[-15]. I am currently, as of 2011, an independent with (A) liberal socialist economic views and (B) conservative libertarian views about social issues, personal rights, and freedoms. This mix of (A) and (B), or in other words, this mix of rather liberal and fairly conservative views is generally known as either socialist libertarianism or libertarian socialism.
[-14]. To simplify, I have invented a new word for this combination of socialist economics and libertarian personal freedoms: it is what I call solitarianism, making me a solitarian. (I have recently come to realize the shortcomings of my vocabulary and that the word "solitarian" means someone who prefers solitude, so perhaps I more aptly invented a new, more obscure meaning for the word. Also, perhaps, "solitarianism" is more apt as it refers to the philosophy more directly.)
Unfortunately, most Americans and most politically active citizens in the west in general, are unaware that they can be solitarians and mistakenly think they must either be conservative or liberal across the board or across a spectrum of issues whereas picking and choosing your own position as an independent will always yield the most accurate picture of one's politics. An individual political human is a sum of positions on specific issues rather than easily defined on the spectrum from far left to moderate to far right.
(A) is the view that (1) the richest individuals and corporations should (a) pay the most taxes to the government in terms of their percentage of income and (b) that this goverment collected wealth should be used primarily to pay for public goods and necessities. What a public good or necessity actually is depends on the political disposition of who is being asked.
[-13]. An eighty-seven year old conservative republican, for example, may say that the public goods and necessities he or she sees needing the most attention and functing are (I) a strong military, (II) a large police force, (III) a tough legal and judicial system of harsh mandatory punishments for criminal offenders, (IV) lots of massive and well guarded prisons, and (V) help for the elderly to get their medications and healthcare freely but no concern for younger citizens as the eigty year old thinks younger people who can't pay for their healthcare are simply lazy as only the elderly truly need assitance with their bills as their ability to work usually dwindles considerably throughout the later decades of life.
[-12]. Public goods and necessities in a moderately socialist country would include such things as: (i) freely available national healthcare (like the healthcare in every other first world and developed nation on Earth), (ii) public roads, (iii) public schools, (iv) public museums, (v) public parks, (vi) public libraries, (vii) public bridges, (viii) public tunnels, (ix) free firemen, (x) free police, (xi) a free military defense force, (xii) strong agencies to protect the natural environments on Earth from harm, (xiii) strong agencies to protect people from harmful aspects of the environment they live in like bad food, water, air, or soil, ...(continued)...
(xiv) strong agencies to regulate a market system against becoming monopolistic, unsocialized, or unjust with regards to the working wages and conditions of the workers in a society, (xv) freely available social agencies that staff social workers trained to help those in need of (a) food, (b) shelter, (c) clothing, (d) substance abuse counseling, (e) help with mental illness, (f) help with family planning and reproductive issues like (I) freely availbale sexual and reproductive counseling, (II) freely available birth control, (III) freely available abortions, and many other things that can be considered public goods or necessities. (among many other possible public goods) and to (ii) pay for the higher wages and credits given to the most needy or lowest earning members of society.
(A) Liberal socialist economics would hold that the rich should pay the lion's share of the wealth needed for social health, the redistribution of wealth through credits and high wages is not only hightly just but essential for a thriving populace and a shrinking of class disparity.
And I admire libertarian views about social issues like our constitutional rights in the Bill of Rights and I am very libertarian about my dislike of the goverment's intrusion into our private lives (as in, people should be free to do with their bodies and property what they wish free of government interference, so long as an individual's free actions hurt no one else's body or property).
[-11]. I think the heart of the political problems in the world and in America is money in the system or as, in American political campaigns, not just within the system, but as the be all and end all of the sytem, the foundation for and cause of the rot of the political system we endure here in the States.
[-10]. This is not to say money is all bad or anything like that, but when Presidents and Judges and Representatives are basically bribed by those they hand billions of dollars to in "bank bailouts" where the friends of the Fed literally make out in the greatest payouts for campaign contributions (bribes) in the history of the Republic, all the while the ordinary people buying the necessity of such a "bailout" to save the economy, the absurdity meter in my mind goes off very loudly.
