Managing the Flock

I recently asked my network a question about Avatars. At its core is the question of authenticity. People who seem to see all reality as a collection of avatars get pretty uncomfortable when the idea is translated into a question about themselves. Nietzsche's discussion of masks in Beyond Good and Evil comes to mind. If there is nothing but illusion then what is it that sees the illusion? The problem with all world views is that each pretends that there is a space within which it's most caustic assumptions do not work - a kind of black hole where the laws of physics do not apply. A classic example is the contention by Buddhism that there is something called 'Buddha nature' and that the rest of the world is illusion. But the question becomes “What is it that privileges this Buddha nature?” In the end the answer is nothing but the assumption that it is privileged - the response must be a tautology or all is lost to the corrosive assumption.

The weakness of any code of logic is that it must be based on at least one core assumption about reality - one assumption that is taken as a synthetic judgment a priori - and that is its weakest point. Kick out the assumption and the code falls like the proverbial house of cards.

While I agree with Nietzsche that the more appropriate opposite of good is bad rather than evil, I am also focused on the question of the relative effectiveness of the use of these tools. The resources that the US government has available - or the resources that established political candidates have at their disposal - can magnify the impact and effectiveness of the use of these tools. I was recently drawn into a conversation about the effectiveness of 'political satire' and made the following observation: 'I can't watch shows like the Daily Show any more because I have come to understand that, while Jon Stewart is laughing at Bush and Chaney - Bush and Chaney are laughing dismissively at Jon Stewart - and they are getting the better of it! Political satire has been reduced to the level of public masturbation – with the same practical effect.’

One thing seems clear over all others - the special interests that most globally and effectively employ these tools will define the future for all others. They will build the mansions that they will live in. The rest are welcome to the crumbs - the bits here and there. But the developers of the tools will most likely not be the principal beneficiaries. I remember a comment by a philosophy professor - "Western philosophers tend to build a castle in the sky and then live in the tool shed in their shadow."

In 1979 I attended a symposium that BF Skinner participated in. He was putting forth his behaviorist theory which contended, at base, that you could predict what humans would do based upon empirical knowledge of their past behavior. A student asked a rather simple question - "What is the effect of that knowledge on my future response?" Skinner had no answer other than a reference to an increasingly unstable equivalent of the 'do loop'. I think that this needs to be a major concern - not only to the idea of individuality but for the future stability of human society. Although I do not subscribe to any religion, the biblical myth of the anti-christ seems relevant here. If the society is becoming more and more 'leadable' because the tools that allow leading have become more and more effective, then how susceptible to charismatically induced self-destruction will it become?

To return to my core question, if people are now reduced to the condition of sheep in a managed flock - lead to understandings of what they need, want and believe in - what it to keep the wolves from aspiring to the job of shepherd? And what to sheep who used to be human decide about their future when they realize that they are now sheep that used to be human? Just a few thoughts.

The necessity of impeachment

The very nature of Mr. Madison’s house is that, no matter which tribe inhabits the seats of power, balance reasserts itself shortly after they leave office. For the most part this pendulum of excesses swings along a relatively narrow arc. But occasionally things get seriously out of whack. Mostly through a combination of circumstances and often because of the cumulative effects of small events, the pendulum will stray from that narrow way and its arc will become erratic – threatening the integrity of the entire structure.

The last time things got this far out of whack was during the Nixon presidency. It is no accident that most of the players in the current administration were present during that failed attempt to establish an imperial presidency. It is also no accident that the current efforts have generated much the same results. The excess of Watergate have returned and multiplied.

An excess of partisanship – and that means on either side of the aisle – is corrosive. After the storm broke during Watergate, partisanship died back a bit. But it became resurgent during the Reagan administration and positively rampant during the Clinton years. Political excesses are somewhat like fevers in that they have to reach some crisis point before they will break. I believe that we are at that point in our history and that it is time for the ‘cold compresses’ of impeachment to be applied to the bow of the ship of state.

Let me be very clear on one point – I am not making a partisan argument here. In fact I am arguing that it is time to flush partisanship out of American politics and establish a new political paradigm.

