had managed to become more prosperous than the north because it was a more open society and free society.

And the Cathars weren't doing anything to anybody except maybe convincing a few they didn't need go to Mass which was bad news for the clergy. Consequently they just had to teach those heretics a lesson. They were threatening civilization. Sound familiar?

Nothing really changes you know? Nothing.

I wouldn't say that nothing ever changes - there have been too many revolutions in the world's history to go along with that (even though they were for the most part communism revolutions). The trouble is that the governments' control over the populace now is much more thorough and deeply ingrained, they now have at least some control over every facet of our lives even down to things like what we can or can't watch in the media (think Gulf War broadcasting) whether we can or can't receive 'free' (paid through our taxes) medical attention, further and higher education, affordable housing, whether for that matter we want to build an (affordable) eco-house (planning regulations) the list goes on and on and on.

Most people are too used to not having a say in their lives' direction that they've practically given up. Now, obviously you have thought your reasons through intelligently Steve and I respect that a great deal, but I think a lot of people have given up with voting completely because they can't be bothered doing something that they don't see immediate benefits in. People are so worried about today they don't want to know what's down the line tomorrow. Many people don't want tomorrow to ever arrive, with a new day for some it just means new worries and new pain.

I think many people are so used to quick fixes and short term measures in their lives that they can't envisage things long-term any more, which is kind of daft since we're all living longer and will reap the benfits of sustained action evenytually. That's I think why we (at H2G2 etc) can talk about these things and have a good discussion, and more to the point, why we go to H2G2 forums in the first place because most of us do see things in the long term. Usually this is deemed as 'idealism' but every revolution (political, social, artistic or otherwise) has started with an idea and with people who were able to commit to something in the long term and to make sure their ideas didn't die in their notebooks.

And you're right Analiese, "We've been kicking this around for ages", people have been trying to change the order of things forever but we have to keep kicking these ideas around or else the folks with the bad, black and unjust ideas will have caught us all in their net and we'll end up like the no-brainers, happy to put up with whatever 'they' throw at us.

It's the story of Jessica Lynch. The US military is said to have really exagerated it, implying that brave US soldiers saved her from her Iraqi military captors. A lot of this has turned out to be a fabriction.

She was a maintenance worker for the US military during the 2nd Gulf War, a few months ago. Some Iraqi soldiers killed her comrades, and took her as a prisoner of war, and hospitalised her. I heard she tried to fight back, but her gun jammed, which I think made her unarmed and an 'hor de combat' or something. (This probably saved her life in the long run)

According to a Panorama documentry on BBC TV in the UK (which exposed some lies and exagerations of the US military about the whole incident), the Iraqi soldiers then ran away from the hospital because the Americans were coming.

Apparently, one of the Iraqi doctors tried to hand Lynch back to the Americans by driving an ambulance to a US checkpoint, but the doctor said his ambulance was shot on so he went back (if this is true this means the Americans must be using the Israeli Military Handbook on Occupation, which isn't good for the life expectancy of the Iraqis or Anglo-American soldiers, and is quite worrying).

The US soldiers came into the hospital, armed to the teeth, tying sick people to their beds and 'rescuing' Jessica Lynch from a hospital (that, as I said, Iraqi soldiers had long since abandoned!) Also, she apparently wasn't tortured, thankfully.

Now she has somehow become an American hero. Odd really, because even if the story about US soldiers saving her from her Iraqi captors was true, that wouldn't make her a hero--since she'd have needed saving, and would have been more of a victim.

The American government typically conceals its arbitrary and capricious perfidy in trivial clutter. What's pertinent about Jessica is that her experience is almost totally irrelevant to the main issue of a war of dubious purpose engaged without legal justification.

America claims to be a nation of laws but apparently only those laws that don't get in the way of what the government wants to do.

America, or as I prefer -- the US, is not so much a country of laws as it is a country of 'trust because it is a country of laws.'

We have a representative government. That doesn't mean that the government is representative of the will of the people so much as it means that the people have reposed their trust in their representatives.

There is no need for a US citizen to be so concerned about hir governance because she has hired someone to do that for hir. So long as shi can be convinced that, on balance (considering that shi is not the only person being represented by any given representative), shi is getting what shi wants then shi can settle back and ignore all the rest.

The key phrase is "not my job".

We are dedicated to being 'free' to do what we want to do with minimum concern for what anyone else wants or needs. We have become the aristocracy that cares nothing for anything but their own personal pleasure and entertainment. Our job is to have no job or to pretend when we are not working that we have none.

We are not known by our professions, as people have been in the past. Mr. Miller does not grind grain. Mr. Baker does not bake bread. We do not go to visit the Smith.

