news from nowhere

I'll get around to posting something original, I promise.

But for now, here's a good meme I found on Stephen's vox.

Meme Time: If I Owned A Country ...

Lets say that a large tropical island (about the size of Cuba) formed overnight in the middle of international waters. You were the first person there and you claimed it as your own. Your claim is uncontested, so now you have your very own country that is completely independent from any government. At this time you are the only person who lives on the island, but many people want to move there because it is a tropical paradise. You now have the opportunity to establish your own set of laws prior to anyone immigrating to your new country. Assuming you WANT people to EVENTUALLY move to your island nation - what laws would you establish and why?

1 - What would you make the legal drinking age?
I'm not sure I'd have a "legal drinking age" per se - law is either the protection of rights or the implementing policy (though I prefer not to use the latter). The rights being weighed here are rights of life and self-determination. If a five year old asks some nonparent for a drink, it's assumed that this nonparent is able to reason out (more than the child) if giving a child alcohol in this situation will endanger the child or anyone else; they are free to make that judgement. If harm comes to anyone as a result of this action, the adult can be held responsible. In other words, it's not the drinking which is illegal, but the demonstration of negligence which is actionable. The youth's culpability can be decided on a case by case basis, but it's reasonable to assume that an unsheltered fourteen year old generally knows safe drinking behavior from risky behavior. Your mileage may vary.

2 - Driving age?
If they are qualified according to community standartds and can get licensed to drive a particular vehicle, they can drive it. Again, if it can be demonstrated that an examiner/instructor passed someone who didn't meet the community's standards and qualifications, that person can be held responsible.

3 - Age of sexual consent?
Youth with youth, no age - sexual consent in this case is a meaningless phrase. Among adults and young adults, consent should be scrutinized and any coercion actionable.

4 - Voting age?
It depends on what they are voting for - like all individuals, youth should have say in decisions the degree to which they are affected by those decisions. As far as national elections go, 15 or 16 seems like a reasonable proposition.

5 - At what age would someone become an adult (free from parental control)?
I agree with Stephen that this should be handled on a case by case basis. In my mind, there shouldn't be such a sharp distinction between "adult" and "youth" and the phrase "parental control" is problematic. The degree to which a person has developed the capacity to reason, so that person has rights that are protectable. Some amount of autonomy should be encouraged around 14 or 15, but no law concerning it.

6 - What types of recreational drugs (if any) would be legal?
- Pot
- Tobacco
- Cocaine
- Alcohol
- LSD
- Caffeine
- Heroin
- Other?
Again, drug use itself should be separated from harmful consequences of drug use, so drug use itself should be decriminalized.  On the other hand, I think that certain drugs should be discouraged and an epicurean ethos encouraged.

7 - Can people have guns? (if so - who and what kind?)
Yes. Again, any unlawful act done without a weapon would be just as unlawful if done with a weapon, so regulating the ownership of guns is a non-issue.

8 - What would be the name of your country?
I'm open to suggestions.

9 - Would you have the death penalty?
No, and I'd abolish a criminal justice system based on punishment or retribution at all.

10 - What would be the speed limit?
As set by local communities. Outside of communities, regional considerations may restrict speed, but by and large, only wreckless activity should be prohibited, not an arbitrary speed.

11 - What types of religions would be permitted or restricted?
Religion is like anything else - no religion will be restricted, but acts otherwise unlawful will not be protected on grounds of religious expression - for example, female circumcision would be treated as any other non-consenting amputation and not have the cloak of religion to guard it. On the other hand, no religion should be promoted by the government either. 

Which of the following would be legal:
12 - Porn? Yes, to the same standards as speech and likewise free from actionable harm.
13 - Prostitution? Decriminalized, yes, but should be discouraged (possibly taxed), other opportunities made available.
14 - Polygamy? Marriage shouldn't be restricted by government.
15 - Homosexuality? Consensual sexual activity shouldn't be restricted by government.
16 - Stem cell research? Legal? Yes, but funding would be set aside for research along non-embryonic lines.
17 - Human Cloning? No, it violates the civil rights of resulting life and fosters an instrumental attitude toward human beings.
18 - Cock Fighting? No.
19 - Slavery? No, it violates civil rights and fosters an atmosphere harmful to a free society.
20 - Hunting? At the discretion of the communities affected.
21 - Fishing? Likewise,  at the discretion of the communities affected.
22 - Eating meat? Yes, assuming that it was acquired legitimately.
23 - Littering? No, it violates collective property rights... that is, unless people decide that they're happy to clean up after litterers to save them the trouble of handling their own waste.
24 - Unisex bathrooms? Yes, legal, if that's what people want.
25 - Suicide? Decriminalized, yes, but should also be seen as a likely symptom of severe distress, and the roots of that distress should be addressed.
26 - Gay marriage? Marriage is a religious/cultural designation, not a social one, so people should be free to express their relationships however they like.  Social units will be treated legally as social units whether gay, straight, familial or platonic. 

