Medici

What kind of spider did I amost step on in Northern Alabama?

In “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” Ursula Le Guin describes a town called Omelas whose residents’ happiness depends upon the imprisonment of one child, who is kept in misery and confinement. They believe the child responsible for their happiness is miserable only because they believe themselves to be happy.

We are living through a period I call the 'Panic of the Patricians'. We, their clients, don't need them anymore, and they know it. They don't know what to do about their loss of legitimacy and authority now that we have our own tools to share information, educate ourselves, create agreements and form consensus, and engage in all aspects of our social and economic environment that once required their assistance and permission. How do you expect them to respond?

Would it be unreasonable to believe Trump and Putin have made a deal not to come to the aid of Israel and Iran, respectively, as these two countries pound each other into their own agreement? The pressure to intervene increases on Trump as it seems Israel may have bitten off more than it realized. Would Trump break such an agreement with Putin or allow Israel to continue to lie in the bed they made?

There is a process responsible for the emergence of individuals, from photons to galaxies to life. Understanding that this process does not rely on intelligence to operate prompts us to consider its conditions. I believe those conditions may be rooted in agape, with love as its essence. It binds individuals into populations and sustains their perpetuation.

TIL there is no such thing as a species. There are only individuals and the relationships among them, which we call populations. Populations persist only for the time those relationships bear fruit. The notion of God's breath, a Platonic idea, or a scientific reality is unnecessary to understand the emergence of individuals and the perpetuation of populations. Did you know this? Let this be my introduction and invitation to you as we establish relationship and attempt to perpetuate a population. #asknostr #Introductions

Do you understand morality differently than I do? I believe morality is the instrument of prevailing opinion that limits the ability of one to act in accordance with a different understanding of reality. A different understanding of reality is a threat to the prevailing opinion. All acts are political acts that are aimed at life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Moral acts hinder these pursuits in ways we don't always understand. #asknostr

The Government is never an instrument of the People. It is always an instrument of the Ruling Class, and the Ruling Class always defines the purpose of the Government. Perhaps we don't get to choose our Government so much as we choose our Ruling Class. I don't yet understand how that happens, but I believe it has to do with public sentiment more than morality, certainly not the result of voting. What say you? #asknostr

Which government is preferred, the one where the oligarchy employees puppets to handle the levelers of power, or the one where they take those levels into their own hands? That is what Trumps team looks like. Not that there is anything wrong with that. #asknostr

When the narrative moves from I wish your ideas were dead to I wish you were dead, the killing will determine the public sentiment, not reason, not righteousness nor the truth. Those things have never underpinned the public sentiment, only common belief underpins it. How does one attain common belief without sharing belief? #asknostr

I like to believe that the children destined to spend a lifetime of labor in the rare earth mineral mines in Africa to support my lifestyle have it easier than the captured slaves of Roman armies who spent the remainder of their lives in hard labor. Either way, is the fix in changing my lifestyle or is it in changing theirs? #asknostr

Some people really do believe that just because they have authority that doesn’t make them authoritarians.

Theorist worry about the effects of small changes that time travelers might make to history, with the same concern, we should all revel the small changes we can make each day.

We are not trying to make the world safe for democracy. We are trying to make democracy safe for us!

There are few things in the world that I believe are true, but one thing I will never doubt is the people running the government will not hesitate to grind us all into gore on their bloody battlefield and lie to us about the nobility of their intentions. Liberty is always what the authority says it is. Freedom is choosing to believe it or not.

As Trump continue to march on, just as Caesar crossed the Rubicon, the US elite are like Pompey, not knowing that they cannot merely stomp the ground to bring forth from the earth legions of fighters for Rome.

A situation is not a temporary thing. People should remember the situation they find themselves in and their life are the same thing.

The Pen is Mightier than the Sword Among bloody victory itself, Self Righteousness and Fear mongering are the means of the sword. That instrument, the sword, can be used by the authorities of the ruling class status quo as well as the authorities of the actors organizing the forces for change. Listen to who uses it and how. Generally the forces for change don’t have the power of the sword, but gain it soon enough as their pens produces the narratives that capture the action of the people. As podcast and alternate media overtake legacy media in grabbing the attention of the people, the one holding the sword changes. Are you watching? It does not always appear as a bloody change. It is what makes sense to them that moves them. What makes sense to you? #asknostr

With regard to what happens as a result of democratic (i.e., mob) rule, I am partial to understanding that it has something to do with the individual beliefs of the members of the mob. I do find value in credible polling in my own attempts to understand those beliefs. I don't look for the administration's 'doings' to align with my views on righteousness or morality, but they don't need to do that in order to become, for lack of a better word, the reality of our environment. Can we agree on this situation we find ourselves in. These changes in our enviorment seems to me to be a battle between a resistant, status quo ruling class and an emerging a new billionaire class who demands reconsideration of the orthodoxy. The loss of credibility of the legacy media seems to be the prerequisite, not the consequence, of this change. The alternate media seems to give to the masses a cognitive space to accept the change and participate accordingly. What is accordingly?

We are not trying to make the world safe for democracy. We are trying to make democracy safe for us!