Don't Hate Authority, Hate the Abuse of Authority

 

Christ Demonstrating the Proper Affect of One in Authority

We live in times where the powers that be are increasingly losing the trust of the average person. Young people look around today and what they see in high places is layer upon layer of corruption. They see it in government, they see it in the media. They see corruption at the upper tiers of much of the corporate world, and especially in high finance.

It would be easy for them to take the wrong lesson from what they have experienced and I fear that many of them are taking the wrong lesson. Rather than objecting to the abuse of authority, they are very close to rejecting the legitimacy of authority itself, especially as it relates to governmental authority. In so doing, they risk becoming rebels, not just against illegitimate authority, but against all authority, just or unjust.

I'd like to make government a lot smaller than it is now, in particular I'd like to reduce the power, scope, and cost of the central government. But that does not mean that I think we'd be better off without a government. As bad as a corrupt government is, the realities of living without a government in a society of fallen people would be much worse. One of many reasons I exhort people to live a life of personal virtue is that it permits the reduction of government. Virtuous people have no need of masters. The weak and the wicked do. Thus a virtuous population is the best defense against big government.

It's true that for most of human history government has been wicked, violent, and oppressive. It often represented nothing more than the toughest gang rather than an institution with the just mission of preserving the rights of those under its protection. In the West, that changed as a new concept of what authority meant and how it ought to be exercised saturated the culture. Authority become more than power under this new concept, it became a duty of love and justice. Where did this new concept come from and how did it differ from what happened before? And most critically, why is it fading from the cultural fabric?

The new concept of authority, which changed the world, came from the scriptures. In Mark chapter 10 (Amplified version) James and John ask to be Christs' right and left hand man in the Kingdom He is setting up. They want the authority. The other disciples get indignant at James and John because of their request. In a beautiful passage of Scripture, Jesus explains the difference between what "authority" means and how it is used in His Kingdom vs. what it means and how it is used in the Gentile nations, whose governments lack the wisdom of Divine guidance......

42 But Jesus called them to [Him] and said to them, You know that those who are recognized as governing and are supposed to rule the Gentiles (the nations) lord it over them [ruling with absolute power, holding them in subjection], and their great men exercise authority and dominion over them.

43 But this is not to be so among you; instead, whoever desires to be great among you must be your servant,

44 And whoever wishes to be most important and first in rank among you must be slave of all.

45 For even the Son of Man came not to have service rendered to Him, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for ([y]instead of) many.

Various people, at various stages of their lives, can benefit from authority. When my young anarcho-capitalist friends have children of their own they will better understand. Authority, even government authority, is not intrinsically evil. At its best it restrains evil. Even a very corrupt government, if it rules an even more corrupt population, can restrain evil. But like Washington said, it's like fire, a dangerous servant and a fearful master. As long as the weak and wicked are among us, it will be needed in some form.

 

Even today the high officials of many governments in the Old World are called "ministers" out of recognition that their office was supposed to be one of service to God and man. In the United States they secularized the titles in part because they were leery of government's attempt to co-opt religion for the state's own use, but the Biblical concept of authority ran deep in the culture.

 

What's happened to us is that we have separated from our culture the conviction that the Biblical world view is the correct one. Why be surprised then when the uniquely just view of authority upheld in scripture is lost as well? When one tosses out the baby of the Christ Child, the cleansing bath water of a high view of government goes with Him. What happens then is that those in power, freed from the restraint of a Godly view of authority permeating the culture, revert to the more corrupt exercise of power which predated the ascension of the Judo-Christian concept. Those young people who arrived after the eclipse of the previous view of authority look at authority, and all they see it rot. No wonder they conclude that authority is intrinsically wicked.

Of course, properly exercised authority (that is, exercised in the manner prescribed by Christ) is not evil at all. It's service, not self-serving. It protects rights, it does not threaten them. It's not a cover-up of their dirt, it's a clean-up of dirt for those under their authority. Just before the Crucifixion He bowed down and washed the feet of His disciples. They protested that it was not right that He, the Messiah, was washing their feet, but He was trying to show them something. This is what Authority looks like when properly exercised. It's humility and service.

12 So when He had finished washing their feet and had put on His garments and had sat down again, He said to them, Do you understand what I have done to you?

13 You call Me the Teacher (Master) and the Lord, and you are right in doing so, for that is what I am.

14 If I then, your Lord and Teacher (Master), have washed your feet, you ought [it is your duty, you are under obligation, you owe it] to wash one another’s feet.

We don't need anarchy, not while we are still this weak and wayward. Nor do we need more rulers who buy into the pre-Christian concept of authority. We need a return to a concept of authority that subjects it to the Highest Authority of all.

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Religious Exemption Letter for Injections of a Particular Nature

What is man? Mario Chamorro and I differ on the answer.