We are individuals who have individual, personal needs that are more important than tomorrow or the day after that.

Having vested trust, we settle back into what has been labeled apathy but which is more properly called inertia. After all, we live in the best of all possible worlds. Why would we wish to change it.

Okay, yes, there is a world out there that is not part of US. But, if it has problems, it should just do what we do and become the same as US. Why would it choose not to?

And why should we worry about it? We have our politicians and they have our armies. Let them do their jobs. Let us do ours.

It has been pointed out that the Japanese really have two distinct cultures, there is the working culture and there is the living culture. The two are moving toward having two separate languages.

So what? We've been doing that for ages! It's entirely possible that they have simply copied the obvious from us, as they have in other things, and are perfecting it (which we have always been too inert to do.)

If you must typify the US populace, then you must allow for this inertia. And you must allow that when we work, we work. Work has no relationship to life, except for that small fraction of us who have made our life and work into one thing.

It is commonly acknowledged that, for the US, there are roughly one third on one side of an issue, one third on the other side, and one third who don't care. It isn't that they don't care, it's that it isn't their shift.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that our national apathy is due to a huge reservoir of people who don't do anything. This is false and misleading. Rather, there are those who are working and those who aren't. They don't need to because they have put their trust in those who are on duty.

This leads to any number of ills, most of which have to do with allowing people who are ill fit for their responsibilities to do work they aren't trained for and competent at. The rest of it is due to the fact that we are very much at the mercy of those who are willing to work full time at whatever goals strike their fancy.

The statistics tell us that about one in every ten men is a sociopath. Not every one of these emotionally limited people is so monomaniacal as to pose a threat to us all, but the simple fact is that our society favors selecting such people as it's leaders.

They make excellent leaders, in the sense that their decisions are clear of most of the emotional turmoil that paralyzes so many of us. And, they are not bothered by having to do things that would be distasteful to most of us. But, if they have not been properly conditioned into the service of the society, there is nothing internal to restrain them from making all their decisions to favor themselves first.

Since our society is constructed on trust, we make it very hard to challenge someone merely because we have lost trust in them. There are limitations in term and there are checks and balances intended to do that, but the properly skilled sociopath can dance around our precautions and take advantage of our trust.

What is worse is that the rest of us, having seen the success of these empathy crippled people, have begun to envy them their skills and abilities to the point that we have begun, long ago, to adapt our standards to permit us to compete with them. Thus we have the popularly acknowledged ethic, "Don't get caught and, if caught, deny."

This is nothing new. These sociopaths have been around for as long as humans have been human. I tend to deny them any credit for humanity, but the simple fact is that if one tenth of the male population, which makes slightly less than one twentieth of the total population, adheres to individual values because they are incapable of understanding the needs of their neighbors, then our society, that of the US, has been built on a false foundation of belief in good judgment for the common welfare.

To make matters worse, there is no real objective test to pin tags on such people. There are only the behavioral symptoms that would tell us that such lone wolfs might be unworthy of our trust.

In our society, I would not begin to suggest that we must search out these 'monsters' and put them to the torch or, more realistically, deny them positions of power and trust. That would convicting them of some crime merely on the expectation that they cannot be good members of society. More importantly, I do not choose to act in so prejudiced a manner despite my fears at being confronted with someone whom I cannot trust to feel my pain when he sees it.

But, if we are to plan revolutionary changes in our world for the sake of all as opposed to merely rearranging the world to suit our personal preferences in a sociopathic way, then we must be aware that we may have been tainted as well as that we must allow for such people who are clearly a part of our society.

The argument over whether people are inherently good or bad fails to allow for the idea that the word 'people' is a label for a bunch of very different things that are superficially the same but which differ in fundamental ways.

I am constantly warning that the map is not the territory, that the label is as misleading as it is useful, that words do not always, or even often, mean what we think they do when heard by someone else. I am equally prone to forgetting that message and falling into the very traps I warn against. Still, I must start somewhere.

Now, having said all that, what the hell is so specially bad with the US government that places it at the top of the lists for being picked at. I tend to answer that question, by saying that it is not so much that is is bad as that it is so perfectible. There is so much possibility of making things better within the framework of the US Constitution.

Of course, there are wrongs and I do not support them if I can avoid it. Of course, there is need for improvement and it is easy to point out those areas of failure and even malicious intent. But, before you can expect any sort of change in the way things are done in the US, you must first address the issue of trust. You must first obtain a significant portion of that trust so that you too can have the leisure to lay about in the woods hearing the birds sing and watching them fly. That is to say, you must find a way to change things so that you can vest your trust in those who do the jobs you have set them.

