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GOVERNMENT! |
Liberals, conservative, birds of every stripeI'm not sure I know what a liberal is, probably wouldn't recognize one if I bumped beaks with one on the trail. Conservatives are a little more identifiable, though they come in many colors. I do know the difference between government and society, though, and it's a difference worth wasting some electrons over. Government is the bureaucracy that translates the will of the people into action, however that will is polled and identified. Every society has a government of some sort, from a gathering of elders in the teepee to our Great National Asylum for the Helpless in Washington, DC. In a democracy, if there ever was such a thing, which there isn't, the government serves the will of the people. The people direct the machinery of government through a process of direct decision-making that holds control over the wheels of government directly, rather than through representatives. The problem, or at least one of the many problems with our present government, is that it has been taken hostage by industrial corporate capitalism. The bureaucracy no longer responds to the people, or even the people's so-called elected representatives; instead the government responds to those who hold the purse strings to elections. The people have no mechanism to match the overwhelming influence of billions of dollars of bribes from industry to support and promote their pet profit-making, projects. Although we would like to think that government protects the people from the excesses of corporate enterprise, the reality is quite the opposite. The government of the United States promotes and defends corporate interests, to the point of a gun, wielded by a standing army and a militarized constabulary. This is fascism in its fullest expression, a totalitarian state that promotes capitalism at home and abroad through a tightly controlled domestic economy and world-wide imperialist aggression. We cannot change the government through democratic means when the process of decision-making is dominated by corporate interests. There are only two paths left to effect change: overt rebellion or non-cooperation. Rebellion is counterproductive, resulting only in an entrenched militarist response in defense of the status quo. As we've seen world-wide, the corporate oligarchy has all the guns and they're willing to use them against the people. Any violent opposition to the government legitimizes a violent and oppressive response. We are left then with non-cooperation. If we turn our backs on the corporate oligarchy and refuse to participate in their materialist, consumer culture, with its associated baggage, we withdraw our energy and power from the system and keep it to ourselves, to be applied in the construction of a grass-roots society and government based on personal responsibility, self-reliance, mutual aid and community. This decentralized approach is the only viable answer to centralized, authoritarian hegemony. Not only does it give power directly to the people, it frustrates the ability of the central authority to wage a war of oppression against the people. If they cannot find the leaders, the troublemakers, the organizational structure, they have no one but the masses of the people to attempt to intimidate and co-opt. "Think of an army that exists only on the day of battle and then melts into the forest to fight another day." Patu Te Weke, last of the Maori warriors. If the power to build society is dispersed among all the people, no one can concentrate power over any other. The legitimacy of the government rests in the willingness of the people to turn their power over to the central authority. A government without legitimacy is nothing more than a well-organized mob. The existing oligarchy has placed all their hopes in the basket of the oil economy, which is demonstrably failing, and very soon. The increasingly desperate attempts by the United States government to consolidate power over world energy sources demonstrates their knowledge of the precipice ahead. Rather than attempting to gain control of the car racing out of control toward the cliff, we're better off bailing out while we can and building a horse-drawn carriage. We'll ride slowly around to the base of the cliff and pick up the pieces to be used in building our own sustainable society. Michael Leona Gulch Pacific Plate |
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September 1, 2002 "I believe it is possible to find and live a balanced way of life somewhere halfway between all-out industrialism on the one hand and a make-believe pastoral idyll on the other. I believe it is possible to live an intelligent life in our cities - if we make them fit to live in - if we stop this trend toward joining city unto city until half the nation and half the planet becomes one smog-shrouded, desperate and sweating, insane and explosive urbanized concentration camp. "According to my basic thesis, if it's sound, we can avoid the disasters of war, the nightmare of the police state and totalitarianism, the drive to expand and conquer, if we return to this middle way and learn to live for a while, say at least a thousand years or so, just for the hell of it, just for the fun of it, in some sort of steady-state economy, some sort of free, democratic, wide-open society." Ed Abbey, Freedom and Wilderness, "The Journey Home" Unfortunately, we've waited too long. We now have the nightmare of the police state and totalitarianism, the drive to expand and conquer is firmly in control of the ship of state, ignoring the rocks ahead in the crashing foam. Abbey's vision of the fascist state in "Good News" is fully upon us, snuck in on us in the guise of the village idiot, the bumbling buffoon in the White House. The ruling minority no longer attempts to hide its totalitarian rule, nullifying elections with impunity, eliminating political opponents and outspoken representatives of Congress with a wave of the limp wrist. International opinion is ignored as with long jack-booted strides they stomp about the world as their very own playpen. The question now is not "Can we find a middle way?" The only question left is "How do we stop this new Hitler?" We are the German people of 1938, increasingly aware that the little painter is a megalomaniac, insane and in control of a fascist state apparatus of control. Do we turn away when Joe McAshcroft puts Arabs in jail without charges? Do we turn away when United States citizens are declared "illegal combatants" and jailed? Do we turn away when our neighbors are investigated and taken away for displaying an anti-war sign in their yard? The "election" of 2000 was clearly a putsch, a secret plan to take over the government of the United States regardless of the outcome of the election. It was engineered through Brother Bush in Florida, with the knowing cooperation of the Supreme Court. It was designed and implemented by a cabal of influential industrialists intent on solidifying corporate control of the United States and its strategic interests around the world. The United States is now a fascist police state bent on imperialist domination of the world, no different from Nazi Germany in 1938. We can't pretty up this picture with talk of democracy and freedom. The actions of the past two years deny this in every way, if there was ever any question about it. Our task now is infinitely more difficult, as we must find some way to defeat the fascist bulldogs in control of the United States while we are attempting to find a way to a sane human society. One path is through non-cooperation. We can turn our backs on this madness and be the change, knowing that the seeds of democracy and freedom will survive, we hope, through the dark ages. In the end, however, we must stand with the she-griz, boxed up, turning to face the howling dogs slathering at her heels, protecting her cubs from certain death. Michael Leona Gulch Pacific Plate |