27 - Abortion? Yes, though extensive educational, material and social resources should make abortion rare.

28 - What types of sexual activity (if any) would be illegal?
No consensual activity should be illegal.

29 - Would your county be clothing optional or clothing mandatory?
Mainly optional, but groups and individuals are free to designate restricted areas.

30 - Would you have obscenity laws? If so - how would you define “obscene”.
No obscenity laws. The unlawful forms of speech would be those which can be demonstrated to cause harm, such as libel, slander, defamation and speech creating a clear and present danger to others.

31 - What system would you set up for collecting taxes?
- Income tax? (how much?)
- Sales tax? (how much?)
- Import/Export tax? (how much?)

If I'm starting from scratch, I might experiment with some kind of Georgist land tax. In our world of generations of subsidies and expropriation, structural changes and a wealth tax would be in order, but w. I don't see the purpose of a sales tax, but along with import/export taxes, such issues can be decided on a case by case basis by the communities affected. 

32 - What criteria would someone need to pass to become a citizen?
I'm not sure what requirements make one worthy of citizenship, so for now I'll assume that anyone wanting citizenship values the country being formed and has something invested in seeing it succeed. Perhaps we should require that any naturalized citizens renounce previous citizenships to assure commitment - I don't know.

33 - What types of people would you allow (or not allow) into your country?
Who am I to judge? If someone's an anti-social lout and threatens the safety of others, we'll deal with them whether or not the person is a citizen.

34 - What type of government would you establish?
A cooperative commonwealth. A radical social and industrial democracy. A libertarian socialist federation of communities in which "government" gives way to "governing" and loses its political character as something above and outside of society.

35 - To what degree would your government be allowed to censor or restrict the media?
Content? Not at all.  Distribution of public airwaves and other public resources? As the public sees fit.

36 - Aside from laws - what sort of unofficial (and unenforced) cultural rules and traditions would you like to establish? For example - taking shoes off before entering someone’s home. Or not eating with the left hand.
Nothing arbitrary, just for the sake of being different. Any cultural rules that foster the development of the personality and further the strength of relationships would be good. This kind of social negotiation of needs and desires should far outweigh the use of law in this society.

A quiz to pass the time...

Swiped from lexcorpninja's blog.

What kind of atheist are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

Though my theology is apophatic enough to confuse many and though I generally find the concepts of classical theism problematic, I don't really consider myself an atheist at all.  Well, maybe I should say there are many "God"s I disbelieve in, many that I reject entirely, but I don't necessarily reject the experience or reality toward which these concepts point.

Likewise, I don't feel the need to proselytize at all - what is exists whether or not I "believe" in it, or have adequate thoughts to conceptualize its reality.  Anyway, my understanding of my religion's place in the world is to act as leaven in the world-process - to transform, critique and elevate what's best in humanity's development - a sorry loaf it would be if it turned out to be a uniform lump of yeast.

Dear G-d, my life has been odd without the formerly ubiquitous LJ lurking in another window. As a recap for campers who may've missed the backstory, I spend most of my day at my work computer - hours and hours and hours. Said work decided (correctly) that productivity would be boosted if non-business websites were blocked while using the company server. Now, I have to log out of everything and log back in just to read LJ (or Myspace or Yahoogroups), making the whole process a pain in the ass even during meagre break periods. Added to this is the fact that after a whole day of computerized, work-related monotony, the last thing I have patience for are more hours in front of the computer sitting in this office chair; thus, my LJ life suffer(ed)s. Divide and conquer, my friends.

Not to worry. I've been an increasingly productive member of the work force, paying my taxes and plotting revolution. I've been reading more books made of paperpulp and talking with more folks IRL. I've been watching birds and squirrels in the back "yard", which has gotten a bit more active since T got me a birdfeeder for Christmas. In other news, the cats are being more social.

Within the past few weeks, I've developed a couple of new obsessions: online Sudoku and Boards of Canada of Salad Fingers theme fame (called "Beware the Friendly Stranger"). Props to M for introducing me to BoC and props to A for introducing me to ...methods of borrowing and sharing music with other music lovers. ;)

I've been disappointed with the Democrats even before their illustrious rise to power, and they haven't spoiled my expectations yet. I don't anticipate they will either. All this "radical" anti-war talk avoids the most basic question, the most salient truth - the war isn't just unpopular, it isn't just dangerous to our soldiers - it's wrong. An invasion was launched under false pretenses and tens of thousands of innocent lives have been lost, the survivors' life-support and infrastructure has been destroyed only to be (inadequately) rebuilt by US interests for US profit, factions have been set against each other, training grounds and motives have been provided for a growing crop of new terrorists, and a corrupt and unrepresentative mob pretending to be a government is expected to "keep order" (interpret that phrase how you will). Simply pulling out and shaming our puppet government for not being able to control its insurgency is such an inadequate response.