[-9]. It appears the corruption has reached such a stink that the whole thing in the west and in America is unfixable given the current status of our political systems and entrenched partisan parties. As Thomas Jefferson was so adament about preaching, the garbage of all nations must be taken out regularly because the corrupting ability of money and power will eat at the system here in America for instance, and lead it to where it ended up on September 11th- murdering it's own citizens in a grand charade by the intelligence agencies and some of Israel's black ops teams to mind-fuck the American people into believing anything about Osama Bin Laden, Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the Evil Sadaam Hussein who we were buddy-buddy with no so long before (as we were with Momar Ghadaffi as well).
[-8]. You see, the American people, and the whole of the West in general, will believe anything if only repeated enough and accompanied by scary color-coded terror warning screens flashing at the top of their nightly news' teleprompter monkey's head. Do you think Katie Couric is a hard-hitting journalist when she reads pre-written corporate whitewashed drivel about the Osama Bin Laden kill hoax or the great state of the economy that is, in reality, on the precipice of a real depression with unemployment over 22%? With oil gushing into the Gulf as Obama and his daughter swim and smile for ten seconds, proving it safe?
[-7.5]. The above graphic is something that I made based on loose associations of individuals with various political views and I'm sure all of these could be argued into another category. But, as a whole, the spectrum graphic I've created here helps understand the spectrum of political views and some key figures who may aptly be said to fall into one or more of them.
[-7]. As 9-11 goes unpunished and uninvestigated because the Democrats are in on the whole thing too and the idea that there is a real difference between a Republican and a Democrat lies only in their lies they tell to appease those liberals or conservatives who will vote for them so they can get into power, rise high enough, and eventually become a virtual puppet for the corporate-military-academic-legal-prison complex that keeps the war machines running and the prisoners coming in droves to fill the pockets of the private investors who fund the systems, the facilities, and the guards in companies whose bottom line looks better when society is a rotting sespool of people trapped in an injust legal system designed not to help or rehabilitate, but make people worse by feeding them to the chaos of modern prisons where survival often means getting longer sentences or life sentences for defending one's life or one's ass while inside.
[-6]. America is broken because the corruption is so rampant and obvious, no one believes in it anymore. The CIA brings the drugs into country through military cargo planes from the poppy fields we guard in Afghanistan while the DEA picks and chooses who gets killed or life sentenced for dealing the drugs our intelligence agency and special forces carts to the various high-level dealers who are basically senators, actors, representatives, and future presidents. We lie about being attacked, blow ourselves up, and go to war against fictional enemies for even more fantastic reasons and made-up relationships between Hussein, our old friend, and Al-Queda, our old proxy warriors against Russia in Afghanistan.
[-5]. I lean towards liking socialist libertarianism or libertarian socialism, or what I call solitarianism, about which I have a page here. I would hope that the future would yield a place where everyone was independent but had their particular isms and icans and tics they liked. Why? Because party politics, like religion, blinds people to the truth and hardens minds into a particular paradigm. Parties obscure reality and control everything. Parties eventually become one single mass of immovable political muck. We need not group human politicians into isms or parties, but we can have movements like the civil rights movement.
[-4]. If political will can only be made strong in numbers and around a central theme, then I would say that we need a truth movement more than anything. It would be a movement in which national secrets are to be exposed for the benefit of all mankind. We would expose false-flag incidents, disclose our knowledge of extra-terrestrials, as well as everything else the U.S. government keeps us from knowing.
[-3]. The real difference between Democrats and Republicans in the United States: Republicans say "Fuck the poor, I got mine" in public and Democrats say "Fuck the poor, I got mine" in private.
[-2]. I briefly aligned myself with the Democratic party because I had been lulled into believing their rhetoric reflected their actions and intents.
