THE RIGHTS OF THE RICH

"Whatever is not nailed down is mine. Whatever I can pry loose is not nailed down."
Colis P. Huntington, 19th Century Railroad Magnate

"Why should men leave great fortunes to their children? Observation teaches that, generally speaking, it is not well for the children that they should be so burdened."
Andrew Carnegie, "Wealth"

Paris Hilton will probably never vote for Barack Obama. He holds her up as a picture book example, cute, clueless, careless, of why taxes on the rich should be raised. Her unembarrassed example fails to convince a hard core of Obama's political opponents, who are determined not only to let the wealthy keep their current tax reductions, but to give them even more. To many of us in the masses, the politicians, lobbyists, and lawyers who pander for the benefit of the plutocracy have understandable, though ignoble, motives. By pleasing the rich, they might get rich too. And many of them do. There are many, however, who are not rich, yet still insist that the rich are entitled to all their money. In the interest of fairness, which the rich demand whether or not they grant it, we must ask some questions. Are there valid moral justifications for greed? Should greed be removed from the deadly sins list and added to the virtues? Where does reality fit in?
All human beings justify their actions, at least while they do them. Captains of industry and finance, and their defenders, insist that getting and keeping more is a righteous goal. Huntington stopped short of admitting he stole by claiming it was all his in the first place. Pirates from Alexander the Great to Jesse James have surely felt the same. From the onset of the Industrial Revolution, capitalist plutocrats have always believed their actions were the guiding lights of human progress, that mankind could not have advanced from the caves were it not for high minded men such as themselves. They may have done some awful deeds, but it's all been worth it.
Yes, railroad builder Huntington helped make our country great. How that fact justifies his right to everything he could grab, how his justification differs from open theft, may be hard to explain, but greed is a powerful addiction. Carnegie, who made steel readily available worldwide, claimed that humanity's lot was better as a direct result of capitalist conflict and disruption. He made that claim sixteen years before Ayn Rand, the modern guru of greed, was even born. Over the last century, history has witnessed many wars, depressions, and environmental disasters. Stacked up, these calamities evoke serious doubts whether on balance, the human race is better off since capitalism has held sway over human events. Still, there are many influential voices that continue to preach the wonders of unmitigated greed.
The main reason Carnegie is ignored today by modern apologists for wealth is that Carnegie states flatly that wealthy people should give away most of their money, to pay for the damages they caused in the acquisition process. As one who had been there, he could say with assurance that competition demands that businessmen have a lot of money to do what they need to do. But once the industrial or financial empires are built and in place, the winners no longer need those huge fortunes, and they are obliged to give the money back. He also says that if the rich insist on keeping their wealth, the public has the right to tax them to get what normal people need. Some modern billionaires, led by Bill Gates, George Soros, and Warren Buffet, are practicing what Carnegie preached. They are voices in the wilderness, given the powerful narcotic of greed. Most rich people, and those who strive to imitate them, cling to the belief that selfishness alone is the root of all human progress. So the debate goes on.
The fall back position for the disciples of greed (should Carnegie and his modern counterparts prove convincing to the masses) is the moral argument: that wealth belongs to those who have it, and nobody has any right to take it away, for any reason. The wealth the rich possess is proof enough of their entitlement. The argument is persuasive. If we were rich, would we want to be punished for it? Then Huntington's famous quote reminds us that the plutocrat's concept of ownership is a little different from most peoples.'
Whether or not we have a moral right to free rich people from their greed, the world is in serious economic trouble. Getting more money into circulation has been proven to relieve hard times. Money nowadays is concentrated in the hands of an extremely small group of people, who refuse to circulate it. Since America is still structurally a democracy, do the people have the right to use democratic measures to use this money to improve the general welfare? We need the money. Have we the right to "pry it loose?"