A mea culpa is laughably inadequate, but the US isn't even giving Iraq that much. All political chatter and media discourse revolves around how the incompetant this administration has been in exectuing the war, but no one wants to question the war itself. Mistake or no mistake, this current administration, acting in concert with the Democrats, is responsible for a humanitarian disaster falling short of Axis proportions - the destruction of an entire country, not to mention Afghanistan or other destabilzations.

I've got no patience for it. Instead of pandering to this tepid discourse, playing by ridiculously narrow rules, I feel like directly targeting the big picture, dissolving the basic points of ideology that make this kind of tripe seem like a reasonable conversation. But that's another conversation - you might have to wait a couple more months for me to formulate an update on that. ;)

Anyway, until next time, feel free to email me anyone. If you don't have my email, just respond to this and I'll send it to you.

The blind waste, redundancy and inefficiency demonstrated in Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward often makes me surprised that anything ever gets done in our modern (post)industrial society. Whereas Looking Backward often fills me with impatience with a human civilization dragging its feet, What the World Wants always fills me with hope.

"It is now possible to give every man, woman and child on Earth a standard of living comparable to that of a modern-day billionaire.

This is not an opinion or a hope -- it is an engineeringly demonstrable fact. This can be done using only the already proven technology and with the already mined, refined, and in-recirculating physical resources.

This will be an inherently sustainable physical success for all humanity and all its generations to come. It can be accomplished not only within ten years but with the phasing out forever of all use of fossil fuels and atomic energy. Our technological strategy makes it incontrevertible that we can live luxuriously entirely on our daily Sun-radiation-and-gravity-produced income energy. The quantity of physical, cosmic energy wealth as radiation arriving aboard planet Earth each minute is greater than all the energy used annually by all humanity. World Game makes it eminently clear that we have four billion billionaires aboard our planet, as accounted by real wealth , which fact is obscured from public knowledge by the exclusively conceived and operated money game and its monopolized credit system accounting.

We find all the no-life-support-wealth-producing people going to their 1980s jobs in their cars and buses, spending trillions of dollars' worth of petroleum daily to get to their no-wealth-producing jobs. It doesn't take a computer to tell you that it will save both Universe and humanity trillions of dollars a day to pay them handsomely to stay at home."

Buckminster Fuller, The Critical Path

I wrote this in response to a message I received from a saunterer.  We've been discussing healthcare as one area in which (to me) market forces and the profit motive have undesireable influences on the services being offered - I was promoting a single-payer nationalized nonprofit healthcare system over the current private market of health insurances.  I'm posting this in my blog because - a) I want to have something in my blog, b) my response was pretty long, and c) I wanted to open the discussion to anyone else you might be interested.

*********

Hey,
I've been thinking a lot since our last discussion about the problem of "trimming the fat".

I was baiting you pretty hard, but it was a discussion I wanted to have and didn't know if you'd really understand where I was coming from unless you found the perspective on your own.  "Trimming the fat" is a great advance as long as "fat" being trimmed is labor and not laborers.

Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about health care too, and honestly yours was the first argument that I've liked (or paid attention to) advocating federal health insurance.

Thanks. I see healthcare as both an economic and a moral issue.

I stumbled upon this lecture on "libertarian paternalism":
http://coblitz.codeen.org:3125/uc.princeton.edu/main/images/stories/podcast/CassSunstein.mp3

I'll take a look at this and get back to you sometime.  Somewhere, I also saw an article that examined universal healthcare from an economic position other than "public goods", which is the category I usually use.  If I find it again, I'll send you a link.

It's pretty interesting... He doesn't mention it, but what about a default government heath plan? When you're 18, you register to vote, get your national id card>, and choose whether or not you want to opt out of government health care.

* Can I opt out of federal defense? Like the 18 year-old being asked if he wants health coverage, I don't anticipate I'll actually need the military and they're awfully expensive.
* I don't have any kids, don't plan on having any, but if I did, I'd send them to parochial school - can I opt out of the public education portion of property tax (or income tax, as they're thinking of doing)?
* I've never drawn unemployment either, but my wages have allowed employers to pay into it for the last 15 to 20 years - can I just stick those contributions in my savings account and use them how I want? PlayStation3 just came out...

No, in all cases.  The public infrastructure isn't just a provider of direct services to us as individuals - it's the framework within which all public interaction takes place. Even if you don't need unemployment or attend a public school, those who work for you or for those who provide services to you need these services. Unless you are Joe Caveman entrepreneur raised-by-wolves, you've participated in and depended upon this social network... and if you haven't, then you aren't drawing a wage, buying or selling or holding property, so the funding for these services won't affect you anyway.

