The Thin Ice

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/after-romney-s-visit-ahmadinejad-slams-u-s-republican-for-kissing-israel-s-foot-1.454965?localLinksEnabled=false

I wonder if Iran has been making inroads with their Sunni neighbors.

It would make sense, since they're dealing with a common issue.

Contrary to Romney's opinions on the matter, they're not stupid people void of cultural heritage or significance.

This is a very old section of the world.

With a long and rich history surrounding them.

And, if they are joining forces under the table, in spite of religious, linguistic and cultural differences, Israel may be facing a bigger threat than it really realizes.

And all they need to do to mitigate it, realistically, is to treat the Palestinians, the Arabs and the Iranians with dignity, respect and kindness.

Assuming it's not already too late to do that.

Think about it.

Cause I doubt that the Israelis or the Americans really are.

And, won't they look foolish at the end of the day if and when their little project is swept into the sea.

All because the Israelis couldn't accept, comprehend and work with the concept of basic compassion and respect for those who are not of their heritage.

Oh well.

Silly brains.

Oh well.

Think about it.

Afghan Governance

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2012/0731/Afghan-governance-more-Judge-Dredd-than-Jefferson?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+feeds%2Fcsm+%28Christian+Science+Monitor+|+All+Stories%29

Uh, welcome to how they end up organizing themselves, regardless of what foreign intervention tells them to do?

From the get go, we probably shouldn't have allied with the Northern Alliance to get rid of the Taliban, and should have realized that in the history of Afghanistan, the state out of Kabul frequently becomes just another actor competing against the local and regional leaders of the country.

That's not to say that Afghans don't actually have a sense of nationality and unity in spite of their ethnic, linguistic, cultural and religious differences.

It's a very old world over there that has a long history of being together, in one form or another.

It's just that the centralized state that we're accustomed to in the West isn't necessarily going to be the model that will, actually, work for the Afghans, and may, actually, prove to be counter productive to their overall well being.

Personally, after taking a class on Afghanistan with the esteemed Dr. Vikash Yadav (who's blog on Afghanistan is used by the US military for training purposes), I would say that the closet approximation that we could get for successful Afghan governance would be a decentralized confederation, rather than a centralized federation out of Kabul.

In the end, I think that the Afghans should have been given a lot more leeway in deciding how they are to be organized and governed, in spite of what we'd call "democracy," simply because, in the end, that option would have been the most democratic thing they could have done.

The world will not chose to organize itself according to Western standards, anymore than the West will not chose to organize itself according to others' standards.

Each system has its benefits and it's costs.

And those should be respected, such that people can govern themselves in the ways that would make the most sense for them, and lead them to the happiest lifestyles that are possible, regardless of what others may think.

If there is a conflict in what we would call universal human rights.

I think that that situation would be best handled internally by the offending society in question. 

Even on such hot button issues such as gender and minority rights.

We don't even do those well here, in the United States.

Why should we tell others how to do it in their own country?

Especially when the long arc of history really does bend towards something like justice, in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Sometimes, you've got to let the world work out its own problems.

And you can't always expect it to go well for your own sake when you chose to meddle.

Look at me.

I'd love to help with this kind of stuff.

But I can't.

And that's just something that I gotta deal with for now, if at all.

Think about it.

Cause you're more likely to screw yourself over when you don't.

Think about it.

Let's Grow Together

http://thediplomat.com/flashpoints-blog/2012/07/30/whys-chinas-navy-in-the-mediterranen/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+the-diplomat+%28The+Diplomat+RSS%29

Honestly, so long as we keep the edge as far as our Air Force, Navy and cyberwarfare units are concerned, I'm not concerned about the Chinese military.

We have no reason to go to war against the Chinese. And they have no reason to go to war against us.

We do not need to land ships to fight the PLA or get within range of their carrier-buster missiles.

It would be a senseless war of attrition between ships, planes and viruses/hacks.

And it's only in the latter area that we're, so far, lacking.

As much as I'm going to be cautious about interacting with other countries and societies.

I see no reason for us to be hostile or competitive with the Chinese, or anyone else for that matter.

And, in fact, see a tremendous amount of potential for collaboration, interaction and joint benefit against potential foes that are unknown to us at the present moment.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/29/ufo-over-olympics-opening_n_1716887.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular

Why aim the weapons at each other or quibble about who has "top spot" in the world when there is so much else that could be done.

Think about it.

The New Strategy Regarding Israel

http://www.vice.com/read/an-alleged-interview-with-the-leader-of-hamas-ismail-haniya

Regardless of the interview's authenticity, if these travel plans are accurate, it is signaling the resurgence of Islamism in the Middle East.

And, Israel is going to have to watch itself and its citizens a LOT more carefully if it's going to expect to stay on that piece of real estate.

Because the neighborhood is moving in together.

These are not the Arab dictators that were each in it for their own personal gain who, still, almost defeated Israel during the last major war.

This is a much more unified and cohesive bloc.

And, really, the one thing that the Israelis need to do, is be nicer to their Palestinian/Arab neighbors and cease depriving them of their rights, their dignity and their resources, such that they can all live comfortably together.

It can come at minimal cost to them, and yield significant benefits in the long run.

And the United States can influence that process for the improvement of the Israeli position in the region, as well as our own.

What is the one thing that will keep them in balance?

Compassion!

Think about it.

Compassion.

http://www.vice.com/vice-news/renegade-jewish-settlers-full-length

Seriously, this is not going to end well for the Israelis if they keep this up.

And I don't care how much technology they bring to bear to protect themselves and their soldiers against the onslaught that could be building against them, if they continue on this callous course of action.

As General Patton observed from history:
"Nobody ever defended anything successfully, there is only attack and attack and attack some more."

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change." -Charles Darwin

And, it will only be their fault, as well as ours, if they should end up being swept into the sea as a result of this springing in the Arab world.

Think about it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZBUeFi8cA8

On Russia

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2012/07/201273115211951682.html

That's the thing about Russia.  Even the "good" guys are likely to have something dirty on their record.  Which kind of makes it so there are no real "good" guys or, necessarily, any bad ones either.

It's a complicated society.

Much like the rest of the world that's around it.

Yet Russia is still something unique onto itself, in spite of the similarities.

Which is something that, at least, can be admired and respected.

Think about it.

Cause they're not going to be going away.

Anymore than we are in this world, that is beyond our brains and our brains hopes, conceptions, perceptions and wishes.

Think about it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK_cCh92Q8U&feature=related

India and Medicinal Policy

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-19060279

This stinks.

This is precisely why I think that successful policy and government is a lot like the science and execution of medicine.  Every once and awhile, you're going to get crises (such as half your electric grid going off-line) that have to be dealt with in a precise, effective, and, frankly, surgical manner.

The rest of the time, you establish a policy regimen, not unlike that of a drug medicine for a person with a chronic illness, that can be tinkered with and refined as time goes on in order to produce more effective and positive results in the world, that can be experimented with and tested in order to determine their validity.

Otherwise, you're basically just making the world a more difficult place to live in and earning the resentment of the people (and the world) that you're responsible for, socially and ecologically.  This then translates into poorer election results for yourself, or, in the case of dictatorships, the greater possibility for overthrow and conspirators whom you will have a harder time legitimately dealing with.

You don't need to believe me.

This, like science, is just one perspective on it.

But I hypothesize that this is the way that yields the best possible results for us, in spite of the difficulties that we face on a regular basis.

Don't take my word for it.

Think about it for yourselves.

Cause we're all boned if we don't.

Think about it.

The 5 Elements, and the Real Value of Money

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/07/201273091920225735.html

Wow....

This is the difference between value and money, playing out right here.

The Brazilian drug dealers value relative peace and stability over money.

And look at the benefits that they realize from doing so.

Again, as a human being, you don't need money to survive past a certain point.

You don't eat it.

You don't breath it.

You don't drink it.

You don't live with it.

Or in it.

In order to be a healthy individual, these five conditions: the edible, the breathable, the potable, the sociable and the habitable, need to be met first.  Else, the individual becomes sick and/or dies off, which leads to further complications for those who are more distanced from the problems (through a lack of physically and psychologically healthy labor and talent, specifically).

And, it's a shame that the world is currently being led by those individuals, whose brains have forgotten these five basic needs of humanity, and have prioritized everything into money, which is a useless sixth element in comparison to the five that are vital for health and well being as organisms at the most basic level.

And, you don't need to believe me in order for it to be the case.

Think about it.

Cause we're royally boned if we don't.

Think about it.

A Message to the Troops

To the soldiers and sailors of the United States of America.

Please remember who loves you.

Who cares for you.

And who supports you as you go out to do what you need to do.

Remember those who disregard you.

Who use your efforts pointlessly.

And who get you and yours killed as a result of their carelessness and greed, in wars that only make things worse for the rest of us here at home.

Please remember who have been there for you and yours when the time has come to support you.

And, remember those who have left you and yours to die ceaselessly in the fields of far off battle, where there was no fight at all before they got there.

The Alien Nation?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/29/ufo-over-olympics-opening_n_1716887.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular

Was this planned?

Seriously, it's probably a foolish thing to think that we're the only sentient life living in this universe of ours.

But to think that there's actually a kind of contact between us and them already?

That's a little much for me to plausibly believe.

Still, I think that because of the likelihood that there is sentient alien life in the rest of the universe, we should begin preparing for our encounter with them.

That would mean an increase in cooperation on security issues and a decrease in competition amongst the various countries, states and peoples of this planet. There's no sense to disarm ourselves, but there is sense to not use them against each other.

And that's all that I have to say on that subject.

Think about it.

The Drug Trade

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/07/2012721152715628181.html

Well, the simplest thing to this is that you can't fight the drug trade.  Even other animals seek out mind-altering experiences, sometimes at their own physical and psychological detriment.

Rather, the more effective thing to do, for everyone (including for us here in the United States), would be to legalize and decriminalize the drug trade such that we can more effectively get help to those who are using (drying up the market forces behind the drug trade), eliminate the criminal ends of the operations that inevitably spring up when you have something high in demand like illegal drugs and save billions of dollars in tax payer money that could otherwise be used for more effective social and economic policies for the benefit of the people and the leadership savvy enough to realize this.

It's a question of math and figuring out the empirical causes to the issues that we're experiencing in this world, and then developing effective policy regimens to combat them.  A lot like a doctor coming up with a prescription regimen for a person that has chronic illnesses.

We can't get rid of all the problems in the world.  Human error and random events are always going to plague us and our species living on this planet.  But we can do our best in spite of these difficulties and live relatively comfortable lives as a species, individually and collectively, on this tiny little rock in space that we call home, and beyond.