Preface: My employer has been really good about this so far. They appear to be doing what is necessary to comply with what they feel they are obligated to do, but are not going beyond it with the fervor of some corporations. That said, they have instructed us to prepare and have ready any exemption letters we may have and I have done as they instructed. Mine is below...

Dear (REDACTED),

I have greatly enjoyed serving (REDACTED) and our client for the projects to which I have been assigned. I believe that I have served well, and brought credit upon (REDACTED) for hiring me. Nevertheless, I object on religious grounds to each of the three injections which the present administration of the federal government is attempting to force upon the very people that any government must rely on- its productive workers. I am writing in order to obtain a religious exemption from (REDACTED) in order to continue my service to this company. It is my hope and belief that the client will be amenable to this request.

Each person will have their own way of documenting the sincerity and depth of their religious viewpoints. Perhaps the easiest way for me to do so is to point out that I have authored a book on early Genesis that runs over four-hundred pages in length. You may or may not agree with the conclusions I come to, but I do hope that you will acknowledge the depth and sincerity of my religious convictions.

In evaluating the substances which the present administration is attempting to coerce me into injecting into my body under the threat of impoverishment for me, my wife, and our three children, it should be noted that one of the injections is not like the others. The Johnson and Johnson vaccine does not use the same methods as the Pfizer or Moderna injections. Although I have religious objections to all three, my reasons are different for the Johnson and Johnson vaccine as compared to the other two.

As a part of my religious convictions, I favor respect for innocent human life and regret the prevalence of abortion in America. If they have to happen, we still don’t have to profit off of them. And we surely don’t have to inject products produced from the same into our bodies! I can document the sincerity of these convictions not only by producing a long list of pro-life political candidates to whose campaigns I contributed, but also by the accounts in another book I wrote- my political autobiography. 

It is my understanding that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine uses aborted fetal cells in all three stages; creation, manufacture and testing. The other two only used such cells in testing. In perfect frankness, using them in testing is more of a gray area for me. The substance could still exist without the testing.

Not so in the case of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. They are intrinsically bound. The product could not exist without aborted fetal material. Therefore, I cannot in good conscience take an injection derived from such sources. I am astounded that I should even have to write a letter in order to say so, it should be so obviously a matter of conscience.

The other two vaccines operate by a different and novel principle. Indeed, the CDC changed the definition of vaccine just this past September. The CDC’s definition changed from “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease” to the current “a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases.” It is doubtful that the action of the Pfizer and Moderna products would even meet the CDC’s definition of “vaccine” prior to this change.

This is because these substances are not “products that stimulate a person’s immune system to produce immunity” like every past vaccine. Rather, these preparations change the human genetic material itself in such a way that our own bodies produce spike proteins like those in the initial version of the COVID-19 virus. Our immune system is then stimulated by the newly-engineered products of our co-opted genomic material.

Unlike vaccines of the past and present, the product in the original injection doesn’t stimulate our immune system, rather it changes us so that our own bodies would stimulate our immune system. If they hadn’t changed the definition, it would not be accurate to even label the Pfizer and Moderna injections as “vaccines” because they don’t directly stimulate our immune systems, rather they change us in such a way that we stimulate them.

It is my contention that what is happening here is more than an inoculation against COVID-19. It is also an initiation into what amounts to a new quasi-religion. One that has a view of man that is the polar opposite of that of classical Christianity. That quasi-religion is “transhumanism”. It turns people into unwitting practitioners of a belief system incompatible with the Christian faith.

In Christianity, man is a creation of God, capable of bearing the very Image of God, and the pinnacle of His creation. Though it is understood that we fall short of His glory, we are but for a little while lower than the angels as it says in the Psalms. This life is just the test, and we look forward to new bodies from God in the resurrection. If humans are to be more than they are now, it will be the gift of God.

Transhumanism holds the exact opposite assumptions about the nature of man. That man is the product of imperfect natural forces, there is nothing special about him other than his ability to shape things by his own power. And they would apply that power to the human form itself, using technology to produce “humanity 2.0”. Indeed, it would be considered an ethical imperative to use man’s power to change in order to change man himself into something they deem better. They would cure us of perceived human imperfections by making us into something else, something greater. By our own wisdom and power, not God’s.

Some even speculate on ways that we could escape the limitations of our own bodies in death. In direct contrast to Christian ideas, they want to elevate us to god-like beings in our own strength. They would have us put an end to death not through the grace of God, but the technology of man.

I want to emphasize that I am not against the use of science and technology on a restorative basis. If for example, someone has lost their sight because of a genetic defect which fails to produce a necessary protein, by all means we should correct that unruly part of nature which is responsible for this terrible result and introduce genes able to make the protein. I would argue that we have a moral duty to do so if we can. But this is not making them something other than what they were meant to be, it is simply healing them so that normal human function is restored in some area. We are not trying to re-make man into some other form in doing so, merely returning him to a condition more typical of our type.

