Politics

[Whiskeyjack]

I'm going against the better judgment here and will publicly disagree with OMM on something. Lord help me.

1). Anyone who believes that the states are less "owned" by corporations than the federal government is hasn't spent much time trying to get state politicians to move on anything. In my experience, the states are FAR more dominated by their big economic "residents" at all levels of involvement [right down to whether I can get credit for making my own energy or growing my own almond trees].

I don't believe that state and local governments are somehow more resistant to corporate lobbying. But they are harder to influence, on a national level, for the reasons I enumerated earlier. If Sam Walton wants to lobby government for a legal loophole that will advantage his stock holders at the expense of his workers, it's far easier for him to hire a single firm on K Street to influence a few of the right congressmen on Capitol Hill than it is for him to hire 50 different lobbying firms to influence the right congressmen in 50 different legislative bodies. I think decentralizing where possible is the best defense against corporatism.

And far better for local and state governments to be dominated by their respective big economic "residents" than for our Federal government to be dominated by shady multinationals. The former are at least embedded in the communities they're seeking to influence; they support the local little leagues, YMCA, etc. Wal-mart and Amazon don't do that. This AmCon article lays out this argument more clearly.

2). Severe change in leveling the field for candidates to run for office without fear of being monumentally outspent is far and away the first "domino" which has to fall if anyone seriously wants government to be more citizen-responsive.

I agree, but I don't think it can be done. Money always finds a way in politics. Might as well try to dam the Amazon River. But we can at least redirect it somewhat (thereby blunting its impact) through decentralization.

3). All states and all cities are economically like micro-nations. Left entirely to their own devices, it will be entirely the "product out" vs "product in" equation which determines their affluent vs depressed status. If America wants to engage in absolutely no "redistribution of wealth", then we need to clearly face the consequences of that. Going "hard-a$$" is the Social Darwinist approach. Other citizens don't want to do it that way.

I'm not against the redistribution of wealth. I used welfare as an example because it's one policy issue over which there's strong disagreement as to who should get what and how much. Allowing the states to craft their own welfare programs would diffuse a lot of vitriol in Washington, and it would ultimately result in better policy all around as Justice Brandeis' "laboratories of democracy" try and discard new ideas in favor of what works best. But you're right to point out that doing so would make inter-state redistribution challenging. I still think it's worth the trade-off.

4). Because we insist on a transportation dependent // regional product specialization model of "The Good Economy", there arises endless [and unexamined in this thread] aspects of modern American life, which even affluent conservatives demand [conveniently forgetting that individual states cannot easily oversee all these pieces of the mindblurring complexity of interstate and international commerce. Health and Product Safety demands are the crude tip of the Iceberg.

My argument is simply that the Feds should devolve power in any area where individual states are able to adequately handle things themselves. The regulation of interstate commerce obviously isn't one of those areas. Neither is the regulation of most types of pollution, etc. As I mentioned previously, technological advancement and global economic integration have undermined state sovereignty necessarily and permanently; but that doesn't mean we should throw Federalism out the window. There are still lots of things that can be handled more effectively at lower rungs of government, but which the Feds are trying to do now (and poorly). That's what I'd like to see changed.

5). What we have here is failure to communicate. That phrase when applied to these issues means that everything about this interstate and international economy is long ago grown lightyears beyond humanscale and the abilities of actual people to concert together and do something which might take everyone into account. We have a MASSIVE "BIG" problem. There is no MASSIVE ORGANIZATIONAL way to solve it and stop bloodletting of the little guys [like citizens, villages, small businesses, small farms]. The only even mild hope is to try to give the smaller candidate a chance to win, so that candidate can really talk with his human constituents.

This I have to strongly disagree with. "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" is a fairy tale, particularly in our current day and age. There is so much power, money and influence in D.C. now that individual politicians, no matter how well-intentioned at the outset, cannot help but be corrupted by it. I don't think it's hyperbole to describe the concentration of extreme amounts of power and money among the hands of so few as evil, plain and simple.