No, healthcare is just as much a public concern as the police or the CDC, and just as it doesn't make a lick of sense to have an opt-out for police protection when you're 18, it doesn't make sense to have someone opt out of healthcare when they're 18. First of all, people's individual healthcare actions (or inactions) do affect the public at large - inadequate and incomplete treatment of infections spur the development of antibiotic resistant strains of disease, which then put a strain on the rest of the healthcare system, young and old, insured and uninsured, rich and poor alike. Untreated conditions often develop into much more expensive conditions, which then force the rest of us to either treat the more expensive condition or be put in a position of letting an uninsured person die (which is emotional and moral blackmail).  Also, an untreated carrier can spread disease, making the overall containment of an epidemic way more difficult that it needs to be.  Bird flu is not an individual concern and I don't think we should leave our national response to a potential pandemic in the hands of 18 year olds registering to vote.

In saying that healthcare participation shouldn't allow for an opt-out, I'm saying that healthcare should be as much a RIGHT and entitlement as much as all other public works. Public works are funded by citizens, each according to their ability and are administered according to need, not according to ability to pay.

I think Real ID is stupid but for the sake of streamlining; you get more people voting, national id cards, and health care... with choice.

I'm not sure I understand you, but I don't think Real ID has anything to do with voting or health care and can't really encourage either. Voter apathy is due to lack of choice in representation, the lack of efficacy. The scare stories of voter fraud spur politicians into needless legislation, but I've never seen any evidence that alleged voter fraud discourages people from voting. And with healthcare, if I've got an ID and insurance and have a health need, I go to the doctor; if I don't have ID or insurance but have a health need, I'll go to an emergency room - the ability to ascertain the true identity of someone needing medical attention doesn't affect my decision to seek medical attention if I need it, nor does it affect the ability of health providers to provider that care. A true ID only "helps" healthcare when it comes to billing, and the bureaucracy needed to verify and direct that billing (as well as the need for billing itself) would be eliminated if healthcare were socialized. A Real ID would only be "solving" an artificial problem with regards to healthcare.

The potential for abuse of a "Real ID" far outweighs any benefits I can see. Not trying to be melodramatic but Real ID would create the foundation necessary for an effective totalitarian police state. In an age where warrantless wiretaps and a suspension of habeus corpus are justified by appeals to a half-hearted "war on terror", I find the concentration and ease of access to this kind of information really disturbing.  I have personal stories behind that, but it's a pretty obvious objection on principle, too.
 

Let me know what you think.

Sure.  Let me know what else is on your mind, too.

response****

The choice at the time of registration was just a quick application of what that lecture talks about... basically fooling people into making preferrred decisions by making them the default choice.  The registration would just be a convenient time to give people these choices, and may have the effect of raising awareness or even the number of people voting.  The Real ID example I just meant as a placeholder really... for anything affecting everyone.  It was probably a bad example, as I agree with you that it's pretty evil.

I see what you're saying in regards to the programs which affect us all (healthcare, police, education).  But, leaving out police and national defense, what about a voucher type system for healthcare like what has been proposed for education?  You have to pay into it, but if you choose, you can take a certain portion back to supplement a private plan.  I know this isn't as effecient because you have money going through the system for essentially a technicality... I guess there may be ways around that.  But with a clause ensuring that any money taken out be spent on a plan, no one would be without healthcare.  The point being to keep the federal healthcare system in check and effecient by market force. I concede that if healthcare is an absolute necessity of government, like defense at home and from abroad, then it should be a non-negotiable tax... but I'm not there right now.

and back******

The choice at the time of registration was just a quick application of what that lecture talks about... basically fooling people into making preferrred decisions by making them the default choice.  The registration would just be a convenient time to give people these choices, and may have the effect of raising awareness or even the number of people voting.

I don't think you can hope to fool people into making preferred decisions and hope to raise their awareness at the same time.   As a purely political aside, this is one distinction that separates a social revolution from the bourgeois revolutions that preceded it.  Also such antidemocratic paternalism seems to be part of the same marketing/commercial mindset that bothers you.  It's not valuing or promoting our liberties at all.

But, leaving out police and national defense, what about a voucher type system for healthcare like what has been proposed for education?

I don't think a voucher system makes sense for healthcare or education, but healthcare makes even less sense.  First of all, a voucher system involves piecemeal defunding of a public system to divert funds to a private company.  The point of insurance at all is to defray costs by spreading risk.  If you start splitting the risk pool, risk is increased on both sides and both suffer higher costs to administer benefits.  The cost-effectiveness and efficiency of the systems stems from its large pool and the simplicity of a streamlined payment system.

Also, administrative costs are a huge part of the healthcare dollar as it is the infrastructure needed to support multiple systems is put on to the provider, thereby raising healthcare costs across the board.  All so a middleman can make a buck by peddling a needless service.

Think about it: where does "profit" come from? What is it?  All other things being equal, how can a company provide a superior product at a lower price than a nonprofit while siphoning off revenue in the form of profit?  There's a reason why privitization goes hand-in-hand with deregulation - it's part of the same agenda.

You have to pay into it, but if you choose, you can take a certain portion back to supplement a private plan.