THE INSANITY OF DENIAL

"Ignorance is strength"--Orwell, 1984

"Knowledge itself if power."--Francis Bacon, Religious Meditations-Of Heresies

New polls tell us more Americans disbelieve in global warming than did a short while ago. Climate scientists are banding together to reinforce their findings that not only is the world getting hotter, but human activity, mostly burning coal and oil, is its main cause. Whether the truth will out or the Big Lie will prevail is beyond our ability to accurately predict. We do know there are powerful corporate interests among us who are dead set on promoting the Lie, against all prevailing scientific evidence and even their own enlightened self-interest. And many among the average folks are eager to believe the Big Lie.
Society appears to be trending toward the Orwellian situation whereby science is routinely ignored, even suppressed, excepting warfare and police surveillance. Climate science definitely does not fit into these categories, and so must be sacrificed for the perpetuation of corporate power. This is understandable. History is full of big names who waste underlings in a constant effort to preserve and expand their power and privilege. The question is why so many average, workaday Americans are eager to be wasted so that the upper classes might retain their position a little while longer.
It is one thing to refuse to act on available information, quite another to plug the senses in steadfast denial. Most of us have at least some unhealthy habits that we know to be harmful, but we're frankly having too much fun to give them up. We Americans like our way of life: our cars, our air conditioners, our plentiful, varied foods, and other niceties. We feel we have earned them, and hate to lose them. But common sense tells us we stand to lost most or all of our bountiful lifestyle if global warming continues unabated, and that if mankind is causing the problem, mankind is in a good position to stop or reverse it, and the quicker we act, the less harsh will be the readjustments we must make. Yet we disdain both knowledge and common sense. Why?
Most of the climate change deniers in America are comfortable, suburban or rural, middle-aged or older, English-speaking, of European descent. Ethnically they are similar to most of the people who control the country. Despite the similarities, the ruling elites seem to be unaware of the existence of these people, except around election time when they send their minions and lackeys out to garner votes. Probably most members of this loyal demographic know full well that their needs are of no concern to the upper class. But the American myth is that anybody can get rich here, with the right combination of good ideas, hard work, and luck, and these middle-Americans feel close enough to maybe hit it big under the right circumstances. These are the "true" Americans, as they like to see themselves, and their status so close to the upper crust is threatened by the concept of climate change. To act on scientific information regarding climate change will require a unified and determined effort on behalf of the whole human race. The "true" Americans' concept of their country's exceptional standing in the world, along with their semi-privileged standard of living, might be sacrificed for the greater good of mankind. And what if all our efforts to curtail global warming don't work? Denial is tempting.
Of course there are other scenarios, much more optimistic, based on the idea that humanity has caused this problem, and humanity can work its way out. But since no one can truly predict the future, we are faced with either ignoring science, or acting on it. Even if global warming turns out to be a false fear, we still have immense, horrible problems with our polluted environment. No one can deny this reality. The ecological and climate solutions are the same. Must we oppose cleaning up the air, water, and soil, simply because some of us refuse to believe the weather is getting hotter? Surely we have advanced beyond the century-old notion that dingy skies and stinky streams are the signs of prosperity. If we clean up the environment, and never know whether the climate was changing, how will we be worse off? If we ignore science, and it turns out scientists are right, it will be too late to say "Oops!" Yes, there is strength in ignorance: the strength of a mob. There is power in knowledge as well, the power of people to improve their lot. In a worst-case scenario, America's wealthy elites would likely be the last to perish. Those of us in that comfortable middle would be next-to-last.
Not much consolation there.

A RECOMMENDATION FOR INTELLIGENCE WITH INTELLIGENT DESIGN

Recent findings of microbes, different from any other life forms heretofore known, will probably not deter religious fundamentalists from pushing creationism as a scientific theory to be taught in public schools. Without question, we are all entitled to our opinions, and have the right to express them. But creationism, or "intelligent design", is not scientific theory on a par with evolution, and a decent respect for reality requires they be kept apart.
The scientific method arrives at conclusive theories after careful study of physical evidence, based on extensions of the five senses, not what is printed in a book, even if some insist that book is divinely inspired. Our practical lives are lived on the basis of physical evidence, including science. Our spiritual lives are lived on different principles, within our own hearts and minds. Many excellent books are available to help us live on a spiritual level, but they have nothing to do with science.
Scientists, overwhelmed by physical evidence based on sensory information, are often agnostics, as no physical evidence of spiritual matters has been discovered. Spiritualists, who spend much of their time looking inward, are oft-times impervious to science and other practical things. The huge mass comprising the rest of us must find a balance between the two, and as our material and emotional needs are always changing, so our balance will constantly shift. Still, science and spirituality will retain specialties that are theirs alone.
The scientific method deserves credit for all the material progress the human race has made. Mankind's material bounty grows steadily as we make new discoveries based on previous ones. We travel farther faster, communicate instantly on a planetary level, eat more, live more comfortably in all climates, lead longer, healthier lives, because of the scientific method. We know more, kill one another more efficiently, have come close to ruining our environment, and possess the wherewithal to save the environment, because of science.
The Bible has nothing to do with it.
Religion helps many people live happier lives. It does not explain physical reality. To insist on creation as a scientific theory, equal to evolution, without the tremendous amount of evidence that backs up evolution's probability, is to require an outright rejection of all scientific knowledge we have gained up to this time, and to reject anything we might learn in the future. For creationism to make any sense at all, humanity would need to return to a primitive state where the creation myth would make sense.
Most religious fundamentalists (at any rate the ones who insist on teaching creationism in schools) drive cars, fly, watch TV, talk on phones, go to modern doctors, eat food procured from supermarkets, drink clean piped water, and generally enjoy the advantages of our modern age. Some, such as Amish and Christian Scientists, eschew many trappings of modern life, but also mind their own business. Religious fundamentalists who insist on Biblical teachings in science classes tend to be among the ones who also advocate the abolition of public schools, which would point to an aversion to knowledge and learning in general. Human beings are naturally leery of changes, and we will always have to deal with irrational fears. But facts are facts.
Scientists right now are accepting the discovery of life forms that can survive under circumstances they had previously thought incapable of sustaining life. The scientific method never accepts any theory as absolute, no matter how much supporting evidence there might be. The creation theory rejects all contrary evidence, so it is unscientific. Since it was written, The Bible has been thought by many to be a good read. Many have found it profoundly inspiring. But it is not science.