To say that the answer is in miniaturizing the governmental unit, so that individuals, family, clans, tribes, clubs, or bowling leagues have more control is simply haggling over the size of the constituency of the representative without dealing with the issue of the structure which would implement such decisions on however frequent a basis. This approach ignores the need for maintenance of fundamental services too large or too inefficient when small to be maintained at the lowest level of power. It ignores the differences between people and the needs of their situations and locations. It ignores the selfishness of individuals. And it ignores the different goals of various groups that are not national or governmental in nature but which still seek to govern some aspect of the way people live and which have support among some portion of the world populace. It ignores that conflict is a part of everyday life and part of being human. But, most significantly, it hypocritically ignores the fact that it is seeking to do what it accuses and abhors others for doing, which is imposing it's will with the presumption that what it is doing is for the good of all.

So, how does one deal with such paradoxical and self-conflictive ideas? Shi does as shi has always done, ignores the logical inconsistencies and opposing opinions and moves ahead with the hope and faith that somehow it all will work out.

It is obvious that the ideal society gives every person the right to state hir choice. Then what? Does shi get what shi wants or must shi submit to the collective will of some portion of the total populace? What are the dues for what ever services shi partakes of? Must shi take the responsibility of maintaining hir society in things shi has no desire for. How does shi gain more or less influence on the opinions of others that might affect hir quality of life. Which resources are hirs and which belong to everyone? What are the various sizes of 'everyone' and who decides? Why should they be the ones to decide when someone else may have needs? Which people are less important in some matters than other people? (It's obvious that there are always going to be some who are more important than others.) Who decides? How do they enforce their decisions?

How is it that each of us knows what the best way is for everyone else to live their lives but not one of us is willing to allow someone else to decide how we should live?

Mark Twain, "No one ever passes a law to stop themselves from doing anything."

Of course, we each are entitled to a voice and we each are entitled to a decision. But it simply is not true, that I, in the suburbs of Chicago, should have anything to say about deciding what happens or doesn't happen in Pretoria. I may not like it, and I can make my disapproval known, but I have no right to decide just because I have the ability to know what is happening, however reliably.

This approach to planning the appropriate state of the world is precisely the kind of thinking that has US and British military in Iraq right now and for the foreseeable future.

Of course, it was done for what was perceived to be the good of the US, Britain, and, after that, the rest of the world. But, it's only our size and strength that has allowed us to bully and kill our way into the middle of this situation. Still, it clearly was not done with the full will of the people who stand behind the government, who *occasionally* choose to voice an opinion but mostly expect these guys to just do their jobs.

Let's take this a step further. If I decide that I and the rest of my household along with all my real property have seceded from the US in order to form my own country and government then I will be confronted with the need to convince anyone else that this makes a difference. If I wish to be separate then I must be willing to provide all the resources that I depend on *or* I must negotiate with someone else to provide them. If I wish to venture out of my home and off of my property then I must arrange for a visa to allow my entrance into the surrounding US. I must establish some way of paying for services not available to me away from my home country (Let's call it Bartonia). I must negotiate for the conditions which I, the elected ruler for life of Bartonia, am to be subject to the laws of this foreign country called the US. I must face the obligation of protecting Bartonia from predation. And most importantly, I must find some way to convince the US government and all of the US that I am entitled to do all of this.

You see, even if I 'own' property ownership is subject to the recognition that this land is always a part of whichever country has the might to draw a line that includes it. The US Civil War pretty much settled that point. For reasons of simplicity and simple self-preservation, the practice of the nations of he world is to treat traditional boundaries as if they were set in stone. The biggest and richest countries are not interested in encouraging the 'lesser' nations into consolidating into large nations any more than those smaller nations are interested in being controlled by anyone else somewhere else.

The US is a huge country but it is only a country so long as it has the might to maintain its boundaries.

So, tell me folks, how do we maintain the status quo while changing everything to suit our fancies? How do we convince those who have to give that up for those who have not? How do we get off planning a revolution when there isn't the dissatisfaction necessary to get it started.

Most revolutions (I won't be so vain as to say 'all revolutions') begin with the increasing displeasure and malaise of people opposed to their current unhappy circumstance. The goal of these people is to get rid of that which oppresses them. It may begin to be organized by those with an idea of how it might be better, but until the triumphant moment when they realize that no one is over them, they do not have the chance to replace what was with what 'should be.' At that point, speculation meets implementation. In the midst of the inevitable confusion are the people with the will to make sure that whatever happens, they will come out okay and, preferably, in charge.