It's not a question of opinion or bias.

It's a question of doing what actually works best in the world around you.

And it's only in our brains that it really matters otherwise.

Silly brains.

Think about it!

The Significance of the Islamists to US and Israeli Policy

http://www.aljazeera.com/video/middleeast/2012/07/201273081149683986.html

It was like this in Libya too.

http://www.vice.com/vice-news/waiting-for-al-qaeda-full-length

Honestly, I think we're about to see the greatest rise in challenges against the United States and the State of Israel the world has ever seen.

This will not be a discombobulated group of secularist autocrats, but a more unified force of Islamists coming to power. 

And, unless we change our attitudes and our policies towards these people (while maintaining our own defensive interests at home, of course) we will be swept out of the region like dust on a mantlepiece.

As for Israel: if it doesn't change it's attitudes and stances towards the Arab/Palestinian people and the Islamic world that's around them, they will, I think, be swept into the sea by an overwhelming and organized tide of Islamic fervor.  And, I think, that if the United States wishes to protect Eretz Zion, it would be in our interests to apply pressure to Israel to change it's attitudes and policies in the region.  Otherwise, we could see yet another genocide of the Jewish people.

And it will all be self-inflicted by the time it gets there.

Think about it.

Cause the winds are changing, once again.

And we need to adjust course and sail in order to maintain ourselves as best as we can on this apparently infinite journey to nowhere in particular.

Think about it.

Eli's Law of Leadership

For every leader that goes into power, an equal number comes out.

And it's only in your brain that it works out to be otherwise.

Think about it.

Concerning the True "Power" of Propoganda

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2012/07/201272916371456512.html

You know, it's funny that the brainwashing hasn't quelled the popular discontent against the government and the government officials. Nor did it stop the Protestants from coming to something new against the Catholic Church (as another example of this). Nor did the "well trained" Germans come to the defense of the dying Third Reich.

When are leaders going to learn that these kinds of things only work when the subjects in question are willing to go along with them.

And, yes, I do happen to know a thing or two about this stuff from my own personal life and my own personal experiences.

Silly little people.

Silly brains.

Silly people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadomasochism

Think about it.

And They Wonder How the Economy Hasn't Picked Up Yet

http://www.aljazeera.com/sport/london2012/2012/07/201272995336893788.html

My hypothesis is that it's a recession and tickets are expensive.

This is what happens when a majority of people aren't doing well, in spite of the success of some businesses and personal elites.

The business well dries up.

And people spend less into the economy simply because they have less to spend.

It's a basic aspect of our world.

And it's a shame that it becomes politicized, argued over and largely ignored.

You want economics to be a science.

Then make it so.

And pay attention to the effects and consequences of the actions and choices of government, businesses, business leaders and banks on THIS plane of existence.

Forget your ideologies.

And look at it.

Cause we're going to be going nowhere until we get it figured out.

Matter of fact, we could end up backsliding down the hill of development.

And I don't think that's something that any political leader really wants to have on their name.

Don't you think?

Think about it.

Non-violence

Why aim weapons at each other, when there are potentially greater threats lurking beyond the stars that we may have to fight out of self defense?

So much waste down here on Earth.

Think about it.

An animal in the wild does not give up their defenses. The universe beyond the brain is not a peaceful place. And there are, perhaps, going to be moments when we'll encounter other species living on other planets.

It would be foolish to disarm ourselves and/or not make preparations for onslaughts from beyond the stars.

That being said, do we really need to be pointing them at each other?

What good does that do for us?

It's expensive.

It's socially and psychologically damaging.

It destroys economies and infrastructure.

Why behave like a bull in a china shop?

Especially when it's the bull's own china shop, when push comes to shove?

Therefore, save the conflicts for the negotiating tables of the world.

And put the guns away.

Don't shoot your own kind.

Or any other kind, for that matter, unless they are, without provocation, shooting at you first.

Be like the Federation.

You can keep the phasers, and the photon torpedoes.

You can even build phasers and photon torpedoes for all I care.

Just don't point them at each other.

And that's probably the best at this point, that we're going to be able to do while living on this planet, in this universe.

Think about it.

And, good luck.

Think about it.

An Urgent Plea

In our own case, we have a number of difficult challenges.  We have spoilers from the Tea Party and other Conservative factions, as well as anarchists and militantly inclined leftists that will hamper the inevitable negotiations between the upper crust of this country and the rest of the world.  We also don't have an effective means of applying pressure to the upper crust beyond mass demonstration or militant action, targeting economic and personal stakes.

I see violence and chaos coming down the pike, if the government does not make the changes that are needed now.  And, it will be the government that will be making these decisions, because that is its fundamental role in a society, whether you like it or not, and whether you chose to accept it or not.

We are on the brink of a massive overthrow of a system, not seen since the era of Apartheid collapsed.

And our leadership is busy dicking around rather than working to solve the crisis.  On BOTH sides of the official aisle.

And, unless I get noticed ASAP.

There will be nothing that I can do about it.

Think about it.

There will be nothing that I can do about it.

Think about it.

On the Leaders' Position to the Society

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/07/201272310585642542.html

A lengthy, if interesting piece from Mr. Noam Chomsky.

Personally, I think that there will always be a kind of ruling class in our world. The question is how do they relate to the rest of the world that is around them, human and otherwise.

When they mistreat. When they neglect. When they are willfully or unwillfully ignorant of something that's happening in their world. When they are malevolent. When they are uncaring about the cries of pain from billions of people around the world, it ultimately is a reflection of their own failings and weaknesses as leaders. And, it is reflected in the world that is around them, in purely demonstrable and repeatable senses.

Sometimes, it gets so bad that the people rise up against their leaders, and institute new leadership following the collapse and fall of the old.

Sometimes, the environment does that job just as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadomasochism

The only cries of pain that should be heard around the world, are the ones that the people willingly and conscientiously endure for one reason and another, in addition to the ones that are caused by forces beyond our control. Otherwise, the world is a very dark and dismal place.

And the pump is primed for change of leadership, once again.

Think about it.

Cause you're going to be boned if you don't.

Think about it.

On Arms Treaties and On Weapons In General

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19025542

These are more deadly than any nuclear weapon.  They kill more people, per day, than any of the non-conventional weapons that we have, rightfully, controlled and regulated.

Again, I'm in favor of gun ownership.

But I'm also in favor of keeping them out of the hands of criminals and the mentally unstable.

And that's precisely what this treaty would do.

Other than that, there are the business considerations behind the global arms market.

However, when one stacks them up against the economic benefits of peace (again, in purely demonstrable, tangible and financial terms), one has to wonder, what is the point of supporting a particular sector of the economy that poisons the rest of the economy?

Just like the banks, weapons manufacturers are only a sector of the bigger picture of the economy.

And they do more to destroy the overall economic/social picture, rather than aid and benefit it.

Hence it begs the question, why should we invest so heavily in international arms?

Russia?

China?

US?

Think about it.

There are better alternatives out there, for their own sakes and their own benefits.

And I'm honestly shocked that they haven't figured that part out yet.

Think about it.

Silly brains.

Think about it.

A Message to the 1% and Those Who Support Them Tacitly

Doing a case study on Apartheid South Africa. Looking at the present situation in this country, I'd say this is probably one of the closest models that we can have towards moving forward from the conflict that's beginning to mount between the haves and the have nots.

I see a great change coming to this country, whether people like it or not.

And it would be best that we all take steps now to address these issues effectively and for the sake of the society/country as a whole now, lest we all get swept up into a very potentially messy affair indeed that will benefit no one. Least of all, the people who have.

I get that you want to live the high life, or you want to live in individual freedom from the government. The high life is possible, but the individual freedom in the ways that you understand it is not possible. You're still connected to the rest of the world, and you're still dependent upon it, as much as it is dependent upon you doing your part within it, for it.

You can continue to maintain your own views on the individual/collective debate.

But you're the ones who are going to be burned by it in demonstrable and tangible ways if you continue to act and behave in the ways that you do.

It's only in your brain that it works otherwise.

That sad, isolated, oblivious and lonely brain of yours.

And you never need to take my word for it.

Think about it.

China's Democracy Is Already a Reality Pt. 2

http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Global-Viewpoint/2011/1017/China-s-political-system-is-more-flexible-than-US-democracy

And, this is where democracy enters the picture.

When there's enough discontent with a system or a political grouping of people, they're most likely kicked out of their offices either through democratic elections, or through brute force. 

We've seen this done countless times in the past, and yet leaders don't seem to pay much attention to it, for their own sakes and their own benefits.

I believe that the Communists can continue to rule China and solidify their position in the world, if they make the intelligent decisions to both address their function issues as well as their popular social issues.

But in case they don't, I think it would be better for everyone involved (including the Chinese Communist Party) to exit peacefully through elections rather than risk another great uprising from the people of China.

It's only a thought.

And I'll leave you to think about it.

Think about it.

China's Democracy Is Already a Reality

http://thediplomat.com/china-power/chinas-new-political-class-the-people/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+the-diplomat+%28The+Diplomat+RSS%29

The Chinese govern (or at least, had governed), according to the "Mandate of Heaven."  I wonder if a more accurate phrasing of the phenomenon would be "Mandate of the People."  After all, when you're in political power, it's easier to take care of challenges to your rule than if you're unpopular or perceived as weak and dysfunctional.  In democratic terms, this means that it's harder for your opponents to win elections.

There's also the issue of there being fewer challenges to your position, since people in their right mind (who are the majority of people living on Earth, when all things are well), generally wouldn't be interested in removing you from power, and people would be less inclined to join up with the opposition as a result of your superlative behavior and governing skills.

Hence how you can ensure political longevity (if not actual immortality, since it's impossible to have in this universe of ours beyond our brains and our brains wishes).

Try it.

And watch.

It will be very interesting to see how China and the Chinese leadership handle themselves in these critical hours.

For their part, the Chinese people seem to like the one party system (http://ppq.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/01/18/1354068810382934.abstract) and that seems to be how they chose to democratically govern themselves, as a society.  The question then remains who holds that one party title, and by what legitimacy do they claim to hold it.

Again, successful policy is much like the science of medicine.  Crises happen and they require medical-like attention from the government, and regular policy regimens are needed to maintain and support a healthy society.  If you fail to act as such, you run the risk of losing everything that you've worked hard to achieve.

And it's only in your brain that it works out to be otherwise.

Try it.

Doesn't matter.

Just watch.

And think.

Think about it.

Cause you're going to be effed if you don't.