A revival of Federalism (to the extent possible) seems, to me at least, like the only real hope we have of combating corporatism.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Just stumbled across a really interesting post on reddit about PRISM. It argues that "intelligence" has basically becomes a 2nd military-industrial complex, and most of this is being driven by private contractors looking to boost their profit margins.

 

[BobD]

I'm going against the better judgment here and will publicly disagree with OMM on something. Lord help me.

 

[Cackalacky]

Just stumbled across a really interesting post on reddit about PRISM. It argues that "intelligence" has basically becomes a 2nd military-industrial complex, and most of this is being driven by private contractors looking to boost their profit margins.

I agree since 70% of our intelligence processing is handled by private corporations. I have read a report that states they use the gathered intelligence against their own competitors. This includes digging up dirt, tracking key strokes, reading emails as they are being typed, electronic sabotage (intercepting mails, changing it, then sending it on). Obviously those that are good at it are highly sought out and profitable. Anonymous exposed three companies a while back.

Stratfor: Inside the World of a Private CIA | Al Akhbar English

People will pay top dollar for information.

 

[phgreek]

Just stumbled across a really interesting post on reddit about PRISM. It argues that "intelligence" has basically becomes a 2nd military-industrial complex, and most of this is being driven by private contractors looking to boost their profit margins.

I was afraid that would happen

...but I didn't think it would come about until we had some sort of a foreign driven corporate espionage case (ie China) that forced us to deal with making the intel gathered data availabale to support cases outside the intel world...

In this case I must cede the point that there appears to be COI in having contractors privy to this kind of data from a business intel perspective.

So what we know in general is government employees have demonstrated a willingness to put themselves in a position of COI from a political perspective, by handing over privacy act and other sensitive data from one group to their political enemies; that contractors can/will engage in corporate espionage from a business intel perspective, AAAAND that the intel community will flat *** lie to congress about what data there is, so there is no oversight until someone commits career suicide and goes whistleblower...

nope...no reason for concern here

 

[Whiskeyjack]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p><a href="https://twitter.com/search/%23NSA">#NSA</a> scandal follows <a href="https://twitter.com/search/%23torture">#torture</a> scandal so closely: "It's not true. / It's not that bad. / We've got to do it to protect you. / Go shopping."</p>— Ron Charles (@RonCharles) <a href="https://twitter.com/RonCharles/status/345244116885594112">June 13, 2013</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

[MJ12666]

It's surprising that the President has not addressed this issue. Any ideas why?

 

[BobD]

It's surprising that the President has not addressed this issue. Any ideas why?

Which issue?

 

[Old Man Mike]

Whiskey: actually we're hardly disagreeing at all.

My view is just more pessimistic than yours, and probably stems from a lot of lost fights with local/ state economic power over my decades as an environmentalist, a solid waste management planner, a city planning consultant, and a hoped-for ecovillage developer. The only time that I can remember "winning" in these depressing incidents was when a group of us met secretly to plan all manner of somewhat-deceptive local politics strategies to defeat county waste incinerator plans in Kalamazoo and Calhoun [that's Battle Creek] counties. We never lied about facts, but we were tricky on tactics. The only reason that this worked was that we were able to operate on a very personal local scale, upon which big money had trouble finding an advantage. We played a bit dirty, but we were playing against very dirty opponents. The end product of our scheming was the installation of the finest recycling program in Michigan. And... a huge saving of landfill space. And... a slow alteration of some of our fellow citizens' higher thinking about consumerism and if anything else matters at all. I myself played the role of the "hired gunslinger" from out of town in helping defeat the Calhoun incinerator after our bigger drama to stop the one in Kalamazoo. I go to sleep at night quite happy with my despicable tricky self on both of these rare wins.