A certain portion?  What about the rest?  If the rest doesn't go back to the consumer, there's no economic incentive to choose one plan over another.  If a portion remains with the consumer, then the road has been laid to effectively defund the program - people squeezed by economic pressures will opt for less taxes and will be tempted to underestimate their healthcare needs... much like where we are now with people not being able to budget reliable coverage and opting to do without.  Again, instead of treating healthcare as an individual bank account, we should treat it as an entitlement in the best interest of the nation.

I know this isn't as effecient because you have money going through the system for essentially a technicality...

If it's not efficient, then why do it?  And that "technicality" is the expropriation of unearned income that could be used to pay for medical needs - in other words, an excuse to funnel public funds into private, unproductive hands.  Why don't we just put those people on welfare and keep the healthcare system intact?

The point being to keep the federal healthcare system in check and effecient by market force.

But you just said this wasn't as efficient, so why are you now invoking this same market force to keep the federal healthcare system efficient?  You're right though - opting to put a third party between the provider and consumer isn't very efficient.  If by "market force" you mean incentives based upon consumer choice, those incentives are best governed by which providers the consumers patronize, not by which funder of services are played as middlemen.  On the other side, successful blocks of providers can negotiate for better rates of reimbursement based upon changes in costs, regional differences and provider performance.  The rest of the circus and stock market just adds more layers of influence which dilute the voices of consumers and providers.

I concede that if healthcare is an absolute necessity of government, like defense at home and from abroad, then it should be a non-negotiable tax... but I'm not there right now.

You're close. You recognize healthcare among the programs "which affect us all" and you recognize that private health insurance is needlessly less efficient than a single-payer.  For me, I see healthcare in the same category as public sanitation, traffic systems or building codes - they are public needs best met with public goods, and the market is notoriously unable to meet these needs.  Lack of healthcare diminshes productive capacity of the work force, impacts the ability of families to care for their children, often develops people with chronic illness, more expensive illnesses and often risks the spread of illness.  To me, that seems like a public need as real as law enforcement, education or public sanitation.  What do you think?

This is the second alert I've received today on this issue, this time from TrueMajority:

"Dear boy,

Our friends at MoveOn and Working Assets have been leading the charge on an important campaign to stop ABC from airing a movie about 9/11 which is out-and-out propaganda written to defend Republicans and implicate Democrats. It was even written by a Republican operative. This sort of distortion of our history for partisan politics is shameless and offensive.

Click here to Tell ABC Not to Distort 9/11

Time is very short -- the movie is slated to air in just two days. Send the message, then Forward this e-mail to your friends TODAY. The latest news is that ABC is considering making changes to their 9/11 propaganda film; NOW is the time to pour on the pressure!

Matt Holland
Online Director, TrueMajority"

:blink blink::

You want me to ask, no demand that ABC not air a movie (that I have not seen, mind you) because it is propaganda? Because it is "written to defend Republicans and implicate Democrats"? Written by a "Republican operative"?

First of all, I'm not demanding that anyone not air anything, especially based on someone else's opinion of what is appropriate - that's the weakest, most paternalistic excuse for censorship I've seen (coming from liberals, anyway) in a while. I take freedom of speech seriously and I have a brain, so let me use it.

Second, this email has a list of citations on what is wrong with this movie - wouldn't it be better to catch them saying something stupid than try to prevent them from saying it? How stupid does it look to get all Chicken Little about someone else spouting propaganda? It implies that either a)they may have a point, or b)you think that people are too stupid to think it through for themselves - neither is a very flattering position for a liberal to take.

Third, I'm really troubled by the "not wanting to implicate Democrats" angle. It's patently obvious that Democrats were complicit in enacting this regime, and basically complicited their way out of a job. If you're okay with this, go play catch with the "other side of the aisle" and stop calling this game "democracy". If you're not okay with it, hiding past mistakes isn't going to help anything - anyone with internet access and Google can see that you're lying. Purge your party (if you're still under the illusion that it'll work), mea culpa and get on with it.

If you're finally dis-illusioned, then stop apologizing and making excuses for the Party like an abused spouse, pack your bags, and leave. You might want to seek help while you're at it.

1. One book that changed your life.

Books change my life all the time. If I had to narrow it down to only one book to change this period in my life, it'd be Small is Beautiful by E F Schumacher. It brought together economics and politics, religion and ecology, and reasserted the primacy of individual human development in evaluating any claims of "progress". It also highlighted how an appropriate technology is necessary to the maintenence a meaningful democracy, and explained William Morris' "divine solace of human labour" in a way that wasn't as alien to the West and as apt to be misunderstood as Gandhi's "spinning wheel revolution".

2. One book you've read more than once.

Walden Two by BF Skinner. I read it frequently and keep a copy in my bathroom.