Think about it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fLUINWsoes&feature=g-vrec

French Forgive Ivory Coast Debt

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2012/07/2012726171730989279.html

Maha (great) props to the French government for this. This is certainly one way to help stimulate economic growth in a country.

It's only money after all.

And what's money to the demonstrable, tangible, human world in which we live?

Think about it.

It's only money.

On Multilateralism and International/Domestic Affairs

http://thediplomat.com/flashpoints-blog/2012/07/26/the-crisis-of-multilateralism/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+the-diplomat+%28The+Diplomat+RSS%29

I think the biggest problem to multi-lateralism is the fact that the states still wield incredible power and influence as individuals, and I don't see that changing at all in the forseeable future.

Fact of the matter is, unless we get a greater global consciousness from amongst the people who wield power, we will always be stuck in these state to state conflicts and battles for control, resources, prestige and wealth.

In fact, I think we're still going to be facing those divisive challenges to our world and our security, even if we truly come together and meld under international institutions.

We'll still likely have moments of scarcity that will leave some out and others in.

We'll still likely have issues dealing with resources allocation and division relative to our own senses of group and self-identity.

And violence is always going to be left on the table as a means of achieving those ends, even if we evolve to the point of realizing that it's a stupid thing to do, even for your own sake and benefit.

War and  conflict are apart of this universe as much as peace and stability.  And the only way we're going to see ourselves through it as well as possible is to learn how to live and get through those moments of turbulence as best as we can, individually and collectively.

For our own sake.

And our own benefit.

In the demonstrable, repeatable and tangible world that is around us, beyond our brains and our brain's hopes and desires.

Such is the universe.

And we can only look to our ownselves to deal with it.

Individually.

And collectively.

From now, until the end of time and beyond.

Think about it.

From now, until the end of time, and beyond.

Think about it.

On Gun Control

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2012/0725/Obama-calls-for-better-background-checks-on-gun-buyers?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+feeds%2Fusa+%28Christian+Science+Monitor+|+USA%29

I'm not opposed to people having guns.

In fact, I think that considering everything that is happening in American government, I'm very glad that the people have access to firearms, lest we should become a country like Egypt where the military's power supersedes that of the elected civilian government.  Not that it would matter, because they'd have to govern in the same basic ways using the same basic methods in order to achieve maximum effectiveness and efficiency.

But still, I don't see how this aspect of gun control: making sure that the people who are buying the guns aren't crazy or criminals, is such a big deal.

Those ideologues at the NRA seem to have no sense about the actual safety of firearms, the first rule of safety, being to keep them out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them, be they Mexican cartel runners, street criminals, or someone in a maniacal homicidal mood.

And I'm shocked that the Democrats haven't taken up this stronger line of defense of reasoned gun control.

How uncreative and dispassionate do you have to be in order to be one of them?

Think about it.

Silly brains.

Think about it.

On the Bank

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2012/0725/Ron-Paul-s-last-hurrah-a-big-bipartisan-vote-to-Audit-the-Fed?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+feeds%2Fpolitics+%28Christian+Science+Monitor+|+Politics%29

This is an old back and forth in American politics.

It happened under President Jackson as well.

He famously claimed to have "killed the bank".

Only to have it resurface some hundred years later as the Federal Reserve.

Personally, I don't see a way of actually killing the bank.

The most we can do is make the bank play it's role within the overall economy and make it play it well.

If it doesn't, it then faces an onslaught of wrath from the people living in the world around it, suffer casualties as a result of the pain it causes to others (you can't run an economy without a vast majority of people, emphasis on vast majority of people, doing well) or as a result of environmental collapse and degradation.  One way involves active participation from a majority of Americans.  The others are passive effects of economic negligence and unreasoned greed.

In all paths, they're hit.

So why not just do your job within the economy, and do it well?

For your own sake.

And your own benefit?

Silly brains.

Can't see their own self interest or be able to act effectively upon them.

What a bunch of silly people.

What a bunch of silly brains.

Should really be checked out for psychiatric illnesses.

And that's all I have to say on the matter.

Think about it.

That's all I have to say.

Think about it.

On Police Work

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/07/201272652557407246.html

This is also known as not good police work.

Police, technically, should be trained in the arts of conflict resolution and peacemaking.  Not in "authority" and "power".

The idea is to mitigate conflict and promote a safe, peaceful social environment.

Not aggravate and inflame it due to "macho" tactics.

But such is the way that our current system works.

Such is the way that their brains are operating.

Such is the logic that is being applied.

Silly brains.

Silly logic.

Silly behavior.

Think about it.

Silly behavior indeed.

Think about it.

Automobiles Francais

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2012/07/2012725103853935231.html

Let's hope this works.

My whole argument is on the line here.

If this doesn't work out like I've hypothesized it would, we have to examine it to find out what went wrong and compare how it was different to the case of Detroit which was a success for the US auto industry.

Remember, I'm only really providing a method for examining and working with policy.  Different policies are executed in different ways, which changes the outcome of the policy in question (even if it is the same type of policy).

Just like how a procedure can be the same in surgery and come out with different effects in the end, depending upon the patient in question (each one is different, after all), and the work of the "doctor" in question.

It's only a matter of time before the moment of truth is revealed through empirical effect.  And that is what we can experience, test and analyze to maximize effectiveness and efficiency.

Bon chance.

Think about it.

Bon chance.

Cause it would suck if the other, more ideologically based and interest motivated side gains credence because of an error somewhere in the works.

And that, is the secret to political longevity in a democracy.  When you stop to think about it.

Think about it.

A Cautionary Prediction

To put it bluntly, the current system of Capitalism that we have in the world is doomed to failure.  So much wealth and power has been accumulated in the hands of so few, that the knee jerk reaction of people is, likely, going to be to take some kind of action which may or may not include deadly use of force against the people who have.

Neo-classical economics jams up the economic process.  It is a system and a theory that only works to put money into the hands of the firms and the firms' owners and shareholders.  It completely ignores the consumer end of the equation which powers the entire economy through market participation.  The consumer is, in short, the actual component of the economy itself that matters.  And when the consumers are able to do well, the firms are able to do well.

Therefore, my solution to the problem would be to do as we did during World War II and the Marshall Plan.  Both events involved massive investment into the economies of the United States and Europe at the absolute expense of those who already have significant amounts of wealth.  Their lifestyles were marginally effected, and as a result we were able to produce significant economic growth and restart the economies of Europe and the United States.  We also were able to use those moments of massive investment to determine the course of development of society and the economy for the betterment of the species as a whole, living on this planet, in ways that improved their physical and psychological well being.

The European Union effectively helped eliminate the need for war amongst the European states.  The investment in armaments produced the military industrial complex that we see today.  We can, at this moment, chose to produce a civilian oriented economy (thus eliminating a lot of the economic incentives for socially and financially costly wars and conflict building) that relies on clean and renewable energy/material resources through the orientation of investments and subsidies that the government (which directs everything within a society, including the choice to not direct) provides.

The banks, bankers, shareholders and executives responsible for the firms, for their part, are a measly group of middle men who have ruined the world economy and failed to ultimately fulfill their expected roles in the overall economic picture that they become responsible for.  Their psychiatric conditions are questionable, since they have chosen to sacrifice everything, including the the ability to live on this planet and with the rest of humanity that they depend on for their own lives and own well beings, for the sake of a marginally bigger pile of, what amounts to, cloth rag, which serves no purpose for survival and well being past a certain point.  They are, and seem to be willing, to go to the extremes of risking their own lives, healths and well beings, for the sake of these cloth rags, either through destruction of the planet and the destruction of the human social fabric that they depend on (physically and psychologically).  And, as we have seen in history gone past and current events, human beings typically react badly to being treated in such ways and manners, even resorting to acts of wonton violence and murder against those who are responsible for their problems, as well as to those who are not.  If the human element does nothing to correct these problems, the natural world around us will, as we pollute, waste and consume our natural environment to our own hindrance and/or extinction as a species.

And you don't have to believe any of this, in order for it to come to pass in the demonstrable, repeatable and tangible world around us.

It's only in your own brain that it works out to be otherwise.

And we can watch, observe, sense and test for all of this in the world around us, in spite of what you may want, hope for, think, believe and do to make the effects of actions be other than what they are.

The choice is up to you to do the right thing.

And I'm not talking about anything that's technically moral or religious when you examine it carefully enough.

Good luck.

And think about it.

Good luck.

Social Web Theory

Sociology is a field, which always seemed to me to lack a concrete basis for study. One of my lingering questions from studying sociology as an undergraduate was: “what was being studied in sociology” or rather “did sociology have a concrete thing to study.” A big chunk of this is no fault of the field or in the people who study it. Sociology is rife with personal biases and perspectives, which help to tamper and sway people's perspectives and conclusions about one thing or another. One can only see what one has the capacity and capability of seeing after all, and the field is full of ad infinitum examples where we can come close to the reality, but ultimately fail to understand and grasp that reality due to our own limitations and our own failings of perspective.

But don't other fields of scientific inquiry run into the same problems as sociology? Is sociology a field for scientific inquiry? If not, what is it then? These are honest questions which remained with me after I had graduated from Hobart and William Smith Colleges. And they are questions that I hope to try to answer through the course of this paper.

In order to begin questioning the scientific nature of sociology, one has to begin with the scientific nature of science. For the purposes of this paper, we will use the second definition of the word “science” from the Merriam Webster Dictionary: “a department of systematized knowledge as an object of studied; something that may be studied or learned like a systematized knowledge.”i This definition most clearly fits into what I am going to investigate, because I am precisely going to be trying to answer a question about a well regarded field of study that has already made extremely valuable contributions to our social, political and economic understandings and function. And I am being this precise with my language and my points, in order to clearly define where I am starting from when I go about doing my analysis of sociology as a science. Because as we see when we consider the philosophy of science, how you look at something determines a lot about what you see.

There are many lenses through which we can view our world and our place in our world. A sociologist will not look at the world in the same way as a biological pathologist, who will not see the world as a military historian who will not see the world as a single mother trying to support her children. This very paper is, in actuality, only the product of my own brain, and my own brain's observations, experiences and functions. But does that mean that there is no world for them to observe? Does it make each of their points moot and irrelevant? Or is there, rather, some objectivity to this world that is only subjectively viewable by our own brains and our own neural systems?
Consider a baseball. One can discuss its nature, it's color it's texture and all its other qualities in the light of subjective experiences. My neurons may not show the colors “white and red” to be the same as what you're seeing as “white and red.” You could very well be seeing what I would call “purple and green” when you look at that ball, and only call it “white and red” because that's the way you learned to call the colors that you're subjectively experiencing. But isn't there still, something called a ball for each of us to experience? Even if the differences are there, in the way we think about and experience that ball, is there still not a ball that is there that we are each experiencing subjectively in a repeatable and demonstrable fashion?