We may have a moral duty to use technology to restore normal human capabilities, but this isn’t what these two COVID-19 injections do. Rather, they give us a capacity which is not natural to humans. It is on a tiny scale what transhumanists want on a large scale. It is the first step to being re-made by science and technology. I for one do not wish to be re-made. I don’t wish to participate in what amounts to their quasi-religious practices.

I do not have any special knowledge as to the motives of those at the highest levels of our government who selected these vaccines and are pursuing these policies. I know that many prominent and rich people are sympathetic to Transhumanist-ideals, but I am not saying that the selection of these particular vaccines is necessarily a ploy to condition the population participate in, and by habit accept the premises of, transhumanism. But I don’t need to know motives in order to judge actions.

In practical terms, this is the effect of their polices, which run counter to two-thousand years of Christian beliefs. Once people have been conditioned into practicing transhumanism by taking a battery of such genomic-altering products, transhumanists win the war of ideas without any ideas being considered. Any contrary theological objection Christians may have would be undermined without an intellectual shot being fired.

Again, I am not privy to the private motivations of those behind these policies. At the same time, the fervor and even fanaticism with which these injections are being forced upon the unwilling is consistent with religious motivations.

By now it is clear that these vaccines are failures. They don’t stop one from getting or spreading the disease. New permutations of the virus easily evade them. What immunizing effects they have are largely temporary. Regions with 90% plus vaccination rates are still seeing an explosion of new cases in the vaccinated. One might argue that they have a moderate effect on reducing fatalities among the infected, but no more so than that demonstrated by safer and time-tested products whose use the government is falling all over itself to suppress. Add to this that the benefits of the well-supported scientific concept of natural immunity are ignored in all their policies.

So while I have no definitive evidence of what would in effect be a conspiracy to condition the population to accept and unwittingly practice transhumanism, their actions are difficult to explain outside of some ulterior motive. Indeed, the more obvious it becomes that the vaccines are a failure, the more strident their efforts to pressure people to comply become. I don’t know that a quasi-religious belief in transhumanist ideas among the elites is responsible, but something must explain this increasingly bizarre and otherwise irrational behavior.

My spiritual forebears risked life and limb for refusing to participate in an innocuous act of burning incense to a statue of the emperor in a support of a state-belief system. From that spark developed the concept of human liberty and freedom which proved a blessing to the people of the west for centuries afterward. I intend to follow in their footsteps. I appeal for a religious exemption from this vaccine mandate.

                                                                                                Respectfully,

 

                                                                                                Mark M. Moore

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The books which I mention in the piece

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Von Mises Institute Reports Many Open to Succession

 A very large number of Americans look at succession from the Union as a viable option. This piece from the Von Mises Institute shows how many. Basically 40% of those polled to one degree or another! They see a very divided nation, and so they figure "let's just divide". Those in power screech about "treason" while continually dismissing legitimate concerns about their own policies and actions and how they cause division.

Localism is the reasonable middle ground which lets us keep the advantages of one large nation without the disadvantages of all the rules being made in a distant city which does not share the values of the heartland.

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Stakeholder Capitalism is Really Making Corporate Governance Official

Globalism will be a horror of tyranny for almost all of mankind. Yet it is coming because the super-rich and global corporations are tired of having to buy politicians year after year. They want to buy themselves a direct seat at the rules-making table instead. They are doing to the politicians the very same thing they are doing with the rest of their labor force- downsizing and streamlining. The politicians have been the Middle Man, and the corporations want to cut them out, or at least make them just one voice among many- of others like them. 

 This article explains it well. 

Even though I wrote the book in 2012, Localism is more relevant today than it was on the day I wrote it, because the threats looming on the distant horizon in that day are now immanent. 

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Left and Right Authoritarians Share Common Traits

 Earlier I wrote a post about whether authoritarianism clustered to one side of the political spectrum. Leftist scholars had proposed that it did, but in order to do so posited that figures like Hillary Clinton were "conservative". This struck me as absurd, and I took the view that left and right authoritarian thinkers had a lot in common. It is a human problem, and not a problem from one side of the political spectrum. 

Now comes this study which confirms what I was saying about authoritarians. While there are differences, left and right authoritarians have more similarities than differences. 

The take-away quote from the article?

"Authoritarians have a predisposition for liking sameness and opposing differences among people in their environment," Costello says. "They are submissive to people they perceive as authority figures, they are dominant and aggressive towards people they disagree with, and they are careful to obey what they consider the norms for their respective groups."

At its core, authoritarianism is likely about power, Costello adds.