DO WE STILL PITY THE POOR IMMIGRANT?

The controversy of our nation's being flooded with immigrants, despite many wordy arguments, in actuality breaks into two relevant issues. On the one hand is the self-evident truth that people have the right to protect their borders. On the other is the rather strange concept that in some cases it must be illegal to need a job.
Of course any country will oppose a hostile foreign attack with all available military force. Right away the notion of America's being "invaded" can be discarded as unsound. Immigrants tend to come here quietly, illegals secretly. A violent incursion would not serve their purposes at all. We do patrol our borders militarily, probably because we have a lot of military resources, and military organization seems to be efficient, especially if we believe we are being invaded. But in this case the invasion theory once again disproves itself, since there is no possibility of our using brute armed force against all comers. Sure, there are some advocates for just this sort of extreme violence to repel illegal immigrants. And some other countries do use such methods, but these countries are also known for using the same methods against their own residents who try to get out, just one of the many reasons there are not a lot of people trying to get in.
Many people do want to get into our country. Most of those who try are from Mexico, a country sharing a very long border with ours. What makes them pick up stakes and move north to a country with strange customs, a strange language, and a good bit of hostility toward them? Is it to sabotage our system, to stage a revolt to return large parts of America to Mexico? Maybe, but among the millions who come here, they are quite adept at keeping it a secret. The only ones who seem to know about this devious plan are Anglos who do not make a point of discussing politics with Mexican immigrants. Another reason for this huge exodus, one that seems more obvious than annexation, is that they are unemployed, long term, in Mexico, and they find work here. In many cases, the work they find is at far lower wages and far worse conditions than Americans (including Mexican-Americans, whose loyalty to the United States is beyond question), will accept. Yet we still need people to do these jobs.
Better pay and conditions would be one way to get Americans to do the work of immigrants, but in the case of construction and factory work, the current economic downturn has made this question moot in the near future. Lack of jobs in these occupations is much more efficient than fences at stemming the tide, there being very little work now for anybody, north or south of the border. Agriculture is a different matter. Farms still need labour, and most Americans will not do this work for the pay and conditions American farmers are prepared to offer. The food supply, even with chemicals, irrigation, and machines, is still wholly dependent on nature, a fact that needs to be understood by anybody who must eat. A complete social overhaul of America's agricultural system might be desirable, but it would take a while, and the next harvest cannot wait. Crops are planted in spring, nurtured in summer, harvested in fall. For our survival, somebody has to do this.
We need workers, they need work. If the number of legal immigrants is less than we need, common sense indicates this is a situation that could be easily remedied. Worrying about a hostile takeover of our lands only gets in the way of common sense. There is an irrational fear involved here, a fear that allows us to ignore the common traits average Americans and average Mexicans share. By starting at this point, rather than focusing on superficial differences, we the people could stabilize the situation more successfully than we are doing now. If we want them to stay there, we could help them do that. A Marshall Plan for Mexico would be cheaper and more effective than fences and military patrols. The United States could arguably also use its own Marshall Plan nowadays, but economic improvements here will naturally bring more jobseekers from there. Any way we look at it, the fates of both countries seem to be pretty closely tied, and co-operation is more effective than picking fights.

CITIZEN OBAMA

"The creed whose legitimacy is most easily challenged is likely to develop the strongest proselytizing impulse."
Eric Hoffer, THE TRUE BELIEVER