[-1]. In American politics, and in politics everywhere, we must stop listening to the politicians' words and pay attention only to their actions. Words are nothing. As a progressive who wants more peace and equity in America and in our foreign policy, I say we remove any and all incumbents who fail to act according to progressive, peaceful, change. These would include Blue Dog democrats and those democrats that act like Republicans but talk like Democrats. We get rid of the Republicrats. Where Obama falls is leaning heavily towards Republicrat.
[0]. Politics deals with class, war, human rights, and the courses of governments.
[1]. Someone who is apolitical (not political) or politically neutral is one of the following: (a) ignorant, (b) without a conscience, or (c) afraid. Children, people who are mentally challenged, some who are mentally ill or disabled, and people who don't pay any attention are within (a). The purpotrators of most wars are within (b). And, the victims and victimized soldiers of most wars are within (c). Soldiers can often very commonly be (a) or (b).
[2]. As Steven Colbert (of the American show the Colbert Report) once asked the Swiss ambassador, "Is that neutral anger you are feeling?" when the ambassador was ridiculed about the Swiss hiding Nazi gold.
[3]. Anyone who knows about the suffering of humans but remains silent about it is guilty of condoning through silence. Ignorance is ignorance and no one can be blamed who didn't know. But there is a difference between not wanting to know and not knowing.
[4]. Every tax dollar anyone has ever paid towards a government that they know kills innocents is a small but real drop of blood on their hands. The blood can be washed with words and deeds of resistance that do not create more blood but seek to end the bloodshed.
[5]. In America, our constitutional framers were very much aware that the Leviathan may need to be restrained or destroyed, if it becomes uncontrollable. But, I do not think violence need be used in order to deconstruct such a beast. Time and thought do more than knives and bullets. Free speech is precisely the vehicle by which any people can peacefully bring the economic system to a halt.
The Leviathian is, in most cases, the system that allows tyrants to rise to power and exert such power, not the individuals themselves, although I would say that there have been cases in history where individuals have become cults of personality (Mussolini, Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot, Napolean, etc).
[6]. I do not condone violence and I do not condone isolated acts of violence, but I also do not deny, like Adams and Jefferson and Franklin and Washington did not deny, that there are times when governments become such monstrosities against freedom that actions must be taken.
This being said, I do not find the conditions of the American revolution against the British to meet any criteria of horrendous oppression nor do I think the current situation in America requires any such drastic action. I would recommend peaceful non-cooperation and dissent, as many of our recent leaders, such as Al Gore have recommended personally. I reserve violence, as I describe further in [11] below, for cases that count as the initiation or duration of civil war only.
[6.1]. The American revolution was more about the rich getting richer and freer to do as they please but I am not wholly unsympathetic to these impulses so long as they consider, as they did not in the American revolution, the poor who create the conditions and wealth for the wealthy.
[6.1.1] Wealth can reflect an individual's drive and motivation to accumulate wealth for themselves or whatever ends they desire and I would think that any government that completely extinguishes this possibility, namely the ability to grow rich, is doomed to failure. People like to collect things and have things and buy things for comfort and, in many cases, the hard work and lifetime of dedication to something such as art, medicine, education, or any other profession, may lead to great wealth and this is in no way bad, immoral, or detrimental to the possibility of a just society.
[6.1.2] Wealth is not unethical if it takes care of the poor first and piles in the treasuries of corporations and individuals secondly.
[6.2]. The contemporary French have learned mass non-cooperation and national striking and they execute these principles of peaceful change well and regularly. The only way to hurt the wealthy with any reason and justice is in the pocketbook. No one, in particular, should be a focus of hatred but only the system that has allowed such people to garner the unearned power and wealth they do.
[7]. I am not even saying here billionaires can not come to exist, but only that it should be a lot harder and a lot more should be given back before they are allowed to amass such wealth on the backs of the poor.
[8]. These things happen through history because people don't want to take risks or create waves. Empires thrive on the silence of those who have found comfort through the spoils of the empire, through the suffering of others that they never have to see or hear or know about.
[9]. If you didn't know, you are innocent. If you knew but did nothing, you are guilty to some degree.