3. One book you would want on a desert(ed) island.

If this is meant to point to something practical, I'd say Permaculture: A Designers' Manual by Bill Mollison. If just something to keep on hand for personal edification, A Guide for the Perplexed by E F Schumacher (not Maimonides)

4. One book that made you laugh.

I laugh at books all the time, but they usually aren't funny. The last book that made me laugh was Class: A Guide Through the American Status System by Paul Fussell. My copy has disappeared with lillassea to accompany her through her journies in Lower Proleville.

5. One book that made you cry.

Once, I cried at Thorin's death in The Hobbit... I hope that wasn't a spoiler for anyone. ;)

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy would've made me cry, but it was too beautiful to cry - possibly one of the best novels by a living author written in the English language.

6. One book you wish had been written.

I've heard that Mary Renault was writing a version of the Matter of Britain (or some similar Anglo-Celtic epic) when she died. Her partner, as promised, destroyed the unfinished manuscripts. I imagine it would've been sweet.

7. One book you wish had never been written.

None. There are too many unwritten books for me to judge which ones deserve oblivion. If I don't like it, I stop reading it.

8. One book you are currently reading.

I read books by the score. Currently, I'm reading Robert Heilbroner's Marxism: For and Against and yezida's book Evolutionary Witchcraft, as well as whatever else I have on hand.

9. One book you have been meaning to read.

Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A friend loaned me a copy, and while he's read some of my books, I haven't gotten around to reading his.

10. Tag five people some folks.

I can't tell if tagging is considered gauche or not - so, I'll throw names out - if you want to respond, do it. If you wish I would've tagged you, pretend I did and do it:

lillassea, redrua, celticfeministw, ghoulchick, ghoulsis, gigglingwizard, lirelyn

Marine officer saw Haditha deaths as normal: Post
The U.S. Marine officer who commanded the battalion involved in the deaths of two dozen Iraqi civilians in Haditha in November did not consider the incident unusual and did not initiate an inquiry...

...which is essentially how our Marine was told that "accidents" would be handled in Iraq - just be sure you take the cuffs off a detainee after you shoot them so it doesn't look like an execution. Just say that you were "afraid for your safety" and your superior will vouch for you. Of course, I'm not sure who as a member of a foreign occupation amidst a civil war wouldn't be "afraid for their safety", so I'm not sure how that's a useful criterion for deciding when it's permissible to kill a house full of civilians, but such subtleties are frequently beyond my ken, so I typically avoid military service.

Story in its entirety:

Marine officer saw Haditha deaths as normal: Post

Sat Aug 19, 1:25 AM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Marine officer who commanded the battalion involved in the deaths of two dozen Iraqi civilians in Haditha in November did not consider the incident unusual and did not initiate an inquiry, The Washington Post reported on Saturday.

"I thought it was very sad, very unfortunate, but at the time, I did not suspect any wrongdoing from my Marines," Lt. Col. Jeffrey R. Chessani, commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 1st Marines, said in a sworn statement given to military investigators in March.

"I did not have any reason to believe that this was anything other than combat action," he said in the statement, which was cited by the Post.

The newspaper said it was provided with the statement by a person sympathetic to the enlisted Marines involved in the case. It said it helps explain why there was no investigation of the incident at the time and why the U.S. military chain of command took several months to react to the event.

Chessani said he had concluded that insurgents had staged a "complex attack" that began with a roadside bomb, followed by a small-arms ambush intended to provoke the Marines to fire into houses where civilians were hiding.

Because of that conclusion, he said, he saw no reason to investigate, or ask how many women and children had been killed.

U.S. Marines have been accused of killing 24 unarmed Iraqis in Haditha in November 2005, one of a series of incidents in which U.S. troops are suspected of killing Iraqi civilians. Two investigations were initiated into the Haditha case - a murder inquiry and a probe into the Marines' procedures following the killings.

The New York Times reported on Friday that the Pentagon investigation into the deaths in Haditha had found possible concealment or destruction of evidence by U.S. Marines.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060819/pl_nm/iraq_usa_inquiry_dc_3&printer=1

"Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right. It is truly enough said that a corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of conscientious men is a corporation with a conscience. Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice. A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men at all? or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power?"
Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

Conscience is awake, judging and discerning at all times. Unfortunately, the US military doesn't see it this way: the times allotted for conscience are a) before you sign up, and b) when you've had an unexpected 'conversion' and are ready to disavow war entirely (assuming you can handle the harassment you'll get while trying to prove such a conversion occurred) - every other time, the 'rightness' of an action is not relevant to duty, only its legality - the lawful order.

Aside from the logistical problems of using 'legality' as a primary criterion (i.e. an order is given here and now, while its illegality has to be proven under the appropriate judicial body in the appropriate manner), the rejection of conscience is a rejection of the soldier's humanity (as if this should come as any surprise).

In the US, selective conscientious objection is not recognized, though we all know it occurs in every other facet of life. Think of this dehumanizing bind those in military service are placed in when we hear the slogan "support our troops".

Sgt. Ricky Clousing has a tough road ahead of him, though he's got this media publicity and peace activist Chuck Fager's help. And thank God, he's not a Marine.