His birth certificate has been widely displayed, and pronounced by experts as the real thing, yet there are those who remain unconvinced that Barack Obama has the minimum requirement necessary for anyone to be President of the United States: U.S. citizenship. To these birthers he is a Kenyan, at best a British colonial subject (since Kenya was a British colony when Obama was born). The same could be said for our first nine presidents, they too having been born in British colonies. But the Constitution got around that technicality, declaring anyone thirty-five or older who was a citizen at the time of the Constitution's adoption, eligible to be president. Since then the question of citizenship as a prerequisite for eligibility has scarcely been considered. We know where public figures come from. We take their word for it--until now. Newt Gingrich claims Obama thinks like a Kenyan, which confirms the birthers' suspicions...he looks Kenyan.
Gingrich's surprise expertise on Kenyan thought patterns notwithstanding, birthers say race has nothing to do with their suspicions about Obama's eligibility. Their disclaimers are hard to believe. Kenyan is one of the new slang words for African-American, a nice way to get around using the really taboo epithets. They probably wink when they say it.
We all know Barack Obama is of African descent. Most of us are aware with a certain sense of pride, or at least relief, believing his election to be a sign that we Americans might someday actually achieve that elusive goal of true racial equality, to finally live in a country that has only one race: human. Not so the birthers. To them, the legitimacy of Obama's birth certificate is a moot point. He may have been born in this country, but he is still a Kenyan, and certainly not enough of an American citizen to be president. There are true Americans, and there are others, who get to live here if they cause no trouble. Never mind that pesky Fourteenth Amendment--if it needs to be repealed, so be it. Then we can stop foreigners from crossing the border to drop newborns, and decide who gets to be president at the same time.
"We want our country back," is the mantra of the birthers, and other tea party patriots. They are vague about where our country has been taken, and why it so desperately needs retrieving. Perhaps the old canvasses depicting our nation's founding can shed some light. The signers of the Declaration, and the framers of the Constitution, "We the people", were all white. America's foundations have stood the test of time, why not the definition of "real Americans?"
By this standard, the man currently in the White House is not "real" enough to be a real American. He is half Kenyan. He was born in Hawaii, which only two years before his birth was a U.S. colony. He lived in a foreign country. He barely meets the minimum requirement for citizenship. Must America elect a president who is only minimally eligible?
The fact that America did elect Obama makes no difference to the tea baggers. By their lights America may be a democracy (or was before 2009) but not even a democracy is allowed to elect a foreigner president. Look again at our founding fathers: all white, some who owned people with Kenyan features. Of course, hardcore right wingers would also despise a white Democratic president, but their fanatical obsession with Obama's citizenship puts off rational dialogue to an extend that only racism can explain. Whatever problems our country may have, they are dwarfed by having a Kenyan usurp the presidency. To the birthers, America's only priority right now is to get rid of that Kenyan. Then their country will be "back."

THE COPS THERE DON'T NEED YOU

A video on the web shows police officers tasing an old man who has a heart condition, in the man's own home. They wanted to take him in for observation (he had been reported as saying suicidal things). He gave the officers the finger. You cannot do that, even in your own home, so the old man found out. That this incident occurred in ultra-liberal Marin Country, and that the video survived to circulate, is disturbing. Equally disturbing is the obvious fact that the officers knew the tasers had cameras, and so did their supervisors. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that police administrators allow, even encourage, tasing as a first resort.
Citizens of a republic rely on the police for security and protection, from each other and from themselves. It is understood that police officers can use injurious or even deadly force, as part of their everyday routine. Since this authority is deemed vital to the greater good, officers are given the benefit of the doubt in their use of force. Their job can be dangerous, and there are infinite unforeseen variables to influence or hinder the decisions they must make, often without time for rational deliberation.
Nevertheless, with the broad-ranging authority given the police, they are expected to use reasonable discretion where possible. When they do not, citizens have a right to know what went wrong, and to insist that elected representatives make needed corrections.
From the video it is evident that the old man was no longer, if ever he was, a threat to anyone or himself. He was back inside his house, dazed but quiet. The time and expense required to take him in for observation was obviously not justified. But he defied their authority. So they tased him.
The taser is a marvelous invention, disabling a living target as effectively at close range as a gun, without causing visible wounds or (usually) death. The victim is reduced to writhing, terrified helplessness. He will be intimidated. Although the effect of electric shock on someone with a bad heart is unpredictable, in this case the old man lived. Since tasing is rarely fatal, seeming to solve temporary problems without permanent solutions, there is no doubt a strong temptation to employ tasers in all difficult situations. Police tend to use this new technology without much concern for the situation, the victim, or public opinion.
The victim and his family have sued. We know how these things usually go: there is a quiet settlement, on condition of eternal silence afterward. It's as if the incident never occurred, but for some missing taxpayers' money. The unfortunate deputies (they too are victims) will be thereafter assigned to restroom patrol and quietly hounded from the force, not for the tasing itself, but for causing problems for management. In due time there will be further police tasings, also recorded on video. Once people know this sort of thing has become routine, average citizens will be frightened away from any contact with police. Authority will be respected, order maintained. There is a built-in inertia in all corporate organizations that seeks to avoid difficulties, and police departments are no exception. They rarely change from within, unless there is considerable pressure to change from without.
Citizens of a free society have every right to trouble authorities with legitimate concerns, such as random electro-shocks on fellow citizens. Police have the benefit of the doubt, not free rein. Regulations dealing with officers' use of guns should be applied to tasers as well. Police, like all public servants, work for us. When they work against us, we can and should make changes. This video assures us that what happened to that sick old man can happen to anyone.