[10]. If you are afraid then I ask that you stop being afraid because fear is the fundamental power source of tyrants. It is only when people stop being afraid that tyrants wither.
[11]. I do not condone political violence except in the extreme situations where a government has begun to unleash massive violence on its own people or on the people of some other underserving nation(s) in a way that is unjust and clear and in which, most, if not all, of the population, is in agreement. I do not condone political violence that hurts civilians. I do not condone political violence that is terrorist-like.
[11.1]. If the government of any nation begins executing, in the streets, and in secret prisons, their own citizens, then that government has created the necessary conditions for what I say is just civil war.
The only developed countries that I think, in 2010, have flirted with this are Iran and North Korea though what can be understood about the internal happenings of these nations is limited and perhaps largely skewed by the American media. Unless any nation actually and clearly attacks us, I do not think any military campaigns against them are justified. Pre-emptive war is always the excuses of tyrants based on half truths or outright lies.
[11.2]. The only political violence that should ever be condoned is the kind where great masses of people come together and say, "Step down because we will not take it any longer" such as that in Romainia when they removed Nicolae Ceauescu. It should be admitted that the people were forced together at a forced rally, serving only to heighten the discontent.
I do not believe in the death penalty for anyone for anything at anytime- even for mass murdering butchers and dictators because when we execute we become, as a society, the very murderers we hate. Neither do I believe that anything can ever justify torture because it destroys those who do it as much as those who receive it.
[11.3]. Political violence that targets individuals is never a clear understanding of the forest-like system against which the purpotrators are fighting. The Weather Underground and Bill Ayers only made the situation worse because the violence was terrorist-like. The asassination of John F. Kennedy, a terrorist-like event, perhaps, changed the course of the CIA's existence, as there was tension over the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, but did little else except, perhaps, for a stronger Democratic and just policy concerning domestic race issues on the part of Johnson.
11[4]. If anything, such acts only serve to galvanize the people of a country nationalistically and, perhaps, this was the motive. The Oklahoma City bombing killed children in a daycare and, as such, constitutes what I call a war crime if it were committed by another nation and what governments call domestic terrorism when only isolated insurgents are involved.
In the case of Timothy McVeigh, there seems to be ample evidence to point to a government false-flag black op with McVeigh as the Patsy. Why?
To test the ability of the government to suppress certain fringe groups with U.S. State-sponsored domestic terror. Most terror around the world is done by militaries and intelligence agencies for the psychological manipulation of the public. Keeping these statements in the realm of a "conspiracy theory" is exactly what the purpotrators in the government want- ridicule of the truth.
Also, thinking that any one outpost of the government or the people who work therein are responsible for the country's conditions is ignorant. Most people in the government in the U.S. don't have a clue what is going on in sister agencies, their own agency, or in the military-industrial complex.
Why? Compartmentalization of duty and separation and classification levels for various parts of various agencies. How many CIA officers know what every other cell is up to? Probably not a single one- even the directors, know everything.
This is how Hitler killed the Jews in Nazi Germany without many of the people not being fully or even partially aware of exactly what was happening for a decent amount of time.
But, in the end, such atrocities will always come to light because this is the Karma of such acts. If you think you will ever get away with mass murder or torture, you are dead wrong. Why? Because, even upon surviving in this life, you will be confronted upon death by forces that are infinitely more powerful than any power gained on Earth. How can I know this?
Because I have died before and I am aware of the details of this system, and the infinite mental entity that controls it. If one accepts that death is total detachment from the physical body and being directly in the presence of God, that is.
It does not forget and nothing is not remembered in this computer. We can do nothing, truly, in secret, for it has infinite memory and "play-back" capability. |
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It will show you that it knows sooner or later, but all must pay their Karmic debt. One can go anywhere through meditation or shamanistic voyage- the body is but a vessel that can be escaped temporarily or permanently at will. You can will yourself to die, it is common in cases of broken hearts.
