Can we get beyond, somehow, the need for simply being (believing 'we' must be) Right? (And these opponents - misguided savages not unlike our own familiar Tee Vee ones?)

Since ~ when? have large groups of people with a real or imagined grievance, managed to:

A) Set up meetings, assess the bases for their claimed disenfranchisement, plot strategy and tactics for redress, then -

B) Adhere to that plan. This while: suffering in dire poverty, possessing little education or sense of the above er 'processes' - all while also having been raised via inculcation of simplistic ideas of the sort, "there's a Big Guy ^up there^ who deems that we are Good / those opposed to our views (== those of Our Big Guy) are Bad/Wrong". Moreover, our foes are actually Evil umm Immoral - for all the above litany.

C) Add in Bryce's apt observation of the human need for tribe, 'belonging' - as tends to create a critical mass of er Certainty, regarding the validity of: B).

???

OK - I give you 1776:

A group of folk, reasonably well-educated for the times, strongly motivated - leave one oppressive old world and conquer a new world from its inhabitants. A new world with untapped - unheard of! - quantities of sheer space and natural resources: these against a foe dressed in regalia guaranteed to limit mobility, arrayed in formations based upon "gentlemens warfare on behalf of Rulers", and supplied from (very) afar.

See any differences in 2001 VS 1776?

Of course I agree re the beggared neighborhoods of groups (large or small) behaving quite randomly.. as compared with A). Methinks however, we shall see few new examples of A) in any next cases. There are many bin-Ls, now; ones capable of mentation and aware of world history and of the books of the great military authors of all time. Added to their lexicon - the modern concept of the guerrilla army. Add ubiquitous technology.

Aiding and abetting C) - is a new litany of factoids concerning the 'general case' that most wealth of the West is controlled by tiny fractions of their (supposedly educated? and alert??) populations. These bin-L's are fully capable of exploiting the Fact of their side's widespread and severe poverty VS the West's.

The whys? are ever the mothers milk of spin - through the ages; The West has 'Values' akin to living to consume!, reinforced via daily doses of massive spin we call 'marketing'. (G\ufffdbbels called it, more accurately, propaganda.) The East? - simply strives to survive, via last century's infrastructure - and ancient 'Values', not subject to (Reason? rationalization? 'improvement' / liberalization? :-\ufffd)

Given that all the 'theological' questions remain, by definition unresolvable - having nothing whatsoever to do with logic: I demur from your implicit assertion that, ~all we are facing is ~ "an inner-city collection of gangs", capable of random destruction but little discipline, thus little chance of prevailing. (My inference of course - not your words)

Methinks that, if a Haves / Have-nots overall assessment of the world - becomes the next forced-issue (?) If we in the West prove incapable of spinning that large Issue into the usual doggerel of slogans, fixing blames on lesser matters (that which we all *always* try to do):

Stand by for a Ram!! The numbers are too stark. The emotions generated by the discrepancies too visceral for, Waggener-Edstrom to defuze *This Issue* indefinitely: in a world wherein techno- has made it possible for *one man* to leverage his power by huge orders of magnitude, against the easy target of societies so dependent upon complex techno systems as to be glass-fragile in their infrastructure.

Are we not approaching the entire substance of Karl Popper's, The Open Society and Its Enemies ?
(I'm staring at the spine of a copy just now, black cover, silver lettering).

There's a fair collection of mindpower as visits these forums from time to time. Can 'we' do a bit better than the categorizations now so familiar from the talking heads du jour? Can anyone here construct a reasoned case for the idea (hope !?) that,

~ We shall prevail next and soon, because - our techno, our material might is such that, no group can prevail / significantly alter the world's distribution of 'wealth'.

(Please.. no variations of God.. Goodness.. Right! Sanity! is er On Our Side. OK?)



Ashton
who admits to having *No Idea* how the events of 9/11 shall turn out for us all, everywhere - for ours and for all currently remaining species

but I can imagine..

(Actually I consider myself 'rich' - I own more of my own time, can engage in more pursuits that interest me, than most I know whose 'net worth' is quite higher :-\ufffd ie. I chose many years ago, as in intentionally - that aim over other options.) I prefer adequacy to endless more.

Won't quibble much about the 'average wealth' of US VS all others - so long as you won't quibble about the fact of very many living well below that average, the % of Murican children below our own arbitrary 'poverty level' and such. We so love to reduce all human qualities of life - and even IQ! - to numbers that fit spreadsheets.

Clearly Scandinavian countries opted for lopping off the extreme possibilities of personal wealth: at both ends, and the experiment appears viable - for them. Of course they aren't Muricans, just homo-saps generically.

Meaning only - there are other demonstrated options to our present yielding of power once reserved for society - to Corporate interests, unresponsive to any allegiance except a narrow, immediate definition of short-term profits. Obviously then, we could.. opt for reforms of laws governing corporate behavior - in many ways quite more subtle than merely whatever (declining percentages currently) we collect in taxes. (We can change the rules anytime 'we' can buy more legislators than 'they' already own, I presume)


As to whatever you imagine I know of economics - we'd both have to guess what direct experience the other has, of how low income folks actually live here. As, say: the temps of Si Valley, the operations of Manpower Inc. and other facets of survival at $10-12/hr, some even less, in such an environment - often amid highly toxic compounds and sweatshop working schedules. (Unless you were speaking of those theoretical concepts re the velocity of money - in full academic flight?) Or maybe we could count the # of people we know personally, living that life? Would that connote: economics field work, or would it not be sufficiently theoretical to receive official credit?

Dismiss the idea of "the tiny group of people controlling the universe" as you like. Dismiss as well, the practical powerlessness of a substantial portion of all US workers too, but then you'll also have to elide: the present impossibility of even commencing campaign reform, that which goes to the heart of our advertised 'democratic process' VS Corporate ownership of (the selection / propaganda aspect of) that process.

We may even have to look to Europe for any discipline of M$ ever! - just one of our corporations. But as to the division of spoils worldwide? I can't see how this factor can be ignored perpetually, as technology equips smaller and smaller players to do large damage. Perhaps you can.

(Of course too, the entire argument may be rendered moot, soon enough.)



Ashton

Perhaps we can meet around that weinie er crapware roast, warm our backsides from..
that glow which can truly light the world..

(Thanks JFK - your words were wiser than many acts you had time to try out.. And then: you might have proved a dud after all. Oh well.)

Ya got me - alas I have no more 'hope' than you, that anything much in the way of campaign reform can ameliorate the fact of: self-selection of the terminally ego-mad and manipulative - as ever are the prototypical seekers of power. Not that Murica has a monopoly on such filtering; just - we be so sanctimonious about how Our Slime is better than Your Slime! :[

And no.. I possess no magna carta for undoing the execrable which 'we' have done - along with the occasional magnificent.. largely done by the founders of a huge Idea (we mostly fail to give even lip-service, in daily bizness).

May aim next is simply, not to yield to a growing hysteria and jingoism which.. we seem prone to, and whose momentum appears to follow the laws of physics and not of reason.


Cheers,

Ashton