THE CUMBERLAND GAP

How can we follow the reasoning of all these old white folks who claim the solution to all their problems will come from making their elected government go away? These people came of age in a time when government was more active than at any period in American history. At the same time they have enjoyed more economic stability and success than anyone, ever. Yet they hate their government and vote for people avowed to destroy it. They hang teabags from their hats and threaten violence if elections do not go their way. They threaten secession, and plan to repeal Constitutional provisions guaranteeing equal rights to all Americans. What has made them so upset with a world where they have come out quite well? What would they replace it with?
These old white Americans claim to want their country back, yet are unable to explain where it might have gone. So distraught are they that they would see their own comfortable lifestyles destroyed, believing perhaps that they achieved their success without any help from anybody, and they can certainly do it again. Many others will be on the brink of destitution, but these comfortable Americans in latter years will be just fine. Their goals are not conservative. Conservatism seeks the preservation of the status quo, which is just what these old white people intend to destroy.
As to what will replace the status quo, they vaguely hint at a distant and golden past. After all, they want their country "back." These well-off citizens of the dominant ethnic culture hail a time before government tyranny and taxes restricted the right of everyman to seek and find his full potential. In our history, there has never been a time when such a utopia actually existed. in our own time, to do away with government would be disastrous for us all, starting with the old and fairly prosperous, whose paper assets would be stolen by the ultra-rich, and whose personal possessions would be brutally taken by younger, crueler neighbours.
The romantic vision of a future utopia based on a halcyon past persists, however. The only time we ever came close to complete freedom from society was right after our Revolution, on the Appalachian frontier. British authority had been rejected, American authority had not yet been fully established, and beyond a thick tall veil of seemingly endless forest, a continent loomed, full of resources. Load your wagon and your long rifle, and leave your problems and past behind. No need for social security, health insurance, or unemployment compensation when there is always work to do, killing Indians and felling trees, finding everything you need right there in the wilderness. No government agents to tell a man he cannot trap or hunt, or hold slaves or shoot strangers...it was paradise on a permanent camping trip.
Of course, for these aging, comfortable Americans to imagine themselves tough enough to make it in such a world indicates a large disconnect from reality. Nor can we forget that even in that woodsy beginning of our manifest destiny, the urge to form societies and government was irresistible. That elusive true freedom was always just that.
In reality, freedom has a chance to flourish only when people guarantee it for one another, and it has little, if anything to do with tax policy or social programs, when such things are openly discussed and fairly administered. But for some reason our tea party patriots feel strongly that America needs no social contract whatever, that all taxes are theft, all government despotic. The Cumberland Gap, in its days of discovery, leading us down through the forest into the boundless West, seems to be the ideal that tea baggers hunger for. If not, it would be helpful if they would come forth with a terse description of what they want. Then the rest of us could decide for ourselves whether the idea makes any sense.

G.W. Matson: MARGARET THATCHER'S WRONG TURN

G.W. Matson: MARGARET THATCHER'S WRONG TURN: "'There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families.' Preceding is one of Margaret Thatcher'..."

MARGARET THATCHER'S WRONG TURN

"There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families."

Preceding is one of Margaret Thatcher's most famous quotes, and in her forthright statement can be found the most honest summary of the modern conservative theory of governance. For the eleven years Thatcher led Britain, contemporary with Ronald Reagan's leading the United States, the English-speaking powers headed in a different direction toward a more pure version of rugged individualism. Their philosophy holds that mankind is happiest and most prosperous when all are free to pursue their selfish interests with no restraints other than the selfish efforts of everyone else. A noble concept, but is Thatcher's statement true or practical?
The "no society" conviction was a break with conservatism of the twentieth century up to that time, when mainstream conservatives, accepting the social safety net programs already in place, sought to hold the line there. In reality, "no society" went beyond the goals of nineteenth-century conservatives, who basically held society to be a fine invention, provided the wealthy could lead it for their own primary benefit. The attempt to create a real world situation where individuals and families basically work against one another to advance their own ends, is actually quite radical. Thatcher's quote is in the form of a statement of fact--not a desire, nor a consummation devoutly to be wished. Presented as fact, it should be fairly simple to verify. This bold declaration represents the meat and bones of modern conservatism. If Thatcher's statement turns out to be false, conservatives need to know this, so they can proceed to do something else.
In the first place, the Falkland Islands War, which solidified Thatcher's standing as a world leader, could never have been fought had Thatcher adhered to her own beliefs. Only organized societies can fight wars. In fact it is highly unlikely that there is any human undertaking requiring more social organization than war. Resources must be found and converted to things to be blown up. Soldiers must be trained to follow orders based on a rigid chain-of-command. And populations need to be united on the endeavour for it to have any chance of success. There is no individualism involved. As for families: a nation at war is supposed to be one huge extended family, but that is probably not what Thatcher meant.
When the Argentine military dictatorship invaded the Falklands, the resident population--roughly two-thousand British shepherds, none of whom had expressed any desire to become Argentines--should have been on their own, for Thatcher's philosophy to have any weight. They could have fought the Argentine army, they could have tried to get used to their new rulers, or they could have moved back to Britain if they could afford it. But if there is truly "no society", the Falklanders were certainly not the responsibility of a non-existent British society, or its representative government.
The British people, however, with Thatcher leading the charge, felt and acted differently. Although few Britons actually knew any Falklanders, and the islands lie about as far from the home country as any place on earth, the British reacted as they would to an attack on their homeland, which in most ways it was. They behaved like citizens of a complex and organized society. And Thatcher led them enthusiastically, as an elected leader of such a society would be expected to do.
From a standpoint of human rights, Thatcher acted in the only way she could. But human rights are only protected within societies. In order to do the right thing she needed to ignore what to her was a basic truth. And a truth ignored is no truth.
The Falklands War is but one symptom of the irrationality of modern conservative philosophy. Only by a return to very primitive, early Paleolithic hunting and gathering would Thatcher's statement make any sense. Humanity is a social animal, and has thriven because of it. Sensible conservatives need to renounce their double-think practice of working within a society while preaching that it does not exist. And liberals, progressives, moderates--all people who know better--need to hold conservatives to reality, because carried to its logical conclusion, the contemporary conservatives' ideal is chaos.

AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM

Some politicians, and their cheerleaders in the media, like to toss around the concept of "American exceptionalism", and how much it means to them, as part of the endless game of patriotic one-upping. They attempted to embarrass Barack Obama when he said that he believes America is exceptional, in the same way people in other countries feel their country is exceptional. Apparently there was little political hay to be made, because the controversy was quickly dropped, but the question of our country's being somehow special beyond mere national pride, as some universal truth, is worth exploring. After all, it has been brought up, and it will be brought up again.
Is it the country itself--our half of the North American continent? If so, how is the arbitrarily defined area known as the U.S.A. better than the other half of the continent and the rest of the world? Are our mountains higher? Our prairies more golden? Our oceans whiter with foam? Is the United States exceptional because of the people who reside within the borders? True, the United States is home to descendants of practically everywhere else, but many other countries are similarly populated, and more will be as the world grows more homogeneous all the time.
And science has proven that there is but one race: human.
America may be one of the first, but it is certainly not the only multi-cultural society. And yes, within our borders more people from differing cultures attempt to get along peacefully with each other than is evident in many other societies. But we still have human failings. And it seems to be that most Americans who most stridently insist on America's unique status tend also to define "true Americans" in restrictive terms. Yes, individuals are valued, and given many opportunities, but this happens in some other nations as well, and one look at our country's current situation is enough to remind us that not everyone gets the same opportunities.
Our founding principles, while not exceptional, are unusual. America was the first nation founded on core principles of the Enlightenment: equality of all, and the universal endowment of inalienable rights. As such, America has continued to survive with those principles more or less intact, despite some very rough episodes in our history. Since our founding most nations, new and old, have followed our example, but most have been nowhere near as fortunate as the United States in adhering to our ideals. A few countries, such as Britain, have come to the Enlightenment gradually. Others, like France, Germany, Italy and Japan, took to the Enlightenment after a series of severe shocks. In our hemisphere, only Canada and Costa Rica have, like the U.S., remained steadily democratic for any length of time.
So our country is the first to break with the traditional method of nation founding: clans, following strong and successful leaders, convinced of their superiority over the rest of the human race, went from there in search of conquest and plunder, eventually forming what we call nations. The United States, unlike the others, has its origins in the conviction that all humans are equal. We have conquered and plundered, however, and our history is rife with internal imperfections in putting equality into actual practice, and we are not arrived yet. Still we have made slow and halting progress, but progress nonetheless, up to the present time. Even with our tenacious imperfections, we still remain generally committed to egalitarian goals.
Here, if anywhere, is America's exceptional standing among nations: a long standing commitment to securing for humanity equal rights including "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." But if our stated goals are the achievement of equal rights belonging to all people, then the concept that our country is exceptional is by its nature un-American.