In the case of the US, it was ultimately decided that whomever was capable of gaining sufficient attention by whatever legal means was entitled to govern however much of the the country shi could arrange to control. Now some of that governance is political and some of it is economic and some of it is popular. Some if it we each have a voice in and some of it we don't. If the Founding Fathers couldn't anticipate a municipal power plant how could they have anticipated something as bizarre as Microsoft or Ford Motors or AT&T which rule our lives every bit as much as do our mayors, governors, representatives, senators, judges, and presidents. None of them is utterly uncontrolled but none of them are as controlled as we might like. They have grown powerful simply by virtue of the size of our needs in terms of the number of us who are willing to submit to their demands.

Consider Bill Gates as the icon of acquisitiveness. If he wants us to do something, he simply makes it a condition for the use of his product. We can choose not to use his product or we can submit. After all, it is a small concession and his defective product is still the most ubiquitous and seemingly useful of any that attempt to do the same thing. He has seen to both the defectiveness and ubiquity because the both serve a purpose. If it is broken then there is always the need to have it repaired or replaced. If it is ubiquitous then there is the greater likelihood and pressure to insure that everything else will work with and depend on it.

No one is ever offered anything that is finished and complete because everything is guaranteed to be broken by 'improvements' to some portion of the interdependent product line which unfortunately requires the correction to a previous problem in a way that is not compatible with the way that something else had dealt with the way things were.

Thus, Bill makes money selling everything over and over again as portions of the system are fixed while other portions are patched to deal with the fixes, which are creating new problems which will be fixed later.

The result is that the general level of service remains the same while the level of ubiquity continues to grow. Our home computers, for instance are now running two thousand times faster than they began at but all this extra speed is consumed by the need to handle all the additional services that now funnel through them. It should be possible to simply do one of those things 2000 times faster while ignoring the others but the product is constructed deliberately to prevent that possibility. That would permit you to make your own decisions about your level of efficiency and your needs for it but that would defeat Bill's plans for ubiquity so that you are forced to subsist at the levels he is willing to permit you to have in order to forward his plans for the way you will live your life.

And this is completely voluntary. You don't *need* to submit to his will. You don't *need* to place your trust in his beneficence. Riiight! So long as you must deal with anyone of his voluntary slaves, you are obliged do traffic with his way of doing things. That is the evil of ubiquity, which is at the same time it's benefit.

The issue is security. Am I safe in my home or as I walk on the street? Can I depend on my water and electricity, my television, radio, and movies? Can I depend on the communications that enable most of the better things in my life? All of these deal with security, which, in turn, deals with the trust that has been placed in the hands of those who are responsible for providing those needs and in the hands of those who are responsible for watching those who are responsible.

Law defines what is legal within a country. Between countries there are treaties or there is custom or there is nothing. There is no such thing as an enforcement authority between nations because nations are like gods. Whatever a god can get away with, why, that is that god's power. Does that sound familiar? "Don't get caught?"

There is no point is saying that it is illegal to invade Iraq or Switzerland. A country can do whatever a country can get away with. Is it wrong? By my standard it is wrong to invade but it may not be wrong to have knocked out the regime in power. That's a personal statement not a declaration of a law of the universe. I can certainly think of a better way to have done it, even in my ignorance. Of course, any of those alternatives would set a precedent for other countries to do similar things where we might not necessarily approve (say, maybe, Canada. "We weren't happy with the way the last curling championship was decided and we felt it was time that someone took action -- for the good of the world. You can have Alaska back, just as soon as we get security all sorted out.")

Now, if you've stayed with me all the way down to here, here's your reward. There is nothing wrong with pointing out inconsistencies and lobbying for their corrections. There is nothing wrong with expressing your disappointment and disaffection with anyone's actions.
There is certainly nothing wrong with stating your personal ideals and showing how you think that their implementation would help everyone. But, the moment you begin to think that your dreams are the way the world must run that is the moment that you are certain to be stepping on someone else's toes. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing in the eyes of those who stand with you or near you or even in the case of the offended parties themselves if they feel that your reasons are proper and their actions were not. But, to make things happen you must somehow find a way to get enough people to go along with you in an active fashion and that means that you are going to need to compromise with their needs and dislikes as well.

For instance, you might have convinced me enough that I am willing to give you the plans for the power plant, but I expect to be rewarded and I will not risk my life to support your hatred of miniature poodles. Now, will your principles stand up to taking the plans and killing me later because I actually have a miniature poodle and I wouldn't storm the coal bin with you? Or, will you make me Minister of Poodle Transitions, which is your euphemism for killing any poodle under twelve inches, shoulder to floor, so that I can manipulate the rulers to save a few poodles here and there, perhaps shipping them off to countries of refuge, so that you will have an excuse to kill me later for crimes against the state and to provide an excuse to invade those countries of refuge when the people get restless at not having more miniature poodles to kill?

