So, you think things are looking pretty bad. Just because a rogue Republican junta has control of the Presidency, the Supreme Court, and both houses of Congress you're feeling hopeless. You find grounds for pessimism in the observation that the Congress has just granted a psychopathic president an arrogation of power not seen since 1215, and the fix is in for another rigged election.
Well, let me tell you, Comrade: You may think you're looking at hopeless, but you don't know what hopeless is. I'm not going to tell you you've got food on your table and a warm bed to sleep in every night. I'm not going to tell you about the loving family in your life, the sunsets and the lakes and the mountains. No, I want to talk to you about Evolution, and about the Military-Industrial Complex.
The long-term trend in biological evolution is from predation to cooperation. This is the well-worn road from parasitism to symbiosis: organisms begin as antagonists, and end up as brothers. The bacterium invades as a parasite, maximally aggressive, and quickly kills its host. Later generations learn that if they back off a bit and allow the host to live, they can infect a lot more hosts in the long run. And as the generations go on, the parasite learns not just to co-exist with its host, but to nurture and benefit the host. Parasitism has become symbiosis, not because the bacterium has any sympathy or morality or fundamental decency, but because evolution has taught it a lesson: If I am going to make my living by mooching off you, then the better you are doing, the more there is to mooch.
In human history, the long trend is from despotism to democracy, from a monarch who lives off the work of his subjects to a generalized sharing of the fruits of labor. This is not because monarchs eventually see the light, or because good triumphs over evil; it is because when the economy is prospering, there is more for the kleptocrats to steal than when the working class is enslaved. Business moguls who sit atop a thriving economy are richer than those who preside over an economy bled dry.
And so the Bush junta must fall. It will fall not because they are unspeakably evil, not because their radical agenda is dissolving the progress of centuries, or that they are rolling back notions of human decency that go back to the Magna Carta. The Bush junta will fall because their policies are disastrous for the Military-Industrial Complex.
Officers of our military know even better than we do that war is hell. They have seen it firsthand. They are onto the fact that this war in the Middle East has no purpose and no end, and that they are targets among a people that hate and resent them more each day. Our enlisted men and women know that their salaries are being shortchanged and their benefits slashed, that the Veterans Hospitals are being defunded and military pensions rolled back. Yes, they are trained in unthinking obedience, but that obedience depends on a bargain of mutual respect, while the likes of Rumsfeld and Cheney have treated them with breathtaking arrogance and disdain.
A handful of billionaires has done well with the Bush tax cuts, to be sure, and two industries - oil and defense - have enjoyed a fresser's dream. But for most American business, these six years have been disappointment bounded by fear. Consumption has been propped up by unsustainable borrowing. The economy is poised on the brink of collapse. There is no stability, no security � no expectation of future profits or growth.
U.S. 'democracy' has always existed for the benefit of big business and the military. They will not tolerate the Bush debacle forever. In the fall of 1953, at the height of Joe McCarthy's power as a demagogue, he broadened his attack, claiming that the US Army was riddled with communist infiltrators. The Army struck back, and McCarthyism was finished. Turkey is the oldest and most stable democracy in the Middle East, but Ataturk's vision of secular, republican rule has been subverted repeatedly by Moslem zealots. Each time, the Turkish military seizes control of the government just long enough to restore a secular democracy.
Politics is the epitome of a 'complex system', whose many parts interact in ways that are essentially unstable and volatile. Temporary eras of calm may lend the illusion of ordered, gradual change; but abrupt transitions are a characteristic property of the system. (Stephen Jay Gould told us that this is how evolution works, and Malcolm Gladwell has noted the same tendencies in social systems.)
We may study history, and we may formulate theories that seem to us like Destiny, but it is arrogance to imagine that we have the power to foretell the future. When we say that our efforts are pointless, this is not historical realism, but the corrupting psychological influence of depression and internal despair.
And so we press forward, spreading the truth, advocating for justice and compassion. We do it because we cannot do otherwise; we are under no illusion that our actions will make a difference. The world is large. There is much that we cannot know; but we can be confident that the next few years will include stunning surprises that dwarf the power of our present imaginings.
And our faith in the future is abundantly justified.
http://mathforum.org/~josh
Josh Mitteldorf was educated to be an astrophysicist, and has branched out from there to mathematical modeling in a variety of areas. He has taught mathematics, statistics, and physics at several universities. He is an avid amateur pianist, and father of two adopted Chinese girls. This year, his affiliation is with the University of Arizona, where he studies the evolution of aging.
I want to thank you for this article. I must admit that at times, I lose faith that there is anything an unemployed victim of this so-called healthy economy can do to bring about change. There have been times I have wanted to just give up, move to Canada, or somewhere else where there is less governmental insanity.
But you are right. There comes a point where the general populace (read those of us who actually work (or worked) for a living) can no longer contribute to the economy because no one can afford anything. When money no longer has value, a billionaire is as poor as a street person. With the way the scales have been tipped in the last five years, I think we are approaching the point of complete economic collapse.
There has to come a point where we can borrow no more, and those from whom we have borrowed come knocking at the door demanding payment. It's at that point where the folly of the actions of our government will be undenyable. It's at that point where the pendulum will swing back in favor of we the people.
All corrupt regimes and empires fall. Rome fell. The Feudal system of the middle ages fell. Nazi Germany fell. The USSR fell. They all fell under the weight of their own greed, insanity, corruption, and the fact that they bled everyone until there was no blood left. It is only a matter of time until this regime falls as well. I hope it falls soon, if not for my sake, for the sake of the future.
So, I will hold my head up in the knowledge that this cannot go on forever. I will continue to speak out, challenge, ask questions, and face being ridiculed, called names, or even be tortured as an "enemy combatant" under our new torture law. It's the least I can do. Besides, I have lost almost everything in life, so what is there left to lose but my ability to continue sucking air?
Blessed be!
Pappy
by
Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments)
on Tuesday, October 3, 2006 at 3:23:53 AM
1 comments
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