High Noon |
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September 8, 2003 "It is curious - curious that physical courage should be so common in the world, and moral courage so rare." Mark Twain Once again, our Liar-in-Chief stands before the country and reads his prepared script. He plays his part fairly well, gesturing as indicated, pausing for effect when directed, trying not to giggle when the script calls for a somber demeanor. He's a bad actor over-playing the role of a corrupt and dishonest politician. He's never been as good at it as his Poppy, since he understands little of what he reads and therefore he can't believe in the lies he repeats. The Oval One's handlers would have us forget history and pretend instead that the United States invaded Iraq as part of the mythical War Against Terrorism, Part Duh, not because Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, as their spokespuppet repeatedly claimed, in four-part harmony with his British counterpuppet. We all shuffled our feet and looked down at the floor in embarrassment when the First Loonie made these absurd claims and denied any attempt to control access to oil in the Middle East. Now it's beyond embarrassing, bordering on malfeasance. The President-Select attempts to Bush aside our concerns for continuing resistance against the US inva... uh... (blush) liberation of Iraq by insisting that those nasties who continue to kill US and (nudge, nudge, wink wink) Coalition troops are remnants of Hussein's CIA-trained henchmen and henchwomen, with a liberal (or conservative) mix of our old nemesis: Outside Agitators! We cannot be allowed to assume that the actual people of Iraq are opposed to our take-over of their country, our denial of their religious freedom, our destruction of their water and electricity supplies, our failure to protect vital medical and educational facilities. Such might call to question the unquestionable moral superiority of the United States of America in world affairs; it might even suggest that the people of countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan hate the US because the US government has repeatedly bombed and murdered their countrymen and allies throughout the world! Thus the Cowboy image of the United States is maintained, the strong silent type, the white hat, the quick-draw revolver, walking out into the bright noonday soon to engage in single combat against the black-hatted dastardly foe, in defense of the honor of the fair damsel in distress. Of course the damsel in distress is corporate capitalism and the dastardly foe is any innocent civilians whose government dares to defend against US fascist imperialism: no matter; unimportant details. In a time when myth substitutes for reality, when lies displace historical record, when appearance transcends evidence, who better to lead the United States into obscurity than the ultimate drugstore cowboy on his made-for-TeeVee ranch, with its cardboard cutout cows artfully arrayed for the cameras, with President-for Effect, George W. Shane, lounging against the bed of his armored, depleted uranium enhanced pick-up truck, cow-shit carefully applied to his designer pointy-toed boots. |
| It's High Noon. Draw, Pardner! |
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Michael Leona Gulch Pacific Plate |
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July 12, 2003 As a result of recent international events, some people are saying that America is on a path that is a betrayal of our founding principles. I'm not sure what "America" they refer to. It's certainly not the people I know and meet from day to day. Most folks round these parts are pretty conservative, in the old-fashioned way of thinking. "Each man is as good as the next - if not a damned site better," as Ed Abbey said. The government, now, that's another story. The government has been taken over by a pack of petty thieves, grifters, card sharks and horse thieves. There's few in Washington who would recognize the truth if it lifted its leg and peed on their foot. Government seems to attract the type of low-life who thrive on despotism and repression, scuttling cockroaches who prefer the darkness of concealment to the open light of democratic participation. "'Say what you like about my bloody murderous government,' I says, 'but don't insult me poor bleedin' country,'" says Ed Abbey. The trick is to get the people back in control of the government. Guns won't help, in fact, guns just feed into the violent mentality of the mental deficients temporarily in control. They have a lot more guns than we do; any attempt at gun play from us is just an excuse to crank the manacles a little tighter. We don't need guns for crime control; we need a free people, good satisfying work at a decent wage, self-respect and self-reliance, ready access to accurate information, opportunities for learning skills relevant to life in our society, and most of all, more than anything else, we need free and open wilderness to salve the wounds of sick society. The mental straight jacket that confines us comes in crushed velvet, with matching cummerbun and diamond studs. It comes on the air waves as thudding rap, mindless pop and hateful talk. It comes on the TeeVee as empty newsertainment, disinformation and government lies, thoughtlessly repeated by corporate hacks. It's drowned in advertising, disguised as entertainment, packaged as distraction from numbing, meaningless jobs. The gilded chains that bind us most firmly are security, safety and necessity. We've been trained for generations to look to others to keep our neighborhoods and country secure. We've been encouraged to give away our freedoms for the illusion of safety. We've been convinced by appeal to necessity to take off our shoes at the airport and hand them over to our keepers to make us safe and secure. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." William Pitt Many people are unwilling to give up a feeling of security for real freedom. Those in government whose authority depends on the continuing willingness of the people to trade away their political and economic power, intentionally manipulate the people's perception of insecurity in our world. As long as the people remain afraid and uneasy, the whip, the chains and the gun are unnecessary... at least for the subjects at home. It's hard to tell just what it would take to break enough people from the grip of insecurity, deceit and disinformation to confront and depose the new tyrants. Perhaps we'll never know. One can hope, when hope fades to the limit of sight, that economic or environmental collapse, or the inevitable combination of both, will strip the obscuring film from the eyes of the people, allowing them to see, finally and ultimately, the trail to freedom laid out before us. It's a hilly and rocky trail, never easy, never paved. The trail runs straight and true from this clinging mass of a collapsing, sick and dying society to the attainment of true human freedom as cooperating members of the intricate web of all life on this planet. Leona Gulch Pacific Plate |