THE ANCIENT REGIME

The Republican Party, staunchly refusing to extend even minimal co-operation with the Democrats on the many pressing issues the country faces, harkens for legitimacy to the Boston Tea Party. The connection cannot be missed: they claim the tyranny that challenges Americans in the 21st century is like that confronting Americans in the 18th. The situation is so severe that it can brook no compromise from true patriots. To question if healthcare, climate change, or massive unemployment might compare with a tax on tea is also, apparently, what true patriots would not do. Recalling the Boston Tea Party is certainly good P.R., but the resemblance is more like the French aristocracy in 1789, than the Boston commoners of 1773.
A moderate revolution in France, with limited bloodshed, replaced the absolute monarchy with a constitutional one. The leaders of that movement, hoping to establish a national polity along English lines, sought the King's co-operation. But the Royalists and the Nobles stonewalled, even allied themselves to the radical Jacobins, intending to render the new government incompetent, in hopes that it would force a counter-revolution, returning the Ancient Regime to power.
History shows this plan back-fired , with horrendous repercussions which only came to a halt at Waterloo in 1815.
Are Republicans aristocrats? Literally, no, since in America we do not have, or believe in, a titled hereditary ruling class. Republicans do represent the wealthy in America, and like the Federalists of our founding, believe the country prospers when the rich maintain their wealth and the power that goes with it. Along with this belief goes the conviction that when wealth is preserved it is also created, thus giving more people the opportunity to prosper. There is some substance to this belief. At any time in our country's history, it has always been possible for poor people to get rich. We hear about it often enough, and we also hear from time to time about rich people (usually in show business or sports) who become poor. The lesson we are to learn here is that in our society anyone can improve his condition with intelligent hard work. Opportunity in America is not the issue here. The fact stands out that in our society, those whose forebears struck it rich tend to stay that way. And it is no secret that tax laws, regulations, and good old tribal connections make the maintenance of this situation far easier than it would be in a democracy where all people truly have access to all avenues of economic opportunity.
So we have a de-facto aristocracy, which is obvious once the propaganda of equal opportunity is removed. No one can blame aristocrats for wanting to maintain their privileges...hence the modern Republican Party. However, since the democracy genie was let out of the bottle, we commoners also have had an interest in our society's well-being, and an obligation to maintain it. There can be no going back to letting the nobles run our country's affairs.
In our last serious economic crisis, the Great Depression, an aristocrat named Roosevelt made some proposals (and even got a few of them passed into law) that would save his class by expanding opportunities to the plebeians, although at the time he was branded a traitor to his class. Today Obama, a definite commoner, makes similar proposals and the aristocrats fight him at every turn. Lacking the numbers to defeat Obama in a truly democratic confrontation, the nobles seek allies among the commons: the Tea Party movement. This is a perilous strategy. The Tea Baggers, like the Jacobins before them, are a randomly angry lot, and no one can safely predict where the brunt of their anger might fall, should they actually gain power. But history reminds us that in post-revolutionary France, it was not only Louis XVI who suffered.

A PAY AS YOU GO PLAN

In 2010 America finds itself, as part of the wide world, in dire economic trouble. Understandably, the country is torn by different approaches to solving our problems, based on differing perceptions as to what caused the problems in the first place. Conservatives, apparently unaware how our distress came about, or believing it just happened, favor reductions of both taxes and government spending, along with looser regulations and opening of more resources to business as the best course toward renewed prosperity. Liberals, believing the downturn was a result of those same conservative solutions, advocate tighter regulations on business, increased government spending to stimulate employment, and higher taxes on corporations and millionaires to pay for it. Both sides are adamant, and neither, at this time, has the power to make things happen, one way or the other, to find out who is right. So very little gets done, while circumstances, and the voters, grow more impatient to have things actually get done.
Without casting blame, it is obvious that compromise is elusive. However, there are some issues where common ground may be closer than we think. In the field of debt reduction, which both sides would like to see, we can find a compromise both sides should be able to agree on. Ending, now and without fanfare, our two foreign wars of choice will do much to stem the flow of borrowed money, contributing to government solvency without causing pain to any Americans.
Other items on the chopping block: schools, unemployment, social security, highways, ecology...the list is long if it even has an end...all will hurt many people who have no alternatives at hand, hurt them in fundamental ways. Neither liberals nor conservatives claim to like drastic cuts to these programs, or the pain they will cause. So why not begin with major cuts in public debt where not only is no one injured, but major injuries will actually be curtailed? The conservatives are fond of allusions to family, pointing out that in tough times families must curtail their discretionary spending, in order to make ends meet.
What could be more discretionary than borrowing to finance wars of choice?
The difference between wars of necessity and wars of choice are obvious to anyone. If a nation is attacked, it must utilize all available resources to defend itself. But if a nation attacks another, for whatever good reasons, the activity is discretionary, and if it becomes unaffordable, ending it is just common sense. Americans will no longer be killed or maimed in foreign conflicts, and Americans will likewise cease inflicting death and injury on residents of those foreign lands. As a bonus, we will no longer be incurring unsustainable debts for goals that have proven either false or unattainable.
Some of the troops may feel betrayed, and we owe it to them to set things right. At any rate we can redeploy them for their true duty, which is national defense. If our national pride should suffer as a result of withdrawing from wars we do not need to fight, we might make good use of the opportunity to rethink our sense of national purpose. Nations, like individuals, can benefit from self examination and evaluation, especially when casualties are eliminated. America is a mature country, which values the opinions of its citizens. Surely we have enough self-respect to swallow some foolish pride.
Besides, in these tough times, pride is a luxury we cannot afford.

BACK TO THE OLD WEST?