"It's a mistake to think of authoritarianism as a right-wing concept, as some researchers have in the past," he says. "We found that ideology becomes secondary. Psychologically speaking, you're an authoritarian first, and an ideologue only as it serves the power structure that you support."

***** 

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Subsidiary Is NOT Localism

 I read a Mark Jeftovic article recently about "Subsidiary". He summed it up as "It means they set the rules, and you get to follow them any way you want." They don't put it like that of course. Jeftovic cited Klaus Schwab's book on "Stakeholder Capitalism". Schwab is considered a leading advocate for "the new globalism". 

Schwab and his confederates are sharp enough to know that few of us regular folk are going to buy what he is really selling, which Jeftovic summed up nicely. So they have to make us think it is something other than what it really is. They have to make us think that it is something a lot more like real localism, which the establishment media is loathe to talk about. In order to keep people from "going there" they ignore the growing demand for decentralization. And when it can't be ignored anymore, they loudly market what they are selling as decentralization while ignoring the real deal. 

Since the Greeks defeated the Persians, rulers have noticed that citizens fight harder, work harder, and cooperate more with their government if they believe that they are co-owners of the society, citizens and not slaves. That's why the ruling elites of nations go to a lot of trouble to give people the "illusion of choice". In America that has for the most part been stripped down to two loathsome and terminally corrupt political parties full of empty suits that nobody really trusts anymore, but the charade continues. It continues because the people who manage your "choices" want you to be able to rationalize to yourself that you still have a meaningful one. 

Donald Trump may have slipped through but love him or hate him, he's an anomaly. And the system sacrificed what was left of the credibility of many of their own institutions to eliminate him. I expect they will fix it so that he can't return. That doesn't mean he was good for America, it just means he was not a part of their plans. 

Redefining local control as "you can do what we tell you any way you want" isn't a new tactic. Like I said, crafty rulers have realized the power of the illusion of ownership for over two thousand years. Decades ago, I heard a Governor who campaigned on "local control of schools" in my state pull this switch once he got into office. Formerly "local control" meant that the schools had broad authority in many areas to make their own policies. He started defining it as broad authority to implement the policies that he and the federally-funded state department of education set for them. 

They have to bang the drums about alleged threats which demand "global" solutions as a way to expand their control over everything. COVID was a good trial run. The CDC started making rules about evictions of renters under the guise of preventing COVID. My own state health department abused their authority to the max, demanding that small retailers close down while exemption big, politically connected entities. It was outrageous, and it failed anyway. Control freaks are pathological. They will never stop using any excuse they can to exercise more and more control over the lives of people they have never met living in places they have never been to. They will never stop- unless we stop them. 

Subsidiary sounds good in principle. Schwab describes one of its tenets thusly: "decisions should be taken at the most granular level possible, closest to where they will have the most noticeable effects. It determines, in other words, that local stakeholders should be able to decide for themselves, except when it is not feasible or effective for them to do so."

That sounds reasonable, except the example he gives for it is the European Union, which is full of meddlesome bureaucrats trying to run people's lives from afar. Why, they have taken to banning national plebiscites in individual member states because they are afraid if citizens could decide on their own, that many would do what the Brits did and leave. 

Localism does not care what is most "effective" or what rulers in distant capitals think is "feasible". Localism is an agreement between smaller political units and larger ones as to who has the authority to do what. This includes the option for the smaller unit to cut ties with the larger unit should the citizens feel that it is no longer operating in their interests. It is not Subsidiary, it is classical Federalism on steroids. 

Control freaks will plead good intentions. They will plead expediency. They will point to crisis. Any and every possible rationalization will be given as to why they should assume additional power and authority over your home, your city, your county, and your state. None of the alleged threats they point to are as menacing to your family and your well-being as they themselves. History has proven this a thousand times. 

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Partisan Politics Reduces Rationality

 When the answer to a math problem resulting in undermining the claims of their tribe, partisans tended to be unable to complete the math problem! We need more idealogy and less partisanship.

See study report here. 

Why Dr. Hannibal Lector Would Have Identity Politics Advocates for Lunch

Because the character has been redone and re-interpreted so often, I want to start by saying the Hannibal Lector I reference here is the one from "Silence of the Lambs". I also should say that I never saw any of the movies featuring Dr. Lector beyond 'Silence of the Lambs', which was disturbing and gross enough for me. I didn't need to see any sequels that tried to top it! Nevertheless, I have researched what author Thomas Harris was trying to do with the character, because I felt what everyone else felt after "Silence of the Lambs". I was horrified and disgusted by Lector while at the same time some part of me was sympathetic to him, if not rooting for him. He eats the kind of people who irritate us all. How did the author/film-maker manage to pull that off? 