My life experiences have taught me that almost anything where any money is involved at all [directly or not] has some big deep pocket corporate interest sitting there like a junkyard dog waiting to bite your head off. AND the only time that we little guys beat the Dog was when we could operate on smallscale. Even then it was high drama. My opinion on our Massive Bigness Problem still stands. Our difference is that you'd like to believe that there's a way to fix it and I don't. If our little band of warriors would have gone up against REALLY focussed giants, they might well have squashed us. But we kicked their a$$ and I'm glad. Another problem which gets much worse for everyday folks the bigger the Beast is is the lovely legal invention of the Slap suit. The Beast just finds a way to sue you, or threaten to sue, and you can't fight it for simple economic reasons. The only way that the little guys can be protected against things like Slap suits [unless the feds WOULD step in, which almost never happens] is that if the situation is so "small", i.e. local, that the little guys could afford court with a real chance to be taken at least as seriously as the onslaught of legal talent that the Beast would trot out.

We are talking about all the same things. You see value in reducing the responsible political units to smaller scales when possible, so do I --- but my life tells me that we little guys get our butts kicked on those scales just as roundly, until the fight gets REALLY smallscale. Someone needs to give a damn about the little folks because they are who actually receive the impact of these big decisions. I don't have much hope for the USA in these matters because everyone who is not directly involved with any given situation tends to side with the "it may get me more money" speculation, and as long as whatever this is does not immediately interfere with my own money flow, then... well, it's a shame about those guys, but sometimes you have to sacrifice. The only times that I've ever seen this distanced-self-orientation behavior blunted is when everybody is getting close to knowing one another, whereupon the Big Thing cannot simply scare the community our of their minds and values.

So, thus my belief in local politics, actual neighbors who aren't politicians and millionaire media dominators, to create the only hope that some strong base of caring about community members might be established which the Big Powers would have to look at and take into account with their decisions.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

So, thus my belief in local politics, actual neighbors who aren't politicians and millionaire media dominators, to create the only hope that some strong base of caring about community members might be established which the Big Powers would have to look at and take into account with their decisions.

Can't endorse this strongly enough. A genuine sense of community (which used to exist in this country) is our only hope for saving American culture; if accomplished, it would fix almost everything else.

To the extent a structural/ political solution exists, I think it's probably subsidiarity, but my previous posts on the subject may have overstated its chances of working in a vacuum. Everything comes back to culture eventually.

 

[yankeehater]

Which issue?

ANY OF THEM!

Also is Grandpa Joe still alive? Have not seen Biden since the VP debate.

 

[Black Irish]

I think OMM needs a hug.

 

[chicago51]

ANY OF THEM!

Also is Grandpa Joe still alive? Have not seen Biden since the VP debate.

Biden has been around. He led the task force on preventing future gun violence which didn't go anywhere. When the Senate couldn't get a deal done on taxes prior to the 1st of the year Biden was the one that actually step in and negotiated the deal.

Biden has actually negoiated a lot of deals. One of Obama's issues is he really didn't have a good understanding of Washington which is why he has rellied on Biden a lot to negotiate some the bigger deals.

 

[BobD]

Can't endorse this strongly enough. A genuine sense of community (which used to exist in this country) is our only hope for saving American culture; if accomplished, it would fix almost everything else.

To the extent a structural/ political solution exists, I think it's probably subsidiarity, but my previous posts on the subject may have overstated its chances of working in a vacuum. Everything comes back to culture eventually.

Question: Does cultural diversity have a negative effect on "sense of community"?

The reason I ask is I've noticed that places where I still see a somewhat strong sense of community are usually neighborhoods where the majority are of the same ethnic and religious background.

I've always been a fan of diversity, so I'm in no way trying to make a statement, just an honest question and I'd like to hear some thoughts.

 

[Redbar]

Question: Does cultural diversity have a negative effect on "sense of community"?

The reason I ask is I've noticed that places where I still see a somewhat strong sense of community are usually neighborhoods where the majority are of the same ethnic and religious background.