[11.5]. If 9-11 was allowed to happen, only some 25-50 people had to have ever known and as little as 5-10 may have been involved given what would have been necessary, from the highest positions, to not act. If only Dick Cheney had stood down the airforce, this would have been enough to allow the planes to strike unstopped as they were stopped in almost every other case in history.
Anger or paranoia, then, toward low-level government employees or any government employee, such as census workers or social workers or police or federal agents, is misguided and misdirected. As in Nazi war crimes, we should take the orchestrators and architects of war crimes to be the most responsible because I doubt the number of people who truly know or knew about such things (Iraq war was lie, perhaps, 9-11 allowed to happen) is very large.
[12]. The violence and self-eating nature of the French Revolution should serve as a warning to all who would undertake revolution without clear plans to restore law and order. And, anyone who seeks revolution towards communism is gravely mistaken about human nature. Almost all political problems can be solved reasonably and peacefully, in time, but the people must speak up and begin to take their lives as worth less than their freedom.
[13]. This is not to say that I sympathize with capitalistic oligarchies or fascist states either. European socialism, is, in my humble opinion, the best balance of incentive and cocern for the wellfare of a nation's citizenry. There is no perfect state on Earth but the people of northern and central Europe and Canada, generally, live in some of the best and most just conditions anywhere though I would push towards more personal liberties and less government intrusion into the private lives of their citizens than some other socialist nations.
[14]. Socialism need not require a single change to our constitution but just a furthering of how we treat each other in terms of help and compassion- such as univeral healthcare and shelters and food for everyone who is in need. All these things would require are reasonable tax rates on the wealthy rather than the current fascist corporate-government monopoly. All of these changes from regulating the financial sector and the banks and credit cards, to the providing of healthcare and basic necessities can be made peacefully with the right organization and motivation for true change, not just words of change.
[15]. If any revolution is to work, the revolutionaries must be more civil and peaceful than the iron fists they seek to dethrone.
[16]. I sympathize with the intent of people like Che Guevara, but I do not sympathize with the Marxist lack of understanding of human psychology. Communism is no solution, though it very well may be better than the conditions created under some despots. I do not sympathize at all with wealthy landowners or robber barrens of finance and industry, but I neither sympathize with the know-it-all leaders and eventual dictators who rise up amongst the morass of communism.
[16.1]. Any system of government where you will be told what to do, to the degree communism does, is just outright ignorant of what makes human beings tick and what makes human beings motivated. That being said, a libertarian or anarcho-capitalist scheme will always gravitate towards conditions that precisely lead to revolution.
When the rich eventually take everything through laws and loans, the poor will become desperate and their capacity to enjoy life will, eventually, diminish, so much, that they no longer value their lives above their lack of freedom and respect and quality of existence and I can not blame them for this.
[17]. Politics is the area of human endeavor that deals with those who seek to be and are elected as representatives of the people. Politics in America, and much of the world, is a rather dirty game where anyone who is too honest will fail. Politics and religion often represent the core values of an individual and it is typical that a candid discussion of either will upset someone.
[18]. Politicians are elected officials that are supposed to represent the people who elected them. In America, politicians play a delicate dance on the line between representing the people who elected them and the corporations and lobbyists that have contributed to their campaigns.
[19]. Politicians are sometimes elected and sometimes not. There are politicians who are self-interested only and there are those who are also interested in helping others. There must always be some modicum of self-interest in all politicians because even if they do everything they do for the people they still think of themselves as worthy enough to be the conduit for such activism.
[19.1]. This being said, I do think that there are many good politicians. These are politicians whose self interest is largely subdued by their attempt to achieve a greater good. There is nothing wrong with pride in one's sacrfices to help others. Giving is the only thing we should be prideful of.
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[20]. Many politicians focus more on their own self-interest than the interests of those they represent. In cases where politicians are appointed or where they usurp power, there should always be a mode of removal for that politician.
The American impeachment process provides this option. While the conservatives seem perfectly happy to bring impeachment, the liberals in this country have largely rolled over for one reason or another.