I'm ready, any day, to hear the Governor announce that the State is bankrupt, cannot afford even to default, that he is going home, and to advise that the rest of us do the same. Load up on food and guns, and don't make any friends.
We'll be back in the thrilling days of yesteryear.
The is an irrational attraction toward such a goal. How else do we explain the trend of taking guns to places and occasions where nobody needs them? Whatever happened to the sense of achievement that came from a town's being able to boast that men didn't need to pack iron on the streets anymore? Missing holsters was a sign of civilization, like electricity, a mark of gentility matching sophisticated metropolises back east. Nowadays, packing heat grows common. Do gun toters miss those times when a man's future was only as good as his draw?
Gone is the notion that local authorities could sensibly insist that hombres check their guns when they go to town. Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson would have to deal with legally knowledgeable gunslingers now, citing recent court decisions upholding the Second Amendment as virtually sacrosanct. The lawmen of old, aware that alcohol and firearms do not safely mix, prudently sought to separate the two. Apparently they were wrong. The Founding Fathers, it seems, meant for drunks to commingle with weapons wherever and whenever they like.
Other rights are tempered according to society's needs. Most members of the NRA are probably at odds with most members of the ACLU, regarding other amendments in our Bill of Rights. But an ACLU member who believes that one ought to be allowed to shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater, or that a religion that calls for casting live virgins into a volcano has a place in a free society is rare. Finding NRA members who believe everyone, regardless of mental state or criminal record, should be allowed to carry weapons about everywhere, is not difficult.
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people," is literally true. But we also know that people with guns kill a lot more of their own kind than those without guns. Could it be that the finality of gunplay, in some people's minds, renders other rights moot? Can we not conclude from this logic that all human rights are guaranteed only when all of us are fully armed, all the time? In our folklore, this condition existed before the twentieth century. "Give me liberty, or give me death," was not merely our ideal. It was our everyday reality, in those halcyon times.
The thrilling days of yesteryear, when the only options were total liberty of action, or total liberation from earthly worries, can be tremendously attractive. We live in difficult times, when solutions to complex problems require co-operation and hard work beyond some people's capacities. Small wonder there are those who reject the present for an ideal future similar to a fabled past. To them, any social contract is not only unpleasant, it's a sin. Stalin's Gulag starts with having to pay for working sewers.
It is human to want freedom. But our nature also needs a sense of belonging, of helping out the clan. Humanity's major quest is for an always elusive balance between the two. The question before us now is whether we want a massive collapse of our polity, or if we're willing to make the sacrifices necessary to preserve it. If we would keep our society, then guns, whether we have them or not, are irrelevant.

LEARNING

During the last economic crunch, the local elementary school got rid of its science program. Now the library and computer classes are on the block--this in addition to class size expansion, furlough days, and other drastic cuts, all directly resulting from the stark fact that schools, like nearly everything and everybody else, are way short of money.
Money trumps everything. Lack of it renders any argument for spending it moot. And not spending money one does not have is a simple recognition of the facts of life. When a family is short, its members do without, stretching every dime until times get better...irrefutable logic, where single households are involved. Hopefully the situation does not last long and prosperity returns, and with it, spending and more prosperity for all. Holes appear in the argument, however, in times like now, when the number of households in dire straights is terrifyingly high, and the duration of the downturn is much longer than a little while. In our day the entire society is endangered. No one can predict the outcome of prolonged economic instability, but history shows that more often than not, when we do nothing, outcomes are hideous.
Concerning education, the penny-wise cost savers being implemented or proposed have the potential to foist a generation of ill-equipped and ignorant young people upon a culture already burdened by too many who are functionally illiterate. And these same economies will waste an already substantial public investment in scientific equipment, books, and computers, which the State can ill afford to replace.
We are told we have no choice, the money simply is not there. But it is somewhere, and in the same amount as always. It just needs to circulate. We are told to grin and bear it, and for quite a while we have become adroit at doing just that. Can we do nothing else?
Though they seem to occur with seasonal regularity, economic downturns are not natural occurrences. They are manmade. And while they may be unavoidable, there are methods proven to alleviate their devastation. And we know from past depressions that scrimping pennies only makes bad times worse. And education is more than a government program, it is an investment in the development of the most important resource we have. This is not a corny homily. It is the truth.
There are many adults who oppose public education on principle (having already gotten it), and many more who think too much tax money is spent on it. Most of us harbour foul memories of that time of life. Many are the valid criticisms of this huge, ungainly system. Still, for millions of children, this is the only chance they will get. California was a leader in technology, industry and business during the last century, largely due to its progressive investments in infrastructure and education. We terminate this investment at our peril.
Maybe today's children will grow up accepting that their substandard educations were a necessary evil in tough economic times. But who will teach them that? We do know that they will grow up, and the type of grown-ups depends on the investment we make in them now. We cannot depend on our all being dead before the bill comes due.