I know that everyone here is speaking out of a sincere sense of misplaced or aborted justice but how about some practical considerations rather than simply fuming at how fouled up things are and wouldn't it be nice if ...

Yes, that's really what all this is about. But, just like you feel the need to point out the inconsistencies in what you see, so I feel the need to point out the things that are being overlooked.

Obviously, if you haven't overlooked them, never mind.

Barton

I think it's incumbant on you, Barton, since you've been so thorough in explaining the reasons for the status quo to advance how you would change it to better represent the needs, not necessarily wants, of the people.

The United States from its inception was conceived of as an empire and it has pretty followed that ideology both in its illegal seizure of territory and the imposition of federal authority over the entire commonwealth. It obviously didn't have to be this way and still doesn't, but that trust you suggest is propping it up is based on deception, fraud, more than anything else. It's that fraud that I've tried to describe in terms people could visualize, not a easy task.

Getting smaller has definite advantages in the sense that getting larger is not an inevitable consequence of human progress. In fact large scale organizations are historically less successful than smaller ones in meeting the needs of communities. Where the large organizations are successful is in the business of commerce facilitated by conquest. In other words, these big things are successful because we say they're successful and will destroy anyone who begs to differ.

There is a qualitative difference between a community and a criminal enterprise. Large nationstates and empires aren't communities by any stretch of the imagination although their proponents keep trying to convince us otherwise. They are in fact for the most criminal enterprises where the foxes watch the henhouses so to speak and take their cuts of the pullet population as much as they think they can without drawing too costly a resistance.

The real revolutions though, at least in the last 500 years have involved the measured and deliberate attempts on the part of the privileged to maintain their privileges in the face of movements to liberate the population from the feudal obligations to support the thugs.

We're seeing it now with in the United States with the emphasis on defense spending, corporation welfare, and the decline or interruption of social services where funding is rechanneled into other areas of political action, specifically war in support of dubious corporate resource control schemes.

Now, nobody has to do a damn thing, and I'm really not telling anybody what to do, but unless something substantial and positive is done, this mess will predictably decay into another dark age if it hasn't already. Perhaps that's an illusion of trust too. Perhaps we've never shined any enlightenment on anything, but from my studies most recently of the Midi in France, where a society flourished for a time in the wake of the Frankish invasions of Roman Gaul that was much more kind, gentle, free, humane,tolerant and respectful than anything that came after it.

The same could be said for Pre-Reconquista Spain or Pre-Columbian America. The point is, what we see, largely the result of the Church Militant and Triumphant, before its time in the latter case, as well as the triumph of the avariciousness of Anglo Norman feudalism in the commercial trading empires some of us have come to detest while others have come to know and love, need not be the inevitable consequence of anything. Rather it represents deliberate moral decisions made by a relatively few human beings on behalf of themselves primarily with the collaboration of a defrauded population of strangers.

These people will probably go on as they have in the past, accepting what they've been convinced, by arguments such as yours, Barton, are the inevitable courses of their lives. To the extent that they can be conjoled or coerced into believing in the inevitability of these matters, they can be dominated by those sociopaths you mentioned.

So you asked what do we do with the sociopaths. Well, we can cut off their heads, slaughter their families, imprison them or banish them among things.

During their flight to the Yellowstone River, the Cheyenne encountered in Black Coyote a classic example of a sociopath. When he finally murdered one of the men in charge of keeping people like him from raiding and thereby bringing the vengeance of the US Army and the local settlers down on the entire band, he was banished along with his immediate family and eventually captured and hanged by the whites. He lost the protection of the band through his own choices. The band eventually made it to the Yellowstone Valley and in solidarity finally prevailed on the US government to let them stay where their descendents still dwell.

That's one way of dealing with a sociopath that didn't involve shedding the blood of a kinsman. Not that that issue would matter much in the contemporary dominant society but it's a possibility.

Anyways, it seems to me that your arguments are pretty self-serving in the sense that they seem to put the onus on us to suggest how the system you apparently subscribe too, however equivocally, should be modified to accommodate our needs when in fact maybe the onus should be on you to do that if that system is as useful as you claim. If it isn't that useful, why would we want to waste our valuable time trying to patch it up?

Fine, I'll do my best.

Present me with a list of your needs without catch phrases and loaded terminology. Or with same, but with the understanding that I as your designated spokesperson for the status quo (which I am not but which I can certainly play the devil's advocate for) reserve the right to willfully misunderstand your requests.