The answer, would be yes. There is a ball that is there. And there is a ball that is being experienced. And that objectivity then, only seems like an academic concept until you're all playing with the ball or your dog is playing with you and the ball, and there seems to be no reason to question the ball or its existence in the objective world that is around us. And it will continue to exist in a way that we can experience until it is somehow removed from our perceptive range of experience, either by its removal or our turning our attention away from it. That's not to say, then, that the ball does not exist without our experience. Indeed, this becomes another line of purely academic questioning as question the balls existence in the first place. You can argue and discuss and think about the ball's qualities. It is interesting to think about what happens to things when we're not perceiving or experiencing them in the world around us. But when push comes to shove, for the purposes of this paper, we are going to shelve such questions for another time, and focus on the apparent objectivity of the world in which we are living and are apart of in order to concentrate on that central question of “is sociology a science to begin with?”

So what does this objectivity mean for science, let alone, for sociology as a science? It means that there is, actually, something which then exists beyond what our brains see and experience, and beyond what they subjectively produce for us. There is not merely stuff “in” our brains or simply “out” of them which is totally alien and separate from us. We are objectively apart of it as much as it is objectively apart of us. We experience each other, our pets experience us, and we all compose this thing that we call the universe inseparably and together. According to our definition of science, that is precisely what is attempted to be studied in the first place, through each of the different lenses that are available to us. And science, again, is just one lens that we can use to observe this universe as it objectively is.

So to get back to my original question, is sociology a science? In order to answer this, we can consider the other fields which are already acknowledged as sciences, in order to draw out some of the similarities and some of the differences between the two groups.

When we consider the other sciences, we are thinking about the second definition of science in Merriam Webster's Dictionary. “A department of systematized knowledge as an object of study; something that may be studied or learned like systematized knowledge.”ii Biology studies aspects of life, living organisms and how they relate to each other and the environment in which they exist. Chemistry studies the relations between different types of atoms and the ways that their structures, functions and inner properties manifest themselves when placed in varying conditions and circumstances. Physics concerns itself with the sub atomic particles themselves, and the very root properties of the universe at its deepest and most subtle levels. There are a host of other fields which look at things through different lenses, and there are a host of sub-fields in each of these fields which specialize in the things that are being studied and where/how the lenses are being focused. But each of these fields are attempting to pick apart and comprehend the objectivity of the world around us in each of their fields. Each one is looking for the baseball of objective reality that exists at the center of our subjective perceptions and conceptions about the world. And they do so, according to very strict rules of research which, many do not become qualified in. Yet we each are scientists in their own regard, as far as perceiving and working with that objective reality is concerned. We all experience the baseball that is objective reality on a daily basis in our own subjective manners, even if we are not pursuing that truth deliberately or systematically or concentrated in a specific field. And the beauty about scientific investigation, is that it seeks out conclusions that are universally demonstrable and universally experiential in our world. Any fourth grader can plant a lima bean in different soils and determine which one works best. A scientist simply uses hundreds of lima beans, in order to statistically rule out any oddities in their conclusion, and get as accurate a picture of reality as possible. This brings us to a root debate within the field of science and the philosophy of science, which is important to our understanding of science itself, and will help us figure out whether sociology can be considered a science in its own right, alongside biology, chemistry, physics, geology and all the others that are present and are being developed as you likely read these words.
In the philosophy of science, there are two basic ways to think about science and observing data. The first is known as inductivism. The second is falsifiability. Inductivism concerns itself with what can empirically demonstrated as objectively true. This means that the information is repeatable and based on a myriad of different examples and results, which then prove one thing to be objectively true, not true and partially true. A famous thought experiment to demonstrate this point, is to imagine counting over a thousand swans, with each one being white. The conclusion that would be reached by the inductive approach, would be that all swans are white and that would be the end of the inquiry. Philosophers such as David Hume purported the theory of induction as a manner to understand all things during the 18th century period of Enlightenment thinking in the West.

However, there was found to be a logical flaw in this line of thinking, especially when it was found that not all swans were white, as originally thought at the time of Hume's writing. Black swans were discovered in Australia and first described in 1790 by British naturalist, John Latham. How then could the inductive approach be founded in what was actually there, since in only a second the whole conception of there being only white swans vanished in an instant as part of an unsolicited and unexpected discovery half a world away from Hume's England?

It would not be until the 20th century with the advent of Karl Popper that the philosophy of science would catch up with this practical flaw in its understanding the world. Popper argued that there was a logical falsifiability that could be made concerning every scientific observation and every inductively reached conclusion. Popper than argued that this was the way that we could observe objective reality. It compensated for where inductivism failed to grasp and be able to work with the largely unknown aspect of the cosmos.

Popper based his conclusion on the observation that science advanced when previously held theories were found to be untenable in light of empirical evidence. Aristotle's mechanics proved to be false by Galileo's experiments, and were then replaced by Newtonian physics. Newton's physics were, in turn proven to be false by Einstein, and replaced by quantum mechanics and special relativity. Each new theory had a greater explanatory power as evidenced by repeatable and universally observable and demonstrable occurrences in the field of scientific study.

Thus, we can see how the two concepts of science: inductivism and falsifiability, work together in scientific fields to produce the pictures of reality that we. Inductive reasoning seeks to eliminate falsifiability and explain and account for how everything empirically works and is. Falsifiability, on the other hand, never truly goes away, but always pushes back against inductive approaches to enhance our objective understanding about the objective world in which we live and are apart of. The two do not seem to so much as contradict each other, and neither seems left out of scientific investigation and scientific research. But through the process of learning and re-learning different theories in light of inductively presented evidence, scientific advancement is made, and we get a clearer picture about this place in which we are, also, inseparably apart of.
So, we now have this understanding about science, which we can apply to our question about sociology. Sciences, according to our definition of “science”, is first concerned with a specific area and concentration in order to uncover objective truths about the world in which we're objectively living. There is always the possibility that some part of the theory, or indeed, the entire theory itself, can be undone in light of specific evidence to the contrary, in order to enhance our understandings and explanations about the world around us. Science is therefore, something that is in the process of destroying and rebuilding itself through the process of inductive research and falsifiable theory testing. The object of science is to establish accurate and clear understandings about the subject which is being studied in the fullest of possible fullest of senses. And this is constantly being done in our own lives, as well as in the research laboratories where it is done systematically and deliberately in order to establish constantly evolving functional understandings about the world in which we are living, and are apart of. So, what, in all of this, has to do with sociology itself?
Sociology is a field of study concerned with the human society and all its related parts. It connects to psychology, political science, economics, biology, environmental sciences and cosmological studies (physics, astronomy, etc), and it subdivides into a host of different theories and branches depending on what and whom is being studied where and when. In short, it's a very incoherent subject to be a science alongside biology or physics. And yet, it also has the potential to do that, on top of everything else that it is and that it does.

The following is a sketch representation of a study I conducted while I was standing at a cash register working during the Christmas rush. The company I was working at was having a holiday donation drive for the local food bank, and while I scanned people out at the register and questioned them about a donation, I took note of if someone donated, how much they gave, as well as their gender, ethnicity and whether they were with others or not. The study was done without their consent, in order to not disturb the data from falling into place naturally, and no personal information was taken from any of the customers that were included in the study. It was carried out over four consecutive days and tallied four-hundred and nineteen individuals in whether they gave, how much they gave, and what their gender and ethnicity were and whether they were in a group or not.

What was interesting about this study was not exactly its statistical merits in and of themselves. It was a small study, carried out over the course of a small amount of days. It was mostly a white and female demographic, and it did not answer most of the questions you would expect to answer about reasons for giving or demographic trends in giving, etc. What this revealed to me was something different, and it was expressed on this small sketch drawing that I made after the study was over:

To me, this drawing represented the molecular structure of our human world, and the precise subject of study when it comes to sociology and social relations. The individual person in this model, represent the base units of analysis. They can be broken down, like atoms in chemistry, into psychological and physiological parts, which then make up and determine the whole that is the individual. The bottom represents the customers at the company, which includes the people who donated to the food bank. Everyone connects to the company on the right, but only a few connect to the food bank, represented center top. The company is broken down to its employees, to show the human element that is, actually, present when we think and talk about the company. A line connects the company to the food bank through its efforts. On the left are other organizations that support the food bank and the donation process (infrastructure, etc). These connect to the food bank, and are again, broken down into their employee elements. Center top is the food bank itself, broken down to its volunteers, which are then the ones who distribute the food to the needy at the top. All individuals have extra connections on them leading nowhere, indicating that each one has their own web of social connections, in addition to the ones pictured here. Around the whole thing, is the environment, which consists of local, planetary, and cosmological levels. Each one is connected to each of the individuals and organizations in question, and each one acts as one together to compose the world in which we all live in. What this sketch is intending to show, is our society on the molecular level that is concretely present and relevant in our lives, despite the subjectivity that exists when presenting this kind of data in the first place. You can fiddle with the exact connections more and change some of the ways to precisely represent it. You could, for example, have all the people in organizations surrounded by bubbles to represent the organization that they're apart of. You could then choose to have either show the people themselves relating to the project in question, or having a line drawn from the bubble to show the connections that they each put in. But you're going to come to the same basic model sets with the same basic features again and again and again and again. This can all be looked at and tested in its own right and I encourage anyone to do so earnestly and honestly. Inductively testing this model and contemplating falsifiable options with regard to it are the only ways we're going to advance our comprehension of this world in which we're living in and apart of. This is what is present, in a very base and very sketch and very small outline of it. But it's there nonetheless. And we can use this kind of analysis to break it down further and understand it more about how these connections are relevant and how they function in the world. But they are there, nonetheless. And this representation is, what I would consider, the basis for scientific study and research in the field of sociology.

We have then, established, from this small study, a clear subject that sociology can study empirically. That is, the relations and inter-connectivity of individual members of this species towards others, and their implications in the lives of the subjects in question and those connected to them in various ways. We have, what is then, a chemical basis for human society that can be objectively and empirically observed and tested.
And what of the other points about science? The induct-ability and falsifiability? The fact that it is merely another lens through which we can observe the world outside of our brains and our brains existing conceptions and perceptions about the world? All of those are still there. This is just another theory when push comes to shove, that is waiting to be destroyed by better collected evidence and more nuanced experiments, which will reveal contradictory information and data. The process of science lives on, as does its place in the grand scheme of things. It's only a tool that some of us are using at the moment to get at truths and objective actualities about the world around us that our brains alone wouldn't understand or cannot begin to conceive of. The nature of science is preserved in the study of sociology as does its spirit in the brains of those who pursue it as a field of study.