Good luck.

AWOL soldier heads back to Ft. Bragg

By ESTES THOMPSON,
Associated Press Writer
Fri Aug 18, 5:32 PM ET

A Fort Bragg paratrooper who says he left his Army barracks last summer because he was disillusioned with U.S. actions in Iraq surrendered to military authorities Friday.

Sgt. Ricky Clousing, 24, had walked away from Fort Bragg on June 23, 2005, with only a few clothes and his surfboard. He said earlier Friday that he hopes airborne soldiers at the post, where thousands are deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, will respect his reasons.

"I don't expect indoctrinated soldiers to have the capacity to understand why I'm doing what I'm doing. Anybody who has an issue with me, I will be more than glad to sit down and explain," he said as he arrived at a North Carolina airport wearing a black T-shirt with the message "Free Speech."

He was met there by Chuck Fager of Quaker House, a Fayetteville organization that counsels soldiers who want to leave the military. Fager said he dropped Clousing at the post after Clousing called military police to determine where to go.

"They told him he wasn't going to be under arrest," he said.

Maj. Tom Earnhardt, spokesman for 82nd Airborne Division, said Clousing is being treated like any other soldier.

"Now the appropriate command is going to make the decision as to what the road ahead looks like," he said.

Clousing joined the Army in 2002 and worked as an interrogator in Iraq from December 2004 until April 2005 while a member of the 313th Military Intelligence Battalion in the 82nd Airborne.

During his time in Iraq, Clousing said he saw an innocent Iraqi man killed by an American soldier in Mosul. He said he tried to talk to unit leaders about the incident but they dismissed him as an inexperienced soldier.

Clousing said he was upset by "the daily physical, emotional and psychological harassment of civilians (and) the daily killing of innocent civilians."

"I learned from the Iraqis their confusion as far as our role there," he said.

Clousing said military authorities told his lawyer that there was no paperwork showing that he was AWOL, but after he turned himself in at Fort Lewis, Wash., last week, the military gave him orders to report to a unit at Fort Bragg that handles absent soldiers.

"It's been my intention to turn myself in," he said. "I really don't feel nervous. I feel totally at peace."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060818/ap_on_re_us/iraq_objector&printer=1

... started on another blog.

I got started on a conversation about history, racism and reparations on another person's LJ. Since I seemed to be carrying on the thread, I thought I'd reproduce my part of the thread here instead of continuing there. Feel free to join in - it ain't a private club.

antipop_phenom wrote,

"If you're to teach history properly, the caucasiananglo majority of the class must feel a certain extent of white guilt at the end of each lecture."
- Prof Weir.

duran_dark
I usually feel guilty.

antipop_phenom
But why?

What did you do?

How is this your fault?

How did you influence these actions?

persona non grata
But why?

What did you do?

How is this your fault?

How did you influence these actions?

If by "white guilt", Weir means a personal sense of guilt based on the historic actions of a race, I agree with tubesoxrock - it's a common effect white people made aware of history will feel such personal guilt, but personal guilt shouldn't be a goal of a lecture. Such personalized guilt over history isn't very useful and I think that it lets people off too easily. On the other hand, removing the moral authority surrounding white privilege should be a goal of teaching history, and so if "white guilt" means feelings of conviction about one's own relationship to white privilege, then yes, that should be an intention. Hope the distinction makes sense.

antipop_phenom
Immensely!

Thanks for the well thought out response.

persona non grata

Thanks for the well thought out response.

Sure. For me, I realize that I personally didn't own slaves, nor did my ancestors. In fact, my ancestors were indentured servants like most poor immigrants of their time and place.

That being said, it was the plantation system, the slave trade and opium production that produced vast amounts of wealth that made Anglo modernity possible. Yes, at the time, none of my folk directly benefitted from these industries, but all Anglos have benefitted from the world created by slave wealth. My concern is this: what now? Do I have greater access to the benefits of that society due to my race? Yes. Have other people been stunted due to lack of access to these benefits? Yes.

Of course, I think that it's primarily the working class and underclass that has been given the shaft in general, but in the right circumstances, my class becomes invisible whereas my race doesn't. Therefore I think that in determining issues of representation and distribution, ethnicity should be acknowledged as well as class. In short, I'm fully in favor of reparations to African-Americans in both property and political power, though it's not due to my being responsible for how slaves were treated two centuries ago, but due to my being responsible for how I handle the disparity and white privilege today. [/preach]

But that's just me.

BTW, if you haven't seen it and you're interested, the community debunkingwhite has interesting conversation.

antipop_phenom
No counter arguements because I am in agreement.

I won't feel guilt over something I had no involvement in.
Especially in American society. My family hasn't been here long enough to be involved.

I don't believe reperations should be paid because of how people were treated in the past. Many "minority groups" have been mistreated in American society (Irish, Germans, Catholics) that do not receive such reperations. Its unfortunately a reality in diverse societies.