I believe that so many people started seeing Lector as an anti-hero that in later novels Thomas Harris had to in a way "undo" his character and make him not just a monster, but a hypocrite and a fraud. He emphasized that Lector was a pure, though complex, villain by attacking the root of one major reason we were tempted to see past his monstrosity. So I ask that you not bring the later alterations of the character into what I am going to say next. Rather, think back to the Lector you saw in "Silence of the Lambs". The one who did horrible things to bad people, but had his own code that drew him to Agent Starling. What was it about this monster that led us to root for him on any level?

For me, and I suspect many whether they realize it or not, a key was the scene where Starling in effect challenges Lector to used his analytical power to find out what "happened" to him. In effect, how he got so messed up. His answer, and I am paraphrasing, was that nothing "happened" to him. He happened. Whatever factors that may have shaped him, he was his own first cause. He was who he chose to be. "You can't reduce me to a set of influences" he said. He was more than just the result of a group of first causes.

Lector was serving notice that he was more free in that cage than all of his former patients who were unwilling or unable to rise above their influences and become who they chose to be. Perhaps they wallowed in the mire of their own grievances, lashing out at others with mundane self-absorption and rudeness. At some point he decided that the only way they could do any net good in the world was to provide an enjoyable meal to someone who otherwise knew how to conduct themselves!

Lector was labeled a "psychopath" by the Director of the facility. Starling more accurately assessed that "they don't have a word for what he is". He was his own category, and in a sense all of us are. 

Look, as an advocate of Localism I am more open than most to letting some of these identity politics people, in particular the racial or religious ones, have what they think they want: Their own dreadful, boring, mono-cultural "utopia" off somewhere so that the rest of us don't have to deal with them. So long as citizens are free to leave once they rise above such thinking of course.

Nevertheless, it strikes me that all of these cultural forces insisting that I, and all others, be defined by the labels and categories that they decide matter flies in the face of the principle described above. Whatever the intent, the effect is to rob us of our true identity as unique individuals who are in fact more than a set of first causes. It would reduce us to mere molecules in motion, bouncing off our environment. It reduces us from free moral agents to mere products of our circumstances. 

I am not saying that identifying with a group is wrong. We are all members of groups. Christians for example are in theory to identify with the invisible Kingdom of Heaven on earth which is supposed to transcend many of these other divisions. That alone, if done well, can destroy the basis for identity Politics. Even so, I am saying that we are more than just the perceived stereotypes of the groups we identify with. 

Reducing us to the sum total of groups we are in isn't just demeaning, it is in a way its own kind of cannibalism. One of our soul. It serves as an attempt to devour any part of the human soul that does not conform to the expectations of our group-matrix. So in the same way that Lector wasn't really a hero even though he ate people that we might find offensive, neither is the Identity Politics movement heroic even if it attempts to undo some things that we might find offensive. Both it and Lector act to rob people of whatever chance they had to become whatever it was they were supposed to be. Even if that chance appeared to be zero anyway, neither today's "Social Justice Warriors" nor Lector (despite his brilliance) are qualified to make those decisions for others.   

 As someone with a classical Christian view of man, I think we are all bound by sin. Disconnected from our Maker, unmoored to eternal truth, even our supposed virtues can be dangerous. That's what happened after the French Revolution of the late 1700s. It started with activists spouting high ideals and ended with the Reign of Terror and falling back into dictatorship. Unfortunately I fear many today are ignorant of that important lesson of history. Sometimes, even deeply flawed elites can be better than mob rule.

 The proponents of Identity Politics are not particularly evil. They are instead mired in that such as is common to man. Many are just insecure. Since our ruling class and their institutions have turned their backs on God, the populace is confused about what it means to be a "good person", and most of them want to be a good person. They want to be a virtuous member of society. That is not a bad thing, it is a good thing that has been twisted to a flawed purpose. They think that they are promoting "virtue" with the Identity Politics stuff, because that is the message that our ruling elites and their media and institutions have been telling them. 

Seeing past the haze and propaganda, the big picture is that we have a deeply corrupt ruling elite, which essentially runs both establishment political parties, that is trying to divide the populace against itself based on superficial distinctions and tribalism. While our attention is directed to fighting among ourselves, they rob what is left of the middle class blind. They are using debt that they have no intention of repaying to bribe the lower and working classes into sticking with the existing system until this titanic theft is complete. They and their key minions can then escape to New Zealand or someplace while the rest of us get stuck with the bills. 

They want us divided against one another into tribes. This not only keeps the spotlight off them while we gnaw at one another, it permits them a façade of legitimacy as the referee in the disputes among our warring factions. Identity Politics is an important tool in this scheme. It is in effect the engine behind the distraction they need pull off the crime without being noticed. Well-meaning people are therefore unwitting accomplices. 