So, in all of this subjectivity and all of this haze of personal perspective, is sociology a science? In my own view, yes, it is. It, like all the other sciences that are out there, is only a lens through which we perceive the outside world. And that, depends a lot on the person's tastes and personal brain function. In my own view, sociology does, indeed, have a clear subject to study in all the myriad of ways of doing it. And I think that, when taken in this light, it has all the credibility and grounding of the so called “hard sciences”, with the added relevance it has towards our personal lives and personal experiences living in this world. Sociology has a subject of study. It can be done inductively and empirically. It is limited by falsifiable theories and understandings about the world. And it is subject of study is as objectively grounded in this cosmos in which we're living, as all of the other sciences. It is therefore, not an abstracted field of study and theory alone, but a very real subject of study in our own lives and our own experiences as living beings living together on this very small rock in space.

On Self-Preservationist Government Pt. 1

Abstract:

Policy and governance is not about what the leader(s) choose to do. It's about what's needed at a given time and place, separate from the leaders' interests and perspectives and desires. The world has it backwards in these ways of thinking. And the leadership(s) of the world are coming to realize this all too late to save their own careers (or hides) from the inevitable thing coming down the pike towards them.

Intro:

Since our evolutionary conception, humankind has grappled with the question of “how to live.” For tens of thousands of years we've grappled with the different question of “how to govern.” Both are essential for our well being and survival, and yet one is an evolutionary step up from the other. “How to govern”, relates more to our more sophisticated ways of organizing and operating ourselves collectively and individually. “How to live”, deals with our immediate survival needs, and is an evolutionary step down from the previous point.
Each human community on Earth has developed their own unique way of organizing themselves for day to day living and long term planning and decision making. While each community has come up with something different, they've nevertheless followed a common thread of eliminating pure anarchy and establishing some kind of legitimate basis for making decisions and organizing themselves, socially and economically, within the group and amongst different groups of different people. More will be explained later about the precise definition of “governing” and “government” in this paper. And it relates to the sophisticated organization of the group, as well as to the respective individual behaviors that they encourage and produce.

In 1513 an Italian man by the name of Niccolo Machiavelli wittingly or unwittingly codified and articulated the first basic principles of governing and statesmanship. However, they were based on the political realities of 16th century Europe, and many of his ideas have actually proven themselves to be caustic to a society and, by extension, the elite class that would attempt to wield them. An excellent example of this is his assertion to kill any and all opposition to the governing body should opposition arise.i It is not only considered completely unacceptable by most people and ruins a considerable amount of potential and talent from within the society, but also has demonstrated itself to be an impractical way of handling public opposition. The Syrian massacre at Hama in 1982 and the Chinese massacre at Tienanmen Square in 1989 both prove to be excellent examples of this occurrence. Both states are currently facing widespread discontent and opposition to their regimes, in spite of their “effectiveness” at dealing with the opposition through ruthlessly forceful means. And both are examples that will be used later in this paper to discuss key moments when these principles of governance come into play.

Historically, and in modern times as well, it has been demonstrated that, not only does might not make right, but it also has an uncanny ability to backfire on the mighty, and those who would seek to be mighty. Similar to Machiavelli, this text will go through case by case to explain and articulate an argument for a new kind of governing and a new kind of rationale for the inevitable elite and the people who compose the entire subject of the world that these elite find themselves responsible for.

Argument:

On Subjectivity and Objectivity:
In order to discuss the concept of governing, I think it is important to first check in with reality and what reality is going to mean in this paper. Within the subjectivity of perception that exists within our species, there is an objectivity to the world in which we live in. This objectivity exists whether we are aware of it or not, and it acts upon our lives in spite of the things that we attempt to do to make it be otherwise. It is that which can be repeated, that is what's universally observable (even if it is observed in different ways and in different means) and that which acts independently of human thought and ideation. A ball exists objectively in the world in which we live. You can argue and discuss its color or its nature as much as you'd like; but it doesn't stop you and everyone else from being able to experience it again and again and again, until it is objectively not in your range of perception. The ball exists, for the purposes of this paper, and you'd be answering purely academic questions if you were going to question it otherwise. As interesting as that can be, for the purposes of making an argument, this paper will avoid such lines of questioning.

It is that objectivity of the world that is the subject of government and governing. And it is that objective world that is impacted through the actions and decisions that the individuals of that government and governing process make, which are themselves, objective in their own right due to the effectiveness they have on the world, even if they are derived from human initiated action. You do not have to believe me in order for objectivity to exist or not. It simply is, and whether you think it does or not ends up being irrelevant in the face of the objective impacts that it has on your own objective self, and that you have on it for your own objective benefit or destruction.

Because the effects of policy and governing manifest themselves in the objective world, the decisions and processes can be tested and examined in the world by virtually anyone with eyes, ears and sense, in order to gauge the impact and effect of their actions and decisions on the world in which we live and they live as well. Therefore, governing and policy takes on an air similar to that of cooking. It is difficult to effectively play off a bad meal, like it is difficult to play off a bad piece of policy that is negatively affecting the whole. You can fancy it up and hide some things, but most people's sense of taste, smell and touch is going to cut through it and experience an objectively poorly prepared meal. Notice, this does not subjectively try to meddle in the existential qualities of one thing or another. It simply is pointing out that there is something that's out there, which we all experience, albeit, differently, that is objective, and that way in which we interact with it has objective implications for our own lives and our own livelihoods that are fully experiential, demonstrable and tangible. You don't have to subjectively try to assign a rating to the meal in question. You can simply sense the way in which the person prepared the objective meal in question, and your senses, by virtue of your evolutionarily developed qualities to distinguish objectively amongst and between qualities for your own sake and your own benefit, are then what help you assess that objective reality that you are experiencing subjectively. This then has implications about your own objective health and odds for well being and survival, depending on how in tune your senses are to that objectivity. It's possible for your own senses to be off in this regard. But the effects on yourself and on others is still going to be there, whether you subjectively choose to believe it or not. It's not academic. It's simply how things seem to work for ourselves and other living beings on this planet.

We can consider squirrels and other small animals as excellent examples for this kind of situation. Being hit by a car is objectively bad for the animal in question. Those who flee the car moving towards them (and therefore, demonstrate some level of comprehension about objective dangers to their own selves and their own sakes), are more likely to survive and be able to pass on their genes. Those who don't sense the danger of the oncoming two tons of metal, or aren't fast enough to get themselves out of the way of the car, are more likely to become roadkill and not live on to pass on their genes. The squirrels are sensing that reality and then having choices be made by their brains to do one thing, or another. Objectivity is only an academic question until you're getting hit by it, or rather in these cases that I will discuss, you're hitting yourself with it.

This establishes the base understanding about the world in which we're living, which is necessary in order to comprehend and understand the remainder of this argument. There is a solid, objective reality that effects us all. Some of us are apparently better at being able to sense this reality and to use it in our daily lives, for our personal well being. I will now continue on with the definition of government, followed by the out-line of the ethic and practice of this system of government, and then finish it off with case examples and a discussion of the final caveats which we encounter in this place that limit optimal function of these principles.

The Definition and Subject of Government:
In order to better organize and articulate this piece, it is first necessary to define what is meant by governing and government when they are referred to in the text. Governing is a process whereby individuals within a society come together in order to solve questions and problems related to their society's function, and government is simply the organization within the society which carries those processes out. Government then exists within society, which then exists within the bigger context of the ecological system in which it finds itself in, which by extension, leads to the bigger cosmological environment in which we exist and are inseparably apart of. Imagine it being like an infinity loop, whereby the people in the government represent the smallest of aspects about the cosmos at the human level, who then become the ones with the biggest impact on the rest cosmos around themselves through their actions and decisions, and the objective consequences that those objective actions have on the rest of the cosmos. Its positive or negative nature is only determined by the effect that its members have on the society and the environment in which it is apart of. And that includes for their own sake and their own benefit. Academic questions about its size and function end up being irrelevant because governments everywhere serve this specific purpose within society and carry out the same basic functions within society. Everything is relevant under the government's sphere, and everything is possible to be the subject of the government's influence. The questions about government then become how legitimate the government's presence in the respective area is within the societal and ecological context (how well it and its members fit in with it) and how effectual it can realistically hope to be within that given area its members have chosen to bother with.

For the purposes of this paper, I will avoid moral and ethical questions and focus wholly on the amoral and practical side of the issues at stake. What you'll find, is that the two concepts, morality and practicality, are not far apart from one another, and are in fact, often one and the same thing for one's own sake and for one's own benefit in governance. More of this will be fleshed out in the next section, concerning the ethic and practice of government that suits the needs and interests of those who are seeking to wield it.

The Practice of Self-Interested and Self-Preservationist Governing:
Throughout history, many leaders have come to power and, interestingly enough, an equal amount have come out of it. How they left and for what reason says a lot about their character as a person. How they left is also where we see these principles that I'm referring to play themselves out in the objective world, whether we are cognizant of them or not. Leaders typically want to stay in power. People who participate in these kinds of actions and behaviors, typically seem to want to stay in places of higher status that garner greater material wealth, and these people typically want to occupy these places as long as they possibly can and as best as they can for their own selfish selves and their own selfish sakes. So, the question that this paper is working with, oddly enough, is: “how exactly can this be accomplished safely and reliably”? The answer, I think, is oddly counter intuitive to what you'd expect. And this is, again, in light of historical and current events which point to objective aspects about this place in which we are living. In order to explain this self-interested and self-preservationist system of government, one has to consider an effective way for governing in light of the original definition of governing and government that was given at the beginning of this text in order to give the needed clarity of this paper.

For most, if not all, of human history, leaders have done generally as they've personally seen fit, falling into the subjectivity/objectivity trap that ensares even the most brilliant amongst us. They have made non-rational decisions about what to do when they're in power, without necessarily thinking about the implications of what they're doing on the whole, as well as on themselves, through these senseless actions and activities. They have, as I will demonstrate later in this paper, consistently and constantly led to the downfall and undoing of whatever they've been attempting to do, through these unthinking and poorly conceived actions and choices. The point of this paper, is how to overcome these difficulties such that the leadership and the citizenry that they govern are able to live as peaceably as possible within this world, for their own mutual sakes and their own mutual benefit. The following will outline and detail the necessary steps for this form of self-interested and self-preservationist system of government.