[20.1]. I see lifetime appointments to the Supreme Court as an error on the part of the founders. I would limit appointments to 20 or as little as 10 years so that the court's interpretation of the constitution can be regularly complimentary to the will of the people.
I also think that new modes of appointment and/or election for such officials should be considered given the already aggrandized powers of the executive branch. Our constitution is a dynamic document and no single part of it is critically important, save for the Bill of Rights and the general architecture of the government in terms of separation of powers. Anything we can do to return power downstream, towards the people, is good.
[21]. I think being liberal when rights are involved and conservative when self-preservation is involved is justified. In other words, I think we should see criminals and addicts as broken people who can be fixed, not bad people who must be punished.
Some violent people, especially in the criminal justice system, can not be fixed. But these constitute a minority and it is on those we should concentrate.
I agree for harsh penalties for white collar criminals but violence should always been seen as much greater than theft of property only. If we spent more time pursuing those individuals who are real threats to society instead of those involved in consenual crimes, we would certainly live in a safer nation. |
22. When it comes to those who would attempt to destroy us outright, I am, in no way, understanding. It is only under mortal threat that a nation should certainly protect itself or another nation. We should not use the military for political or cultural change in other countries unless that country poses a mortal threat and has shown, clearly, through action, that it is such a threat.
Iraq and Vietnam never satisfied this condition but the Axis countries of WWII surely did. I am not wholly against intervention in genocidal campaigns elsewhere, but not through indiscriminate bombing and their must be enough public support to justify the acting nation's loss of troops in just intervention that does not allow "collateral damage" or, in other less Orwellian terms, the death of innocent men, women, and children.
23. Politicians are necessary in a democratic representative government. Most nations in the west are democracies that elect politicians. Some nations put more or less power in the hands of any one politician. The centralization of power is always dangerous and all efforts to keep power separated and in the hands of the people should be taken.
23[1]. Perhaps shortening the terms of our representatives would help increase their desire to please their electorate. Human memory is dull and, typically, politicians only have to please the people they represent immediately before an election. This creates a situation where, in the US Senate, for example, senators have years of virtually unaccountable action that can be greatly influenced by special interests.
23[2]. We should not shorten terms so much that the politicians are incapable of making change, but perhaps 1 year terms for Representatives, 2 year terms for Presidents, and 3 year terms for Senators would help keep politicians more aligned towards their voters' interests and not their donors. That we allow people to be re-elected is, perhaps, detrimental to their ability to make great and good change. If someone knows this is it, then they need not think about pleasing special interests to keep the coffers filled for the next election.
23[3]. Donors' interests are more often paid attention to when donations can happen at any time and over time. The money in the American political equation consistenty keeps laws and justice skewed towards the benefit of the wealthy. A healthy society does not let its poorest members suffer while some prosper immensely.
23[4]. Because money is, in the American system of politics, such an important and determinate force, those interests with the most money usually win political positions. Corporations and the wealthy minority, then, get a greatly lopsided portion of the influence.
(Politicians like Senator Joseph Lieberman's (of the United States) lips only move when corporate money is bulging from their pockets. I have heard that he plans not to run again but take a high-paid position for corporate interests after his tenure. How is this not outright bribery? I single him out because no other contemporary politician represents such amoral flip-flopping between parties and principles based only on who has the biggest handout to support such shifts.)
24. We need to remove money from the political equation before, during, and after politcal campaigns and careers. How many politicians quit just to become lobbyists? The whole system is infected and we need laws to change this. The problem is the lawmakers are the very ones being legally bribed. What do we do? Vigorously support democratic progressives and then, if this continues to fail miserably, and there is widespread and unanamous support, break away and form a new progressive party.
24[1]. This last option should only be considered if and only if the resultant party will be capable of defeating the prevailing conservative party, the Republicans, at the moment. Splitting the democratic vote into democrats and progressives would be a disaster. Perhaps if the existing Democrats in power and voters were willing to endure mass or majority defections to a new progressive party, thereby effectively stranding Blue Dog democrats, it could work.