Ultimately this is a spiritual problem and policy solutions alone will not deliver us. To the extent that they can though, The prescriptions of Localism as a system of government is the answer. Not just localism where you are, but the embrace of a system which robs the robbers of the systemic tools they use to perpetrate these crimes. To do that, we have to be mentally healthy enough to sleep well at night even though people we have never met in a city that we have never been to are doing things that we would not approve of. Meanwhile, be kind to people where you are, even if they are not in your "tribe". After all, neither they or you can be defined strictly by what tribe they associate with. None of us can be reduced to a set of first causes!

Cheaper Cotton Circa 1850 and New High-Tech Opposition to "Free" Trade

 I read with amusement and frustration recently that certain America tech voices including a former Google CEO were calling for "Bifurcation" of U.S.-China tech. That is, they want us to have our own technical standards and infrastructure. They want a "firewall" or "decoupling" of sorts between our tech and theirs. This is because they have discovered that China "does not play by the same rules" and does not respect intellectual property rights. She subsidizes both espionage and key sectors that give them strategic advantage. They didn't mention it, but a few years ago China was caught sneaking stealth microchips into their products that would allow them to remotely hack a wide array of devices. It may be best, they have decided, if they have their tech sphere and we have ours.

None of them called this "protectionism".  None of them suggested that what has falsely been called "free trade" has been taken too far. None of them dared breath anything about "nationalism" or suggested that globalism might not always be the best idea. But that's what they were talking about. They just made up another label, "bifurcation" for what anti-globalists have been suggesting all along. We need firewalls and back-ups and we should not be vitally linked to an unfree economy. If we are, then when they go down, we go down with them. Or worse, they don't go down. We go down because they take us down, by using our open system against us while theirs stays tightly controlled.

You can't have "free trade" with unfree people. In 1850, cotton from the American South probably seemed like a bargain - and it was for those who were a part of the transaction. But this was at the expense of other parties. The slave labor used to produce it for example. Those who have argued for "free trade" with Communist China are the same kind of people who would have argued for "free trade" with the American South in 1850. They might be outraged and offended at that comparison, but I am outraged and offended at what they have done to our economy and our middle class, and how they have strengthened the position of the ruthless gangsters who run the world's largest slave-labor camp. 

Imagine there was a product called an Omelassian Box. You buy it and take it home, and the first time you open it, it contains at least twice as much as you paid for it. Sounds like a great product. But then you learn that the money in the box is somehow obtained from other people who are worse off than you. The winners are the people who make the box and you. But the box is not a net gain for your society. It's gifts come at the expense of others. 

All sorts of excuses are made to justify using 'free' trade strategies that are really analogous to the Omelassian Box. People want that easy money. But if you don't start putting more and more of your own money towards buying that box, you quickly wind up in the part of the population that is victimized by it. The more money you have, and pour into the purchase of more boxes, the richer you get and the poorer everyone else gets. 

One may argue that the slaves are at least better off than they would be if there were no jobs for them to take. But this argument ignores the reality that it is their masters who are most strengthened by such exploitation. If the slaves are helped a penny and their masters a pound, they they are a penny richer but almost a pound less free. 

So called "free" trade with nations that are not free societies is a fantasy. The trade is only free between merchant and master, not worker and master. And such trade has hidden costs that we cannot afford. Even if we could, we still should not do it on moral grounds. "Bifurcation" with such economies may cost us something in the short run, but it is insurance against entangling our own fortunes with tyrants that when sleeping Justice finally awakes, we go down with them. 

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On Nassim Taleb's Principia Politica

 I just finished Taleb's Pricipia Politca.  This is my reveiw. 

This is an academic work and as such the language is not very accessible. The first page of the first chapter uses the term "tangible fractal gradations" and say these lie between "the concrete individual and the abstract collective". Page two says "Scalability is a simple property of an object that has a concave or convex response. For instance an elephant has more fragility than a mouse for an equivalent proportional random shock." and that's about it as far as explaining what a "concave or convex response" means.  

It isn't even a book about localism as such. I say this without malice, as the first chapter admits it when he says, "The main aim is to fit the dynamics to the proper scale. Hence this is not a discussion on localism but rather one on scalability." So there you go. It isn't a matter of whether his book is better or mine are, but rather what your desires are. If you want to read accessible books on localism, I suggest you read one or both of the books I wrote (see bottom of page). If you want a difficult read on scalability, then his is the better choice. 

Green-centric localists will love his assertion that, "Many modelers fail to realize that model uncertainty and disagreements about, say, a certain policy, is itself potent information that command the maximally prudent route. As an application to climate change: the most contradictory the models, and the wider the gap between their results, the more uncertainty in the system which calls for precaution, even if one disagrees with the models." 