To begin with, one must have an understanding and comprehension of the whole with which they're working with, without exclusion of anything for any reason. They need to be able to understand and work with the whole without a personal shade of subjectivity being in their way. While this is challenging for most to do, it is actually possible, and it takes an extreme realization about one's own self first, in order to pinpoint the subjective views of the individual person in question. They can then be calculated and factored into determining the overall course of action. Without this comprehension about the practitioner's own self and own self perspective, the practitioner will always be tainted by this shade, and will more likely miss aspects or prove to be stubborn in accepting factual aspects which are, again, objectively there, like the ball or the cars in the previous example. The question that first needs to be made, is if the person in question is able to recognize the cars moving towards them internally and externally, and are willing and able to do what needs to be done to avoid them, for their own sake and their own benefit.

To put it another way, excluding anyone or anything from your analysis, or neglecting to think about anyone or anything in your practice, leaves you blinded and inhibits positive governance and government action. Every piece of the whole is interconnected together in order to compose the whole which is the world. By missing parts or by willfully disregarding and ignoring them, you fail to get the needed understanding and comprehension of the whole (also known as the gestalt) that will allow you to make intelligent decisions about the world for your own sake, which then, oddly enough, translates into others' sakes, which then, again, translates back into your own sake as part of the political leadership. There is no disconnection and disembarkation point where the leadership becomes magically disjointed and disconnected from the rest of the whole. And it is that whole which comes down around and/or on top of them, when they fail to recognize and act appropriately to signs within the whole pointing towards change and something other than what the leadership had anticipated or planned for.

If that understanding is reached, one can then set about identifying issues and non-optimal situations and conditions within the whole. The practice is then determining how to solve the problems for the greatest possible benefit while doing the least amount of actual damage to the whole or any of its parts. Only with this kind of ethos will a governing group ever hope to remain in power for long, or else fall victim to all sorts of conditions and maladies, internal and external, which will lead to their overthrow or undermining of themselves. The rewards are increased likelihood of time in office and increased time to reap the benefits of being in office. The cost, which is again, objectively present, is that it requires the political leadership to do what is necessary for the whole, and not for their smaller selves sincerely and genuinely and without coercion. Rather, they need to be able to treat the whole as if it were their own smaller selves. All of the impacts and effects are going to be felt within the world that is the subject of government and governing, and can therefore, be observed and tested for effectiveness in the larger world around it, which serves to benefit the whole AND the leadership, as a means of gauging the world around them.

Self-interested and self-sustaining governing and government, is therefore a science similar to the practice of medicine. Empirical tests can be used to determine what is significant to the lives of individual human beings living in a given social order. Public opinion polls, elections, and scientific surveys of quality of life are all methods that can be used to determine what works, what doesn't work; what is significant and vital to survival and physical/psychological well being and what isn't.

A complete understanding of the body and the environment it lives in is needed first, in order to practice, and the only acceptable goal is to do the most amount of good, while doing the least amount of harm to that which is subject to the doctor's actions and decisions. The main aim in both, is to keep the patient healthy and improve their quality of being. The key difference, which I will illustrate later, is that the doctors of policy and governing directly pay for their negligence and incompetence, either with their lives, their health, their reputation, their office and/or their ability to join society in a healthful and self-interested and self-preservationist manner. Because of these risks for the doctors in power, it also sometimes means that a different doctor is needed for the old doctors' sake in light of demonstrated and consistent incompetence, inability and/or unwillingness to function effectively for the sake of the patient that their well being is objectively tied to. This would ensure the members of the old leadership come off as well as they possibly can, in spite of the mistakes they've made, and have a chance of rejoining society peaceably to carry on their lives and livelihoods as best as they honestly can. What member of a species would prefer to do something else, as a living organism, intent on survival and being well? Not a very functional one. And to those who'd prefer the nastier course of action, medical and psychiatric attention would likely be the best policy, in order to ensure, again, that they can lead as positive a life as they possibly can, given their apparent maladies and afflictions, without causing harm to others.

This is why I want to emphasize at this time that not everyone can do this for their own sake and their own benefit, even though, anyone can tell when things aren't working out so well. For those who can't bring themselves to function on this level of comprehension and understanding, these positions prove toxic to themselves and to everyone and everything else in their world, regardless of whatever can be said or done to try to paint it subjectively as being otherwise. Again, the objectivity of the world is actually there, and to neglect it or fail to comprehend it will likely lead to the places and conditions which I will get into later on in this piece. Suffice it to say, that you don't have to believe what I have to say, and you don't have to ever have heard what I've had to say, in order for these processes and aspects about our world to be or not be in effect. That is the core of the objectivity of the world beyond what our brains produce for us, and it extends beyond observation or attempted human manipulations upon it. And that is what I am going to demonstrate in the following pages, as we go through case by case from human history and modern events, to show this trend in functional detail and effect.

Like the sailor at sea, you do not control the winds and currents and tides and weather, even though they objectively impact your condition and quality of life at sea. You only adjust your own settings in order to better adapt to the ones that you find yourself in. Otherwise, you're likely to break something on your ship or not make any headway in the epic quest for health, well being and happiness that our species is on. If you're not on this kind of quest as an individual or a group of individuals, one has to question your respective abilities to survive, let alone, be well in this world of ours, which then, gets into some interesting evolutionary implications, like the squirrels we discussed at the beginning of this paper. Suffice it to say, that I think that everyone has a right to be well and to live well on this planet. How that happens is different to each of us, and it may not be in the ways we'd expect or hope to have happen to us. But the objective sense of it, is universal to us all, human and non-human alike. And that, is something you don't actually have to believe. As far as I am personally concerned, it is either “is”, “isn't”, or “is something different than what was previously described.” And I don't know how else to subjectively describe the concept of objectivity, beyond these three points that can be tested for and examined by anyone or anything with eyes, ears, touch, taste, smell and sense.

Such is the thesis of this paper: that when these principles of self-interested and self-preservationist government are implemented and genuinely implemented, they yield benefits for the leadership in question as well as for the citizenry that they govern. When they don't, it yields further aggravations, further complications and even the likely undoing of whatever it is they were hoping to do in the first place. This then concludes the base argument section of this paper. The next sections are going to be devoted to case by case studies of examples in history and current events which emphasize my point, and show how might does not actually make right, and in fact, has a tendency to blow back in the face of those who attempt to use it against others, through whatever method or reasoning that can be conceived. Later on in the paper, I will discuss the final problem that humanity and, indeed, all living beings have in dealing with these issues and predicaments well, for their own sake, as much for others' sakes, the environment's sakes, and their sake through the sakes of others and the environment. It is important to note, that the cases that are discussed are just highlighted examples of general trend which play out even in our current personal lives. They are merely being trotted forward due to their relative profile in demonstrating my larger point about self-interested and self-preservationist government and governing. We will begin with the historical examples, and move our way up to the current events.

On Self-Preservationist Government Pt. 2

Historical Cases:

Spartacus's Slave Revolt:
In 73 BCE, a group of slaves under the command of a Thracian called Spartacus revolted against their masters and set themselves up for a fight for their freedom. Trained in gladiatorial arts, the slaves did considerable amounts of damage to the Roman Republic before, finally, being subdued in 71 BCE by eight full legions of Roman troops, commanded by the professional general, Marcus Licinius Crassus. What was remarkable about the slave revolt, for the purposes of this paper, was that it was an entirely unnecessary consequence for the Romans, had they not been in the practice of buying and owning people as slaves and gladiatorial combatants.

The slave army did not win ultimate victory over the Romans. Militarily, it was remarkable that they lasted as long as they did against the legions of Rome. What is significant here, is that you have this reaction from human beings against repression and subjugation, ineffective and non-benevolent treatment, even before human rights were articulated and conceptualized on a universal scale. In short, this was simply how human beings reacted to being treated in such ways without their consent and ability to articulate their personal needs. We see it time and time again throughout the history of the Roman Republic and Empire, indeed, throughout the history of the human species, in all times and in all places. This suggests then, that these are universal principles by which human behavior acts and reacts to these kinds of repressive and oppressive conditions, by means of every revolt, rebellion, overthrow, breakaway and election loss, regardless if they were ultimately successful from it or not. This is a theme that will repeat itself throughout history. And it is a testament to this paper's thesis statement that policy, if done for the benefit of the leadership itself, is more of a benevolent science and practice of medicine unto the people, rather than a practice of interest, opinion, subjugation and dominant repression. Failure to do so, results in conditions and situations like Spartacus's example. That costs money, lives and peace of mind, for somethings that they could have done without, again, for their own sakes and their own well beings. Spartacus is only one of several that will be looked at and examined over the course of this paper, in order to demonstrate a pattern of action that's in effect within the universe. And we begin here, at a time in our history before anything of the sort regarding formal human rights were articulated and executed in governing practice.

The Protestant Reformation:
To date, there have been few powers on Earth that could have rivaled the power and influence of the medieval Roman Catholic Church. It didn't hold land, per se, as traditional empires have done. But it wielded considerable influence over the rational and non-rational minds of Europeans. Yet through a couple of distinct miscalculations and doctrinal flaws, it has ceded much of its influence and power in the world over to not only the Protestant churches, but to a myriad of secular and non-religious teachings and schools of ethics. To this day, the power of Rome continues to fade in the light of scandal and continued doggedness towards old ways of being. But for now, we'll focus on what is, perhaps, the biggest collapse of power the human world has arguably known.

The Catholic Church grew out of Western Roman Christian institutions and schools of belief stemming from its members' interpretations of the Nicene Creed of 325 AD. As a religion, it teaches that it is linked directly to Jesus through his blessing of the the Apostle Peter to found his church.1 Peter was taught to be the first Bishop of Rome, also known as, the Pope, who was said to have supremacy over the entire Christian community. Over the years, authority was consolidated under the Bishop of Rome in the West while the Christian communities of the East together, formed what would be later known as the Eastern Orthodox churches in the eastern half of the old Roman Empire under the Patriarch of Constantinople and other prominent religious figures.

One of the key features that distinguished Western Christianity from Eastern Christianity, was the claim made by the Popes that they were the infallible transmitters of the word of God and the personage through which the Holy Ghost was said to come through. This is a key point in the undoing of Rome and the Catholic Church, and we will see this play out later as times begin to change underneath the Church's authority and, even with the Church's own aid and participation.

The Church's presence was everywhere during the Middle Ages and was central to the lives of the population of Western Europe. The Church controlled marriages between political elites and peasants alike, maintained the power to excommunicate anyone it chose to do so and maintained the air of legitimacy to control in all aspects of life.ii The Popes were infallible, and they made it very clear that contradicting their word and doctrinal teachings were unacceptable. In the 15th and 16th centuries, however, things began to slide away from underneath the papacy while the Catholic Church, remained true to the tried medieval formulas of the past. Unadapted to the changing conditions in European societies at the time, and clinging to it's own sense of self-righteousness, it would soon be faced with extreme breaks in its power, control and authority. People were beginning to see beyond the Church and the Church's influence and teachings. And it all came to a head in 1517 with a man named Martin Luther.