I'll try to give you two versions. One will attempt to illustrate what is wrong with asking the genii what your wish should be (otherwise known as the 'white man speaks with forked tongue' answer), which will of course give you the least bang for your buck. The other will attempt to be as impartial and fair to both sides as possible (though I can't think of anyway to be fair to your opposition without ignoring you altogether.) These will be accompanies with whatever I can devise in the way of methods and techniques for achieving as much as possible without undue bloodshed.

If I'm not completely befuddled or bored, I may even attempt an answer using the dewy eyed liberal child of little thought but great hopes approach. Which should be good for laughs, since it will probably be fairly close to the agendas of both current parties.

Be aware, that bloodshed is quite likely to be required to achieve any significant goals failing the full capture of the hearts and minds of most of the people in the country. (Even I can't guarantee that.)

I might even slip in a few of my own never, never land dreams much to your dismay and disgust, just to fill in the chinks and to make a workmanlike job of it.

I have no idea what form this is going to take because I still don't know what your (plural) needs are. I don't have the time or energy to do this sort of thing over and over.

I have a friend I haven't seen in a very long while, whose hobby was meeting with groups of 'dissidents' and drawing up plans to take over the local power, water, and communication networks as part of a coup. He was well trained by MI and had a bet with himself that not one of those groups, when confronted with perfectly workable plans would take even the first step. So far as I know, he has never lost his bet.

He professed no interest in the groups' politics. He just stated that it was an exercise for him. Of course, step one always read, "1) Kill me. Now that you have the plans you don't need me and you can't trust me."

I too believe I am capable of presenting at least the broad outlines of the sort of thing you might use. However, I will not make the first step entail my death. I'm not as good as my friend is.

Of course, I don't really expect you all to settle on a list of needs. Just to make it interesting, the discussion must take place here and there must be contribustions to the final list from at least three people who are not Natives. (I'm not going to try to teach Natives how to fight guerilla war fare when all then need to do is consult the old wisdom. Their solution is too simple to be a challenge, assuming all that they need is to force the US Government to honor the treaties and come out of it alive and still a viable group of peoples, at least for a decade or so.) There must be no more than ten and no less than five needs that are fundamentally or significantly different. After all, there's no point in shaking the whole country up without a substantial list of required changes.

I reserve the right to make counter demands, that may be distateful for any one of your needs and you may accept or drop the need from the list. TAANSTAFL. I am not your fairy godmother. I don't plan on being viscious or vindictive, just practical. If the list drops below five then the revolution is off.

Please be aware, the result may actually be worse than what you start with but you will have your needs (in theory.)

Let me know if you all need to haggle. I'm flexible and friendly. What I am not, is what Analiese seems to keep thinking I am, just because I speak in disparaging tones of some of the dreams and ideals expressed in this forum and elsewhere. If I were to plan a revolution, it wouldn't be nice and it would most likely work but not even I would be happy when it was over.

This is not simple bluster, I am ready to try and I think I can do it. And, no, I never have before.

Barton

Oh come on Barton, do you really think people would rally to your elitist war-cry?
I started off thinking "my God, I'm actually agreeing with Barton" at the beginning of your entry, but by the time I'd got two thirds of the way through I was thinking "...right, here we go...another Bush".

I don't know if an army of Shakespearian luvvies would really be able to stand up to the armies of capitalism...unless they put on a special show for Bush etc and blew up the theatre in a cloud of stage make-up.

Though, in following your surmise that we give up our trust to those who would stand in power (and, like all the rest of our 'great' politicians you have chosen to nominate yourself - not someone else), here goes -

How would you find solutions (and I mean PRACTICAL solutions) to the problems of fulfilling most basic human needs which so many people the world over (in developed and undeveloped countries) still do not have:-

1. Affordable shelter and housing for all (no-one has solved the homeless/slum/ghetto problems yet)
2. A balanced and healthy diet available (affordable) to all
3. Free Health Provision and Medicine for all (including dental needs)
4. Free Education and further education for all
5. The right to free speech
6. The right to vote OUT those elected to represent as well as the right to vote them IN.

In my humble view, I believe that the only way we can solve things is to put HUGE and all-encompassing restrictions on multi-national mega-capitalist business. This is spreading the US's brand of horrible consumerism across the world like a virus and which, in my opinion, is far more dangerous than AIDS or SARS - global american consumerism has the potential to KILL US ALL, after all that's the real reason why we're in Iraq etc etc etc. That's the reason there's an international arms market. The Law should put the greatest restrictions on the power-mongers, not those under their control.