Redressing the damages to the American national government can only be done within the hot fire that purges and rebalances - and that fire begins with the impeachment of almost the entire senior team of current administration. But I suggest that it needs to go far beyond that. Circumstances require the recall of the leadership of the Democrat party as well. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reed have sold out the intentions of the founding fathers just as effectively and thoroughly as Bush and Chaney. For both sides, the party’s business rather than the peoples business is being done.

Impeachment is a form of revolution in Mr. Madison’s house and I suggest that it is overdue that we have some.

Missing the Point

I am amazed at how studiously the talking heads are ignoring the elephants in the room. Day after day I watch the so-called ‘experts’ pontificate about the Bush Administration and its agenda – and watch them carefully avoid the twin pachyderms that are taking up most of the space.

The Imperial Presidency: Forget about oil or spreading democracy or Wilsonian Imperialism. None are the top priority of the current administration. The principal objective has been to perfect the project that Richard Nixon started – the project that failed, they believe, only because of Nixon’s darker side.

The Republicans – by this I mean the Nixonian Republicans – kept the dream alive through the dark times. These are the heirs of Alexander Hamilton.

They believe that organized society requires a monarchy. Their dream was reinvigorated by Ronald Reagan who had no real interest in an imperial presidency but used presidential power to reshape American society and the world.

The Nixonians are determined to establish an executive so powerful that no other branch of government can check its prerogatives. And they have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.
In their search for a champion they found George W Bush – an intellectually limited politician with almost no curiosity about the world and a sharply limited personal philosophy based on religious dogma rather than global understanding. They found their new King George! They have established an executive so powerful that the US congress grovels before it – limited to senseless political theater. And if anybody should doubt that Congress is now an unincorporated branch of the executive, go back and watch Senator Arlen Specter explain why the Attorney General did not need to be sworn before testifying. His self-serving drivel aside, we all knew why – because his King told him not to put Gonzales under oath and, as a loyal subject, he complied. Senators used to be made of sterner stuff!

Redistribution of Wealth: Most commentators make the mistake of lumping the Neo-Cons together with the Nixonians. This leads to a fundamental misunderstanding of the real purpose of the Iraq war. The Neo-Cons were just ‘useful idiots’ – tools to promote the imperial presidency and to allow unfettered access to the public treasury. Second only to the imperial presidency, nothing matters more to this administration than war profiteering. In Watergate, Deep Throat told Bob Woodward to ‘follow the money’. It amazes me how that proscription has been abandoned at a time when the US government is awash in a tsunami of red ink.

The question is not "How many American kids will die before the war is over?" it is "How much longer can we keep the war going?" Each day the war continues, wealth continues to be ‘redistributed’ from the public to the FOG (Friends of George). The Nixonians don’t care whether we win the war – for them the war has already been an overwhelming success. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been ‘redistributed’ – and so what if future generations are neck deep in debt or that China, as American’s creditor, is now a major force in forming American foreign policy. Wealth has been and continues to be redistributed. The ‘good guys’ have gotten theirs!

Checks and Balances – NOT: So the talking heads continue to perform – grinning traitors to the idea of a free press that serves the public’s right to know – avoiding even the mention of the elephants that we all know are in the room. Congress continues to behave like loyal subjects of King George. The Democrats declare that they are not going to give in to the administration on Iraq and then do precisely what King George hopes for – table all discussion until September. The administration leaks classified information with impunity – places itself above the law by declaring that the president has the power to stop any justice department investigation by simply evoking executive privilege – removes fundamental rights like habeas corpus – and declares the Vice President’s office a fourth branch of government. The response from the press is to ‘commentate impotently’.

The response from Congress is even worse.

Left Alone: The American people are now left alone before their government – and, by that I mean the executive branch and King George. We are rapidly approaching the same situation that the colonists found themselves in prior to the revolution – but now the oppressors are on this side of the Atlantic. Faced with the burden of paying for perpetual war, facing a constant erosion of rights and a government that does not even believe there is something called the ‘common good’, Americans face a hard choice.

We can either become subjects of our government or recapture the American idea of government ‘of, by and for the people’. The entire world is holding its breath.

Dr. Smith is a political and social theorist who lives in Georgetown