The Catholic Church was already on the ropes by the time Martin Luther had come along. There had been previous schisms within the Church over the location of the Papacy, and the Black Death had shaken people's faith in Rome. Meanwhile new discoveries in science and geography in the West were calling in to question the written doctrines of the Popes.2 The Americas were discovered by the Europeans, and there was a new boom in trade and economics that created a new class of wealthy merchants and town manufacturers that questioned the old order of the religiously ordained nobility who oversaw affairs and issues in government3. New inventions, such as the printing press allowed humanity to communicate ideas faster and more easily than ever before. And these new ideas about the human condition and human nature were beginning to spread out of Italy in contrast to the dogmas of the Catholic Church.

But that was not what Luther was complaining about. At the heart of Luther's complaints against the Church were the practice of indulgences (people paying priests for forgiveness), the practice of simony (selling Church offices for money), the infallibility of the Pope, mistranslations of the Bible from the original Aramaic by the Latin writing priests of the Church and the official status of the Church and Church officials in the official catechism of the Catholic teachingsiii. The combined total, created a picture of a corrupted Church using its assumed power inappropriately and abusing those who worshiped to it through false teachings of Jesus and scandalous actions. Attempts were made in the 14th century by John Wycliffe and Jan Hus to reform the Catholic Church, but both attempts were defeated by the military supremacy of the established Catholic Church and their political followers. In spite of the triumph of arms of the Catholic factions, dissent continued to exist and spread amongst European societies. Martin Luther's Ninety-Five Theses were, by the end of the day, only the tipping point of a long building anger against the Church and the Church's practices. To this day, Catholicism has never recovered from the blow that was dealt to it by Martin Luther. And judging by how things are working out as it is, it's not likely that they're ever going to gain that ground back again, judging from external circumstances and continued internal practices of the Catholic Church.
What's amazing about this, for this paper's sake, is not that Luther managed to pull off something spectacular in successfully challenging the Catholic Church. Indeed, Luther can be seen as just another one protestor against the existing practices of the Catholic Church in a long standing and long building line of them. What's amazing about this, for this paper's sake, is how the Church lost as badly as it did, with all the perceivable advantages it had on its side.

The root of this power vacuum for the Church, seems to come from the Popes' claims of infallibility and the chosen actions of Church officials when it came to interacting with the world outside and inside their realms of authority. They claimed too much and did too little to work with those who had placed themselves in their hands. In the end, the Church lost almost half of Europe in the Treaty of Westphalia, which concluded much of the religious fighting in central Europe that resulted from Luther's Ninety-Five Theses. And it would continue to lose authority in countries where new ideas and popular bitterness against the Church had taken root amongst the general public. In the end, the Church came out a shadow of its former power. And, as we will see later on in this paper (and in history), it will continue to lose ground, again, due to its own excessive claims and poorly chosen internal actions.

Notice, how it was not a mighty army that defeated the might of the Roman Catholic Church. It was one individual person, out of a line of several individual people, which permanently upset the status of the Catholic Church and ended its primacy in Europe entirely. Might and wealth did not help the Church. In fact, it proved to be a hindrance for it in areas where the new brand of Christianity, Protestantism, established itself. And it still proves to be a sticking point, even in Catholic societies where the Church's influence remained intact. The difference came ultimately in the quality of the brains of the societies that were in question, and how they interacted with the world. But that will be discussed more at the end of the paper. For now, we have seen the undoing of one of the most powerful empires the world has ever known, as a result of its own actions, it's own decisions and its own doctrinal beliefs.

The American Revolution:
The American Revolution did not begin as a grand call for human equality, social justice and other high ideals of the so called Enlightenment Period of Western Culture. It started out, simply as a political dispute between an imperial nation and thirteen of its colonies over the right to representation before taxation. It is a point that's easily mistaken in the grandiose calls of the American Founders. But it nevertheless is actually the case that the big idea of America, the country and society, began as a dispute over whether or not one political entity had the legitimate ability to levy a tax on others without the prior consent of those being taxed being had in the first place.

Following the French and Indian War (what was known as the Seven Years War in Europe) between England and France, the English had come off with most of the French colony in North America, but with a considerable amount of debt to be paid. In order to pay for their enormous war debt, the English Parliament decided to raise taxes from their American colonies, which their taxpayers in England had paid to defend. They felt that their colonial subjects should pay for a portion of the cost of garrisoning and deploying troops on their behalf. However, there had never been a tax from the imperial mother country on the colonials before, and furthermore, they were not represented in the English Parliament. The English in Parliament chose to go ahead with the taxes anyway, without the consent of the American colonials. Protests ensued in the colonies, with colonial officials petitioning the English Parliament to allow for representation before enabling taxation of the colonies. Eventually a back and forth started to ensue, with colonials protesting the English government's actions, and the English not addressing the key issues that were at stake, despite other attempts to placate the colonial populace. Eventually English troops were sent to the colonies to maintain order while being garrisoned in private colonial housing (again, all without colonial representation in Parliament). Shots were exchanged on April 19th, 1775 in Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, and war was on between the colonies and the United Kingdom of Great Britain. By 1783, the colonials had managed to fend off the onslaughts of British troops, and a peace was reached in Paris, ceding the American colonies over to a new country: the United States of America.

What was at the core of the colonials' complaints against the United Kingdom was the fact that the taxes were being levied without the consent of the colonies. For a long period of time, the English government took a back seat to colonial affairs and allowed them to function on their own. As a result, they had come to different organizational methods than the historically entrenched English systems across the Atlantic. While you can talk about these different subjective perspectives of legitimate authority, one can notice this very clear trend that spans across the two worlds of perspectives. The English stubbornness at dealing with the colonies, and their apparent inability or unwillingness to listen carefully to the complaints of the colonies, caused the ultimate conflict which would cost them thirteen of their overseas colonies.

In terms of government action, they technically could have allowed for the colonies to have their representation while collecting the tax they were looking for as well. That would have prevented the conflict and enabled both sides to get what they were looking for. That would be using the principles that I have talked about. And that, is clearly not what was done in the conflict between the United Kingdom and its colonies in America. It would have gone down differently. But it's not enough to speculate on such things. We've only the present to make choices. And this is only an example from the past which could help influence our present and our future. It shows, precisely what I talked about earlier in this paper, but completely the opposite of what should have been done in order to avoid conflict and preserve relations between the United Kingdom and the American colonies. In the end, we saw what happened. And that is not something we need to speculate on for long.

The French Revolution:
Nothing epitomizes the impacts of poor governing practice more than the French Revolution. The American Revolution blossomed into a revolution for the essential equality of humanity (at least, male humans) and their rights in government, under government and over government. But the pollen from that flower carried over across the Atlantic, and spawned a different type of revolution in France.

The French system of government had changed little since the feudal period of the Middle Ages. The landed aristocracy and clergy still lived decadent lives under the French King and Pope, who then depended on the peasant class to support all of them through their efforts in the field and in industry. To pay for their lifestyles, the French aristocrats took it out of their peasants in the form of taxes. It was the most direct kind of abuse of power; concrete exploitation at some of its worst.

No doubt, anger and resentment was already present before the time of the American Revolution. But it was only a small step that was taken in 1789 when the Revolution began, that led to decades of upheaval and political complications, that led to the undoing of the clergy, the aristocracy, the monarchy and the ideals that they espoused for their own sake and their own benefit. The entire system of monarchy and its adherents were wiped out or cast into exile due to the perceived lack of connection and care that the aristocracy had for the rest of the population and the destitution brought on by poor harvests and high taxes on the peasantry.
We can afford to step back from the big analysis of the complicated events of 1789 through 1799 and the consequences of them to see a very simple truth lying at the front of it. In the end, it was the monarchs', the clergymen and the nobles' own choices and own decisions that ended their period of time in office, and that all stemmed from their own attitudes, behaviors and perceptions of the world around them and their place in it. This is what it was in objective reality. This is what the objective effects were from their objective actions, attitudes, behaviors and perspectives.

If the nobles had simply given up some of their lavish lifestyles and taken better care of their population, would they have been stuck with their sticky fate at the executioner’s guillotine? Who knows. Historical analysis does not permit using “what if” scenarios to describe history. Suffice it to say, that you had one group having everything, and another having nothing. And the French Revolution is what you got out of it. It was not a great mysterious event whose origins are obscured by time and mythology. It was pretty clear what the people were rebelling against and what they were initially opposed to.

The Revolution violently meandered for some odd decades after the initial storming of the Bastile in Paris. But the causes that led to that fateful day are as clear as ever in the collective conscious of the French people, and the world of humanity itself. And the nobility didn't just lose the excesses that were being gleaned off from the peasantry either. Such is one lesson of history. And there are many more that follow this same pattern that need to be attended to.

The Haitian Revolution:
Like the French Revolution, is another example of the principles of this paper, not being put into practice. You can bog yourself down in the complicated affairs of Toussant L'Overture and his lieutenants. But to do so, you'd miss a very critical fact of the Haitian Revolution. Like the French Revolution before it, and the American Revolution and the Protestant Reformation, a revolution ended up taking place against a regime that was misusing and abusing its power and privilege over other human beings, with force of arms eventually being used against the upper classes responsible for the oppression. What made Haiti different from the other slave revolts that occurred throughout the Americas (and there were plenty that did actually happen with lives lost on both sides of the disagreement), was that it was successful in turning out the oppressive class and preventing it from re-establishing itself.

Revolts were a common fear in slave holding societies and for good and obvious reason. What is being asserted in this paper, is that that fear was unnecessary and limiting to the societies in question. If they choose instead to rely on paid and humanely governed labor, they could have avoided a lot of the problems that a slave holding society has to offer. Chief among these problems, is the problem of violent insurrection against the slave masters. It's not a value judgment, as much as an observation of function akin to having one's hand stuck in a pickle jar (the pickle representing human well being and survivability). You can continue holding the pickle with your hand, and not be able to get it out to enjoy. Or, you can let go of the pickle, get a fork and eat it in a different and more effective manner.