Once leashes are put on these economic global organisations everything else would slowly fall into place - once again we would be feeding our own people, we could stand up for ourselves and say what we want without having to stand against the combined economic wealth of global organisations (take the pensions crisis as an example) we could build our own houses on our own land (I'm Scottish and am really F*cking SICK of American Businessmen and their consortiums buying OUR islands and estates where WE have lived for centuries and now can no longer AFFORD to live in).....
....I could go on and, like Sir Barton, list everything that comes to mind but I am as aware as any of those with sense that the changes have to be simple and fundamental for them to work and start the domino effect.

One thing I do agree with Barton about is the fact that WE as a people (the common man/woman) need to WAKE UP and THINK about what is best for all and then make a commitment to follow this through by stopping voting for power-lusted, money-crazed idiots who only have their and their kinds' interests at heart. We need to make a commitment of voting 'in' the right candidates who shouldn't need even one dollar to be able to run for election. How can a democratic system EVER work when you need multiple millions to be able to run for election?

We need a system like Analiese and Abbi pointed out - one where our smaller communities have the power to govern themselves and the necessary FAIR economy and infrastructure to allow this to happen where London or New York or LA or Hong Kong etc don't get the majority of the country's benefits but where they are shared out among the populace as fairly as possible. NOT a communist system (as I suspect I may be accused of suggesting) but just one where money does not give anyone the licence to force his/her neighbour out of his job or home due to the quirks of greed, business and economy.

Right Barton, over to you.

You've elected yourself, now prove you'd be anything different than to what we have already.

Going back to how quickly power corrupts:

"There must be no more than ten and no less than five needs that are fundamentally or significantly different. After all, there's no point in shaking the whole country up without a substantial list of required changes.
I reserve the right to make counter demands, that may be distateful for any one of your needs and you may accept or drop the need from the list. TAANSTAFL. I am not your fairy godmother. I don't plan on being viscious or vindictive, just practical. If the list drops below five then the revolution is off." - Barton.

- after nominating yourself, you're already dictating to others what YOU think should be the rules Barton. Why TEN points? The things humans need to live comfortably are the most fundamental aspects of survival eg shelter, food and good health and MAYBE the ability to 'better' themselves (education etc) so they can pursue their CHOSEN career. We need simple changes that affect everything that follows, not another list of laws intent on controlling

And going back to the quote above, we need REPRESENTATIVES who are elected out of their compassion and respect for those they stand for, not people who, before they've even started, are voicing the terms under which they will only represent us...that's the start of the power corruption.

"...I reserve the right to make counter demands...If the list drops below five then the revolution is off."

See how easily it happens?

If any system is to work, the leaders must ONLY represent their peoples' demands and needs, NOT THEIR OWN.

Well, the limitations I placed on this exercise are there because, it is an exercise. I haven't the time or resources to rule the world the way you seem to want me to.

I said the conditions are negotiable, they are. You want eleven, or four, just get together with some one else so that there is a group agreement.

For the record, I didn't nominate myself. Analiese told me that it was my responsibility, since I seemed to think I had all the answers, to come up with the solutions that none of you seem able to do on your own.

You listed 6 and then in the last sentence of your second posting a seventh and nearly unblievable one. Very well, you have proposed seven. Now we need to here what others have to say, since I plainly stated I'm not going to do this over and over for all of you.

You all are an experimental, ad hoc, revolutionary committee. I am the mysterious and more than a little unbelievable voluntary expert who is willing to draw up the plans for your revolution. You will tell me the needs of your revolution and I will either accept them as given or I will point out counter issues which might be side effects or might just represent my own nasty and hidden agenda. I told you the conditions under which I will work. I told you I am flexible. I did not tell you that I was your private Aunt Sally willing to take whatever punishment you care to dish out when I am offering you something you can't even afford to buy and aren't, apparently, interested enough in to even consider though it will cost you nothing but some of your obviously copius and previously committed hootoo time.

I'm not interested in starting a flame war with you because I play a knight at a Ren Faire in the Middle of the United States and you seem to have some *thing* about that. (I'm sorry, that I mentioned Pinky Cleugh. If you can't see the humor in my character's history then you need to take a nice long walking vaction to the Orkneys. It wasn't intended as a personal insult. The Scots lost that one like they lost a lot of others. I'm not to blame for William Wallace either. It isn't the losing that matters, it was the resistance that was glorious.) You should know that you can't insult me by calling me an actor, we actors are too stupid to be insulted by dull folks lack of imagination.