That's a recipe to lose localism when you have a ruling class which is willing to brazenly politicize science and have an SOP of "never letting a crisis go to waste." It is a very short step from there to those with a vested interest in a crisis as a means to centralize power simply using the tools at their disposal to manufacture one which requires global solution, It isn't a default setting that a localist should follow. A more consistently localist idea would be something like "necessity, not uncertainty, should be the standard by which localities should cede power to the center."

That said, I found a lot to agree with and value in his short chapter on Scalability. I don't disagree with him on scalability, it is just that this is an aspect of localism and not a broader approach to establishing a society which can avoid the gravity-like pull of centralization over time. When it comes to scalability, he knows what he is talking about. It's just too narrow to thought of as a stand-in for localism. 

In international relations he suggests that nations reject the golden rule in favor of the sliver rule, which he describes as  "golden rules (a la neocons). Golden rules ("treat others the way you’d like to be treated") invite busybodies to change other people’s lives, while silver rules ("don’t treat others the way you wouldn’t like to be treated") is more robust. Silver rules require skin in the game..., "

I agree with him that neocons and imperial foreign policies are bad, it isn't enough to trade one idea of how to treat people in favor of a slightly different one. People who want power will twist any idea or principle around into a need for them to run other people's lives. The problem isn't the wording of what rule the profess, but rather than they are sinful and defective personalities even by normal human standards. Rather than rely on a slight verbal change in professed rules, a rigorous set of boundaries whereby such would-be God-men are not even capable of pulling off forever-war is needed. We cannot count on good intentions, but rather clearly defined boundaries which shut all thirteen doors centralizers have historically used. I don't talk about scalability much, but I do talk about how to shut every door the neocons have used to turn our Republic into an Empire. 

Another of his principles is that "Precautionary decisions do not scale. Collective safety may require excessive individual risk avoidance, even if it conflicts with an individual’s own interests and benefits. It may require an individual to worry about risks that are comparatively insignificant."

The example he gives is of a virus which in the early stages causes a relatively low risk. We now have an example of how that works in real life. He specifies what he means by saying these things "do not scale"...

The risk for an individual to catch the virus is very low, lower than other ailments. It is therefore "irrational" to panic (re-act immediately and as a priority). But if she or he does not panic and act in an ultra-conservative manner, they will contribute to the spread of the virus and it will become a severe source of systemic harm,,,,,operate in a convex way for cross-dependent small idiosyncratic risks that end up dynamically extremely large at the end. avoid systemic problems,.....even where the immediate individual payoff does not appear to warrant it. 

In light of how the corona virus saga is playing out, giving place to this "principle" ends localism. He is saying such problems "do not scale" in the sense that they don't scale down to the individual. But a localist isn't claiming that anyway, that would be an anarchist. On the other hand, masks and mandates and quarantines' can and should still be a local decision, not a state or federal one. Decisions which take away freedom even for those who mean no harm should be made at the lowest level of government possible, so that if the decision makers go to far people can escape their over-reach, or more easily replace them. He does through the word "local" in there but he doesn't spend any time describing why a centralized response would be wrong. Not even as many words as I spend here. It is all about why it should not be an individual decision and none about why it should not be a central-state one. Where is the balance, the moderate center that localism truly is compared to the disorder of anarchy or the crush of the central state?

His principle of practical Roman tinkering with government vs. Greek over-reliance on platitudes and theoretical frameworks is a good point, but there are plenty of things which seem to work in the short run but in the end are a trap. Debt-based fiat currency is a prime example, Plus, while with this principle he favors "practicality" over ideology the rest of what he writes is very ideological. 

This sort of conflicting view repeats in his chapter on how liberty is scale invariant and the chapter speaking about how morality is not aggregate. The former is at odds with what he said earlier about how it is possible for a man to be a libertarian at the national scale, a Republican at the state scale, and a Democrat at the community scale and a socialist or communist in the family. And he is right about that but then he must be wrong about liberty being scale invariant. It is ok for communities to place infringements on liberty that national governments should not be allowed, or even capable, of doing. 

This is because it is much easier to pick your own, or escape your own, community than it is to escape or pick your own nation state. The "transaction costs" of exiting bad government are lower and thus market forces on government at that scale are much stronger. That is what protects liberty even though local governments can have more leeway- localism does not rely on the good intentions of rulers at any scale of civil government. It seems like he is trying to say that some things about libertarianism are OK and some are not, and he isn't wrong about that. It is just that finding a sub-set of libertarianism which applies universally isn't what localism is about. 