Haiti is just a bloody example of the problems with exploitative systems of governance and government. It, like the previous examples, is just another example of how bad government and poor governance leads to problems for the elites who perpetuate them. It ultimately spells their doom at the end of the day. The Haitian attempt was just one out of many slave revolts, and it was the only one that was genuinely successful at overthrowing the regime. But everyday, slave owners would have to ask themselves when the next one was coming and how successful it was going to be at accomplishing its end. Haiti is just another example of what happens when the principles of government are not put into action, and another part of the overall pattern that is being revealed throughout time and space. It makes you wonder, how worthwhile it all is to do in the first place, for the leadership's sake and the leadership's actual benefit, when push comes to shove.

The Socialist Movements in Europe and the Labor Movement in the United States:
Karl Marx is famous for two things. The first, was to describe the fatal flaws in Capitalism through his book Das Capital. The second, was to found a lasting social movement in the world's conscious, arguably, creating the most powerful rivalry to Capitalism the world has seen and likely will know. Socialism as a concept and a systematic way of thinking did not start out of a vacuum. Indeed, there were causes to its development and spread. And all of it was because of the treatment that the workers of Europe and the United States were being subjected to at the hands of the new Capitalist class of individual elites.
People who were formerly farmers were kicked off the land, and forced to emigrate to the cities to find work. Conditions were abysmal in the early industrial cities, with people living together in cramped conditions surrounded by their own filth. Sewers weren't designed to handle the flow or waste that entered into them, and many of them were actually open air with shared latrines to boot.iv Conditions in the factories weren't much better, as work days were long and grueling, and the work dangerous and deadly. Children were employed with adults, wages were scant and barely able to provide for the earners and benefits that we take for granted today, were unheard of as Capitalism took its first steps in the world.

. Now, it was not the squalor itself that would end Capitalism, in a Marxist view of the world. It was the overproduction of capital through dangerous means, the scarcity of resources and the reduction of everything to capital terms that would. Most of this, is actually proving to be correct as we enter into the twenty-first century. But for now, we are going to focus on the living and working conditions of the workers, that lead to the inspiration for Marx's Das Capital, and his more inflammatory piece, The Communist Manifesto.
The conditions that the workers were left in, were what arguably led to the creation of the Socialist movement in Europe and, indeed, around the world. Again, you see where exploitation and negative treatment of others, leads to calls against it from amongst the species, causing further changes to occur. Unions were formed against the Capitalists to stand for the workers' rights as human beings, which led to clashes between the two, which eventually produced changes in the ways that the Capitalist class treated and worked with its workers. Again, it's only speculation to think what would have happened if the Capitalists had begun from a point of treating their workers as human beings like themselves. But would there have been a need for the confrontation to happen in the first place? That I cannot answer. But I can note that, this is again, another example of how things work out in the world beyond what we'd hope for or expect to have happen, like all of the other examples before this one. Unions are still around to this day. And their influence on the working and personal lives of individual workers is still palpable. Politicians in the early twenty-first century have attempted to get rid of unions in the United States through various mechanisms. But in general, the concept remains in practice, and is not going to be undone by any amount of legislation or political action on the behalf of the elites.

One's got to wonder, again, what the point of trying to take these kinds of exploitative steps against humanity actually is. Each time it's ended, and it's the people who thought they actually had everything who ends up paying the highest cost and the end of the day, literally and figuratively as well. But that will be discussed in a later portion of this paper. And we'll again, bring our focus back to another instance in history to show this pattern, again, playing itself out in the world beyond our hopes, actions, wishes, desires, and contrary perspectives.

The Russian Revolution:
There was no singular start to the Russia Revolution. Indeed, agitation against the Tsars had begun as early as the 1900's and only continued on to culminate in the February and October Revolutions in 1917. There's also the impact of World War One on Russia and the mishandling of the campaigns by the generals and the Tsar himself. The consequences were sapped morale at home and on the front, and a populace that was destitute and desperate for change within their society and polity. Suffice it to say, that the mismanagement by the Tsars, the desire amongst Russians for a more representative and responsive government in their interests and the social and economic fall out from World War One, all played critical roles in the eventual overthrow of the Tsars in February 1917 and the conflict with the Bolsheviks starting in October of that year.v
Once again, you have a case where there is a combination of constant and consistent abuse and mismanagement of affairs, a desire amongst the people for something different, and conditions of extreme poverty and economic inequality that lead to an popular overthrow of the regime and the establishment of a new order. In spite of the military superiority of the Tsars and the White Army and the backing of Western countries against the Bolsheviks, the old order was undone and put into a place where it could not be redone again.

You may draw comparisons between the emergent Soviet Union and the Tsarist regime. But notice how a) the Tsar and his family and ministers were exterminated and driven off, and b) that the Soviet Union itself only lasted a scant seventy-four years before collapsing under its own unresponsiveness, inefficiency and barbarism. We'll consider this case later in the paper. But suffice it to say that this is, again, another example of history repeating itself with the same conditions present and the same basic sets of factors leading up to the events which bring about the change. And notice how poorly the old order and its supporters tend to fare once the corrupt system goes through its cycle and collapse, in spite of its own successes and its own accomplishments to the contrary.

The Civil Rights Movement in the United States:
Even though the slaves were freed in the American South following the end of the Civil War, African Americans still faced enormous amounts of racial bigotry and hatred in the country from amongst the white populations. Jim Crow laws kept blacks and white separate down to the minutest detail of drinking fountains and theater entrances. Civil disobedience and revolts against these systems of inequality and exclusion were not uncommon in the South.vi But the defacto punishment of the era was the lynching of those who stood out against the system and against others associated with the individual(s) in question. None of that show of force, however, prevented one Rosa Parks from refusing to give up here seat on an Alabaman bus and touching off what would be an ongoing movement for the fundamental change of American society and the way it integrates people of color into its midst.

Granted, the movement's complete success was never realized. Racism and bigotry remain within American society, indeed, all of human society. But the regime of Jim Crow in the South was defeated through the efforts of activists, political and judicial figures alike. The overt offense to the dignity of other human beings was what was lost in the struggle. The fears of the segregationists proved to be unfounded and life continued on from there. The success of the Civil Rights movement may be questioned nationwide, beyond the legal victories of Brown v. Board of Ed and the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts. But the legacy lives on in the present day with no one's currently held rights having been harmed in the grand scheme of things, in spite of the caterwauling to the contrary. Everyone actually benefited from such a movement, because it technically brought us all that much closer together as a society and as a species, even if others refuse to look at it from that perspective.

The principles of do no harm are alive and well in this example from history. And the lesson is clear about the level of intolerance that people are willing to take under a regime that's perceived as oppressive and unjustifiably positioned in the world. In the end, only some people were able to share the same rights and privileges as other people, without the latter being harmed by the former. Notice how the two are not mutually exclusive things, and can exist together in harmony and peace on this plane of existence.

The Iranian Revolution:
Few revolutions have genuinely generated something unique in the world. And the Iranian Revolution certainly is one of these examples. Following the overthrow of Mohammad Mossadegh in 1952 by American CIA and British MI-6 operatives, the Pahlavi dynasty was restored to power and immediately set up a tyrannical regime in the place of democratic governance. With the aid of their infamous secret police service, SAVAK, the Shah established dictatorial control over Iran and the Iranian people. However, this was only to last a little more than a couple of decades, before people began to grow weary of the regime and started acting out for change.

The Iranian Revolution lasted some two years before the Shah was deposed formally. Yet the legacy of it proves its valid point. If you misuse and abuse your position within a social context, you're more likely to end up having it taken away from you. Military support is not a guarantee, in terms of soldier support on the ground. And even if it is, we've already seen countless examples of these military forces being overwhelmed by the number of people to begin with. Like nature itself, change finds a way from happening. And while even the Iranian Revolution ended in corrupted ends, one is already hearing the low grumble of change lurking beneath Iranian government and within Iranian society. The mountain is being primed, and the pressure is building up under the volcano. When it erupts or how it erupts is anyone's guess. But "will it erupt" has, arguably, already been answered through our look into history. And the answer is simply "yes."

The Fall of the Soviet Union:
We've returned from the Shah of Iran to the Soviets in Russia. Even though they had successfully overthrown the Tsar and the Kerensky government in Moscow they still had a lot that needed doing that they ultimately failed to do. Unfortunately for the Soviets, they got off on a poor footing under Stalin's cult of personality regime. But even more unfortunate for the Soviets, they failed to pull themselves out of the megalomaniaical, overly idealistic and callously cruel regime that they got started off as.

If one were to look into the Soviet Union in the 1960's or 70's, you would already see the decay happening in the streets.vii Centrally planned economics had proven to be disastrously ineffective and inefficient and quality of life was brought down by it and the constant threat of repression by the NKVD/KGB secret police units of the regime. The lack of vision, comprehension and care by the Soviet leadership was, arguably, ultimately what did the regime in in 1991, following a disastrous war in Afghanistan and uprisings from amongst their satellite republics in Central and Eastern Europe; traceable to the repression and ineffectiveness of their Moscow oriented regimes. Once again, in spite of military advantages against the protestors, and in spite of the use brutal intimidation and control techniques to subjugate the populace, the regime crumbled and eventually fell. Like all the others before it.

It's not that these systems and exploitative power functions are not necessarily bad ideas, to begin with. It's just that they don't work. And it's only in our brains that we're going to be able to overcome and ignore these kinds of issues. So one's got to wonder about these kinds of premeditated or accidental undertakings in the first place, as well as the brains that are or end up being behind them in the first place. How connected are they to the world that actually is around them? And how well do you think that their priorities are based from the absolute start of the accidental or purposeful undertaking?

These are questions that are not going to be answered in this paper. But given the historical record of events, as events, they are, I think, questions that are entirely worth answering. And indeed, can be answered using modern medical diagnostic technology, methods and techniques. Like the Civil Rights Movement, it would be doing the least amount of actual harm (since the object of this would be to get people into medical care rather than depose them through other methods), while doing the most amount of good for the rest of the world through such an intercession. Everyone would be able to live as best as possible a life as they can, and should, be able to manage, again, coming back to the doctor's ethic of doing the most amount of good by doing the least amount of actual harm. There are other modern examples of this going afoul in our world, which I will continue with in a moment. But there are also positive examples of this actually working out. And we're able to see the effects of this positive function of government in action in the rest of the world around us.

Again, this is not a value judgment for one thing over the other. This is an observation of cases and how they ended up panning out. One way or another, the negative acting government ended while the positive aspects continued on elsewhere in what has been, historically, a haphazard fashion, unobserved. This happens in spite of what we do to make it be otherwise, and in spite of all other hopes, dreams, plans and visions that we could possibly have while accidentally or purposefully conceiving these ideas and practices in our world. I will now continue on with the more modern era examples and cases, which continue to show that these concepts and principles are still in effect, even in this present day, and in spite of actions taken to make them be otherwise.