I'll wait to see if we can get at least three non-Natives to come up with a list of reasonable length. The lower limit is because I want you all to work at it as hard as I'm intending to. There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. (And yes, I got careless before and spelled it TAANSTAFL instead of TANSTAAFL.)

Do you do thinking as well as you do rhetorical scorn and thoughtless shouted slogans without much content? Remember, I'm the one who doesn't have to put up with your childish vituperation. You said you valued an honest opinion. I only value opinions if there is more behind them them shouting and I never offer them as my own if they aren't honest. Anyone can have an opinion. Literally anyone.

The only diffult thing you've asked for so far, is your seventh. But I don't think you will like the trade offs. We'll see when there have been a few more voices heard from.

Barton

You would think that the requirement for at least three non-natives to contribute would have been filled by now, but I suspect that probably represents the nature of the subtrifuge here. The professional thug glibly congratulates himself on his astute anticipation of human nature.

I personally find dealing with him loathsome in the extreme and exactly opposite what I think needs to be done any case, so if this is the persona of choice, I'll just let him languish in wings. I have no need of his specious speeches or duplicitous dialogue. In the worlds of the American commander in Iraq when confronted with a threat of a strike of police sympathetic to American interests, "We'll find more."

Anyways it doesn't matter because I'm not a non-native so I guess that pretty much puts me out of the cast anyway.

But there's this one issue raised about us finally maybe getting the government to honor the treaties AND survive for a decade that needs to be addressed.

Since the honorable thug has the temerity to assume such divine powers of divination, let me argue from the record that we've survived a good deal longer than a decade already, maybe 10,000 years or more more and in all that time, at least in my homeland, about the worst thing we've encountered other than the gradual dissication of the region due to the onset of the current interglacial period is the arrival of the Anglos.

So I trust there's probably quite a few Anglos or their sympathizers that can secretly or explicitly congratulate themselves on being the functional equivalent of a major climatic catastrophy on a much faster timeline that damn near brought 10,000 years or more of traditional survival to an ignoble end. Consequently, I don't think I even want to play this silly game.

As the honorable thug's friend challenged those who would complain to kill him first, or so we're told, I'll simply challenge anyone who is interested at this point to kill me if you can now before your decline into the next dark age.

Except I think you're already there but too clever to know it.

So have fun non-natives as you play Barton's game and don't forget to review of spelling of sucker while you're at it. The Nazis used to toy with the Jews in this manner, presenting them with fun little puzzles whereby they could decide for themselves which of their people would be baked first. In Sophie's Choice, Sophie by the way was not Jewish, this principle was extended to selecting which child would be exterminated given a choice of two with in retrospect the rather predictable result that both were snuffed.

Interesting little sadistic games aren't they?

No Barton isn't responsible for Wallace. Edward I is and Edward is conveniently dead isn't he? So try to imagine Barton's surprise to have been chosen by acclamation as the whipping boy but that after all is only a role and Barton is only an actor.

Well, when you can't get at the perpetrator I guess you got to find a scapegoat that's all. Restitution will be made one way or the other. That's what clever people don't seem to comprehend because they're probably just a little too clever for everybody's good.

Congratulations and I wish you our very best.

By the way, when Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse, decided to resist the invasion of the half-million or so "crusaders" led by Simon D'Monfort that came roaring down the Rhone Valley to murder the Cathars among others, he was predictably defeated, due in no small part to the failure of Diego, King of Aragon to support him as previously agreed. Raymond was compelled to do penance which involved a public flagellation and the loss of lands already conquered by Monfort and forfeited forthwith, another example of Western Civilization in action.

Now, Raymond was no quitter and eventually reconquered those lands during which Monfort was mortally whacked. Unfortunately, only a few years later Raymond died and Louis the Boy basically finished the job of raping Languedoc that Monfort had started. Oh well.

Louis, by the way, is the French form of Clovis which goes to show how deep barbarism is institionalized in European society. By all accounts the Franks originally were a tribal people and the word itself seems to have meant freeman in their language. But apparently they just had to try to impose their version of the Roman Empire on the rest of the known world. The Arabs used the word to designate all Europeans, a typical overgenerationization but maybe forgivable in that they had very little dealings with any other Europeans than Franks.

In the 1970s a group of young people mostly gathered at the ruins of the castle that had served as a Cathar refuge and where over 200 Cathar perfects had been burned alive a little over 700 years before. They lit a bonfire, not so much in commemoration of that atrocity but in affirmation of life and love and respect on the eve of the Feast of Saint John the Baptist. Gradually, the youth of Languedoc are recovering their cultural heritage. You can't keep good people down indefinitely it seems.

I thought this might be of interest if we happen to delve further into issues of Scots independence among other issues sometime.