I've always been a fan of diversity, so I'm in no way trying to make a statement, just an honest question and I'd like to hear some thoughts.

As much as I hate to say it I think it does have a small effect on "sense of community". However, I think there is a much bigger "threat" to "sense of community" and that is the progress of civilization in general. I am not saying that I think this is a great idea, but as it is unfolding I have to say that I agree with Ayn Rand's observation when she said that, "Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men." For better or worse, the rise of individualism is IMO the biggest threat to a sense of community.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Question: Does cultural diversity have a negative effect on "sense of community"?

The reason I ask is I've noticed that places where I still see a somewhat strong sense of community are usually neighborhoods where the majority are of the same ethnic and religious background.

I've always been a fan of diversity, so I'm in no way trying to make a statement, just an honest question and I'd like to hear some thoughts.

That's a great observation, and a proper response will require more time than I have right now. Will revisit this later.

 

[Old Man Mike]

Diversity has a "negative effect" on the sense of community only if the individuals standing around are lazy and just want "community" to happen without putting any work into it. That sort of "community" is a phony concept. Community is merely one form of relationship. All relationships must be conscious and worked at. Only then might the individual "unit" come to the awareness that maybe sometimes doing something non-selfish for the good of the community is worthwhile. Anyone who just wants to wake up in the morning with a bunch of folks around who are sort-of like themselves has no concept of a community relationship.

It is in the deep and ongoing relationships that people share, that Community is built. It's not handed out to passive or "private" duds. [This is why, once again, Ayn Rand is a disastrous Dead End. Hers is a world of fundamentally NON-communal fools painting themselves into a lonely uncared for corner]. Conversely, personal sharings meld people deeply even where most cultural differences would divide, and the "culture" of that micro-community is built from there. Simply imagined: if I have a friend with whom I've spent many helpful relationships, that bond grows stronger than the fact that he is muslim and I am Catholic or, God Forbid, he is a Michigan fan and I am a Notre Dame fan. Communities are the multiplication of such worked-for friendships despite what are in the end trivial differences [unless one is a fanatic, in which case that person will always be too bent to share in community].

All fanatics are [with perspective analysis] partially insane, and all insanity is [with that same analysis] excessively bent towards ones own desires. Such people may think that they are in community with fellow fanatics, but it merely a banding together of self-oriented egos who really don't give much of a damm about the others in the group --- only the fanaticism which shallowly binds them.

It is only persons who can get over themselves and truly join in with others, who have community. That takes a certain amount of selflessness, other-orientation, and trust, over and beyond the need to work at the relationships.

 

[BobD]

Diversity has a "negative effect" on the sense of community only if the individuals standing around are lazy and just want "community" to happen without putting any work into it. That sort of "community" is a phony concept. Community is merely one form of relationship. All relationships must be conscious and worked at. Only then might the individual "unit" come to the awareness that maybe sometimes doing something non-selfish for the good of the community is worthwhile. Anyone who just wants to wake up in the morning with a bunch of folks around who are sort-of like themselves has no concept of a community relationship.

It is in the deep and ongoing relationships that people share, that Community is built. It's not handed out to passive or "private" duds. [This is why, once again, Ayn Rand is a disastrous Dead End. Hers is a world of fundamentally NON-communal fools painting themselves into a lonely uncared for corner]. Conversely, personal sharings meld people deeply even where most cultural differences would divide, and the "culture" of that micro-community is built from there. Simply imagined: if I have a friend with whom I've spent many helpful relationships, that bond grows stronger than the fact that he is muslim and I am Catholic or, God Forbid, he is a Michigan fan and I am a Notre Dame fan. Communities are the multiplication of such worked-for friendships despite what are in the end trivial differences [unless one is a fanatic, in which case that person will always be too bent to share in community].

All fanatics are [with perspective analysis] partially insane, and all insanity is [with that same analysis] excessively bent towards ones own desires. Such people may think that they are in community with fellow fanatics, but it merely a banding together of self-oriented egos who really don't give much of a damm about the others in the group --- only the fanaticism which shallowly binds them.