But I so believe reperations should be made to any group that has been subjective to a supposedly free/non-caste system that has made laws in the past to prevent the prosperity of that group. I'm still not sure however, how far they should go and who all qualifies.

n8whnp
Oh persona ...
While I am glad someone brought a bit of clarity to the discussion ... I find the idea that power or privilege in any way grants someone moral authority pretty scary. In a sense you deem power / privilege authoratative as long as it was obtained justly.

This is the same mistake Rawles and many of the other distributive justice people make ... first they try and find a way to describe property and power justly aquired instead of looking for ways to make the current distribution of property and power more just.

The question is not: are you morally culpable for the crimes of the past, it is: are you enjoying the spoils of injustice today? If so you should feel guilt. A good history lecture should connect the abuse of the past to the injustice of today ... show how one built the other ... and how they are continuing to spiral. If all your prof did was say slavery is your fault and that did not cause guilt it is because it was a poor lecture. A good lecture would have connected the dots. (i.e. prof is more right then wrong) Persona explains this well a bit lower down in the thread.

I will also comment that this is where the informed christian worldview can be far more descriptive. A christian can say the world is warped and broken. Christians name that would sin. Christianity speaks of Original Sin, the idea that as a member of a society that has sinned, your use of ill got gains is sinful. Your existance as a cog in the machine is itself a sin. Christians also can present a hope for a different culture of life. Life in the Kingdom of God. Life where people live in loving community and forgiveness and forgiven-ness. Life where people truely love each other. As Shane Clairborne explains: "When we have learned to love[as jesus loved], capitalism will not be possible and socialism will not be nessacary."

Reperations represent the use of violence, to make right the use of violence against someone else. Reperations alone will never bring preace, wholeness, or shalom. Look at the histories of Indian and South Africa for examples of this. It is only by intentionally living in the Kingdom of God right now that the world can be transformed and the pattern of history changed in any meaningful way.

persona non grata
Re: Oh persona ...
I find the idea that power or privilege in any way grants someone moral authority pretty scary.

I hope you're not reading that in my comment above, but I can see how my writing was a bit misleading. I think that history should remove the moral authority from white privilege, not because the authority was gained unjustly, but because such authority is illegitimate to begin with. Power or privilege cannot confer authority of any kind, but those so privileged hold this ideology in default.

The question is not: are you morally culpable for the crimes of the past, it is: are you enjoying the spoils of injustice today? If so you should feel guilt.

Bingo, though I'd say that you should feel responsibility rather than guilt - given the insight of history, how will you respond? Just feeling guilty doesn't do anything for anyone, neither would burning down the spoils of injustice. What to do?

Interesting comparison with Original Sin.

"When we have learned to love[as jesus loved], capitalism will not be possible and socialism will not be nessacary."

Sounds like communism. ;P
Actually, that is communism.

Reperations represent the use of violence, to make right the use of violence against someone else.

How so?

n8whnp
Reperations always involve either increased taxation ... beyond anything found in any social contract theory ... and enforced by goverment force (legal or military ... same diff) or involve the forced eviction of people from their land (settles in Isreal and before that Palestinians in Isreal) or forced claim of someone else's propperty. Reperations are a goverment action and all goverments can do is act by force, even if its just the force of coersion in the form of tax breaks.

I hope I was clear that within the christian language "white guilt" is simply one form of original sin.

persona non grata replies:
Reperations represent the use of violence, to make right the use of violence against someone else.
How so?
Reperations always involve either increased taxation ... beyond anything found in any social contract theory ... and enforced by goverment force (legal or military ... same diff)

So, are you abandoning all government or just government's actions in the role of distributive justice? Any function of government is fraught with the same perils: taxation at all is violence as it entails legal force, laws enforcing property rights are likewise violence, representative democracy is violence in that it coerces a minority to decisions of a majority, etc, etc.

Luckily, we don't have to get weighed down into inaction because the action has already started - people are already suffering violence - we just need to choose how to respond. Disenfranchisement and poverty - the very structure of life in which people find themselves is violence, and not violence against someone's pocketbook, but against their person. When it comes to choosing between "violence" to property rights or violence to life rights, there's no question which is most important. I fail to see how a government's role in reparations are any different from roles in taxation, public works, districting and voter rights, labor arbitration in collective bargaining and at worst *gasp*, eminent domain. These government functions go on every day and work toward someone's benefit. Why is this different?

The very fact that there is such a disparity that spurs some people to suggest reparations in the first place makes the whole notion of a "social contract" theory suspect - I'm sure that the Africans brought here didn't leave the State of Nature to enter into a social contract; no such agreement and no such "pre-contract" period exists. By and large, social contracts theories are mythic rationalisations of current social orders. It's not like people choose to be born disadvantaged.

I hope I was clear that within the christian language "white guilt" is simply one form of original sin.

I agree and it is a useful insight. I wish more people saw original sin in such terms.