His 8th chapter is called "Non-naïve Universalism". When it comes to the rules under which people from various backgrounds should live, there is no such thing. That's why the attempt to shoe-horn some libertarian ideas into "localist" principles falls flat. And I say that as someone who voted straight Libertarian ticket in the last election. If it is right, let one local space at a time discover that for themselves. The only systemic rules should be the ones which are necessary to keep power divided. His 8th principle is "Never conflate localism with monolithic, absorbing nationalism." and I have no objection to that. Nationalism is the second-worst form of government, unfortunately we are headed toward the worst- corporate-rule globalism.

I thought his ninth chapter on racism et al made some good points but he fell down again by chapter ten "Neither the minority nor the majority should be able to impose their preferences on others." He made this statemen irrespective of scale and therefore not only does it fly in the face of his claim that his work is about scale but it also flies in the face of localist premises. Local people should be able to put more restrictions on their neighbors than they can on someone they have never met in a city they have never been to. That's because those near do have some impact on one another's lives while those in distant places know their own business better than we do. 

The rest of the material through the end of part II could be called "helpful hints for better living and governing." They were good, not bad, but they really had very little to do with localism. They would not serve to stop power from being drawn to the center over time. Especially since they were expressed as principles, not suggestions for specific laws or rules to keep power from being vacuumed up. 

I did not read the final part, which were answering a series of question which seemed again to be mostly irrelevant to the subject I am interested in- how do we stop defective personalities in government from manipulating things so that more and more control of our lives winds up in their hands in the imperial center? 

That's what my books are about. Please see below. Thank you. 

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Yellen's $7 Million: High-Stakes Regulators Will Always Be Bribed. Do Away With Them!

  Janet Yellen is about to cycle back into power in the Biden Administration. Yellen, the former Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank who served the global banks (if not the American People) very well during her tenure, has made over seven million dollars in speaking fees from these same banks in the two years since she stepped down. 

Call me a cynic, but I am going to say that she didn't get that seven million dollars because she is a spellbinding public orator. Rather, speaking fees have become a legal way to bribe politicians and top-level government regulators. It is a way to pay off people who have served a particular special interest well. Making them rich sends the signal to the next bunch of regulators that if they keep the money flowing then they too will be rewarded for their treachery. And rewarded in a way that is not only legal, but if they try hard enough they can even delude themselves into thinking that it is legitimate. That people really value their views on things enough to pay six figures for a forty minute speech. 

If we ban such a practice, many people who are insightful and great communicators will refuse to enter public service. It will block out just the kind of people we need to go in! Additionally, the bad actors will find another way. Companies will hire their spouse ala Barbara Boxer, or their children ala Hunter Biden and work the bribes in that way. They may buy large number of copies of their books, or hire them for product endorsements. "Consulting fees" is a popular way to legally bribe politicians as well.

I don't want to be defeatist. Even though you can never stop corruption, there are things that you can do in order to prevent the wholesale purchase of your government which has occurred in the United States. But in order to do this you must give up one thing. You must give up centralization. You must give up the idea that inserting your preferred person at the top of the pyramid will alter the laws of human nature and self-interest. You must buy-in to doing government smarter, and the way that the Founding Fathers of the United States intended. 

That is, a government where the powers of the central government are few and defined, and those of the states (and preferably the localities as in what they called "Town Rule") are numerous and indefinite. To continue to support the vast central government we have now is a choice to continue to support gross corruption. De-centralized government is the only kind of government where market forces can act the other way- to encourage clean government rather than empower corruption as our current system does.

You must remove high-stakes regulators, administrators, and politicians in order to make the costs of corruption so high that it is no longer rational to pay them. If there are hundreds of small agencies and offices scattered everywhere each under the watchful eye of local people instead of one huge one with a giant staff insulated in the national capitol then the costs and risks of buying them off becomes unworkable. In some cases, the entire function must be removed. For example, you cannot have central banking and decentralized government. You must choose one or the other. And since you cannot have true political freedom without decentralization, you cannot have central banking for any length of time and expect any other outcome than the one we have- giant corporations buying off banking regulators in order to loot the rest of us who suffer under a progressive loss of freedom and local choice as all decisions are increasingly made in the national capitol. 

When I say we should support the changes necessary to return and sustain this method of governance I mean several things. This includes buying in to the changes necessary to keep the system of checks and balances they set up from being eroded over time. And a necessary part of that is a commitment to a diversity of political parties, including state-only parties with no national head-quarters. Just cheering for team red or team blue, as if giving either one of those crime-families a monopoly of power would make anything better, must be rejected as part of the problem, not part of the solution. It it no longer intellectually defensible as the act of a patriot. 

There are thirteen doorways to centralization of power. If all thirteen are not kept shut, then each generation will grow up in a nation with a more centralized government than the last, no matter how people vote or otherwise choose to live. Those doorways, and how to shut them, are described in "Localism, a philosophy of government". The case for localism as a political ideal verses the two extremes of centralization or anarchy is made in "Localism Defended". 

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