It is only persons who can get over themselves and truly join in with others, who have community. That takes a certain amount of selflessness, other-orientation, and trust, over and beyond the need to work at the relationships.

I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, but what are the odds?

I agree with your thoughts, but what I'm wondering, is there something more primal (not sure if that's the right word) to creating successful long-term communities? Is community something that should come natural to us (packs, pods, tribes) and we're screwing it up? In modern human societies are we trying to hard to mix water and oil? Ever see a a tiger hanging with leopards, chimpanzees chilling with orangutans, porpoises working with dolphins? I see them existing together, but not so much working together. Does this make sense?

Animals are probably not the best example of what I'm trying to say. A gentleman I work with is from Afghanistan and part of a very strong Afghan community locally. That community has their own social network, business network, soccer club and in many ways functions as a large extended family. They all seem to be very nice people and to get along with people from all walks of life, but when his kids need a ride to school or his car needs to be fixed, it's always someone from within his community...Afghani and Muslim. Same for a Chinese woman and a Portuguese man we work with. They both are also part of a very strong local ethnic community. They mingle with the masses peacefully, but when they need something, they always look within their community first.

 

[Redbar]

As much as I hate to say it I think it does have a small effect on "sense of community". However, I think there is a much bigger "threat" to "sense of community" and that is the progress of civilization in general. I am not saying that I think this is a great idea, but as it is unfolding I have to say that I agree with Ayn Rand's observation when she said that, "Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men." For better or worse, the rise of individualism is IMO the biggest threat to a sense of community.

Diversity has a "negative effect" on the sense of community only if the individuals standing around are lazy and just want "community" to happen without putting any work into it. That sort of "community" is a phony concept. Community is merely one form of relationship. All relationships must be conscious and worked at. Only then might the individual "unit" come to the awareness that maybe sometimes doing something non-selfish for the good of the community is worthwhile. Anyone who just wants to wake up in the morning with a bunch of folks around who are sort-of like themselves has no concept of a community relationship.

It is in the deep and ongoing relationships that people share, that Community is built. It's not handed out to passive or "private" duds. [This is why, once again, Ayn Rand is a disastrous Dead End. Hers is a world of fundamentally NON-communal fools painting themselves into a lonely uncared for corner]. Conversely, personal sharings meld people deeply even where most cultural differences would divide, and the "culture" of that micro-community is built from there. Simply imagined: if I have a friend with whom I've spent many helpful relationships, that bond grows stronger than the fact that he is muslim and I am Catholic or, God Forbid, he is a Michigan fan and I am a Notre Dame fan. Communities are the multiplication of such worked-for friendships despite what are in the end trivial differences [unless one is a fanatic, in which case that person will always be too bent to share in community].

All fanatics are [with perspective analysis] partially insane, and all insanity is [with that same analysis] excessively bent towards ones own desires. Such people may think that they are in community with fellow fanatics, but it merely a banding together of self-oriented egos who really don't give much of a damm about the others in the group --- only the fanaticism which shallowly binds them.

It is only persons who can get over themselves and truly join in with others, who have community. That takes a certain amount of selflessness, other-orientation, and trust, over and beyond the need to work at the relationships.

Old Man Mike,
As usual I agree with everything you said, that is why I said, "as much as I hate to admit that it has an effect..." the point being that it shouldn't but I believe in the society we have created up to this point, it does... sadly. Also, I would never put Ayn Rand on a pedestal, that is why I said, "I am not saying it is a great idea, but as things seems to be unfolding I would agree with her observation that civilization today is driving us to individualism." My point, probably not well stated, spoke more to how I think diversity is actually playing in modern society, and not at all to the value that I personally place on it, or the value to which I think society should place on it, which was more accurately and I think correctly stated by your commentary. Point is I think we are making some poor choices or as you said taking the lazy route. I do believe that thus far in our evolution and spiritual maturity the forces that drive progress in civilization are having a negative effect on "sense of community" and that because of this immaturity, insensitivity, and push to individualism, diversity has been perceived in many many places as having an effect on sense of community. I did not say "negative" but you were right in thinking that was my feeling.

 

[Redbar]

I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, but what are the odds?

I agree with your thoughts, but what I'm wondering, is there something more primal (not sure if that's the right word) to creating successful long-term communities? Is community something that should come natural to us (packs, pods, tribes) and we're screwing it up? In modern human societies are we trying to hard to mix water and oil? Ever see a a tiger hanging with leopards, chimpanzees chilling with orangutans, porpoises working with dolphins? I see them existing together, but not so much working together. Does this make sense?

Bob,
I think higher thought, the difficult work OMM talked about with regard to interpersonal relationships and spiritual truths revealed by enlightened men and women are definitely not encouraged by our modern society. They would very much prefer we behave like the animals in your example, we are much easier to control this way. Unfortunately, I think they are succeeding to a large extent and that is the reason I made my first comment to your query.

 

[Bluto]

The small community I spent most of my formative years in was about as diverse ethnically as it gets. The thing was everyone shared a common sense of purpose. I think this "sense of purpose" beyond accumulating wealth and stuff and protecting me and mine is what is missing in this country.

 

[Old Man Mike]

I'm rather proud of IE this day.... very thoughtful people seeing deeply into this [in the end] spiritual "communing" matter.

 

[Black Irish]

It's easier, initially, to form a community with people of similar backgrounds, beliefs, culture, etc. But too often it all falls apart when the usual suspects rear their heads: jealousy, greed, anger, arrogance. I remember my uncle warning me away from my parish chapter of the Knights of Columbus because of all the "political crap." I saw what he was talking about in other social clubs and groups I got involved in. For a solid community to come together and be successful, its participants need to try very hard to be their best selves.

 

[chicago51]

I think it is has been hard to achieve that sense of community that recent post of mention because of figure pointing.

You got half the people in this country myself included rightly or wrongly pointing the finger and saying 1 percent of the people are too greedy. Then you got the other half of the population pointing the finger saying 40 percent of the country is too lazy.

Rather the claims are true or not there is a whole lot of playing the blame game.

 

[chicago51]

Affirmative Action Ruling Contest: Race Vs. Class - ABC News

 

[MJ12666]

I think it is has been hard to achieve that sense of community that recent post of mention because of figure pointing.

You got half the people in this country myself included rightly or wrongly pointing the finger and saying 1 percent of the people are too greedy. Then you got the other half of the population pointing the finger saying 40 percent of the country is too lazy.

Rather the claims are true or not there is a whole lot of playing the blame game.

Just curious, can you please define for me how YOU personally define the 1 percent.

 

[BobD]

How's everyone feeling about this situation?

Putin warns U.S., West against arming organ-eating Syrian rebels - CNN.com

 

[chicago51]

Just curious, can you please define for me how YOU personally define the 1 percent.

I think it is people making over roughly $500k. I know top 2 percent is over $250k.

For the most part I don't have a problem with the way the top 1 percent are taxed.

Its the top 0.1 percent that really benefit from certain tax breaks. The 400 richest Americans have half all capital gains which are taxed a lot less than regular income. High income capital gains (stocks, bonds) is 20 percent, which is less than a middle class income tax rate.

Having lower capital gains taxes encourages invest which is a good thing. I big believer though that once you hit $1-$2 million should either get hit with a surtax of 5 percent or so which would apply to capital gains as well as personal income, or have some sort of minimum tax rate for true millionaires.

 

[Buster Bluth]

How's everyone feeling about this situation?

Putin warns U.S., West against arming organ-eating Syrian rebels - CNN.com

American policy should resemble this:

 

[BobD]

American policy should resemble this:

If there was ever a time for a true diplomat.....