Learning from History

 "blogkin"....I like that, sounds very Tolkien! I feel like an opinionated ethereal hobbit. (sans hairy feet) :)

Your reference to the Blue Angels reminded me of an exciting afternoon with my dad many years ago. I'm so jealous!

The diverse groups that you so easily move among are offering you different things that you appreciate. We humans aren't going to find everything we want in one relationship (hence the continual need for friends, mentors, etc. even if we find our "soul mate"). We also aren't going to find it all in one group. The fact that many of THEM seem happily isolated from one another is just further indication of how easy it is for us to form our opinions about important complex issues and never revisit them or try to learn from those with a different perspective who we may disagree with. It takes mental and sometimes emotional energy!

"Everyone cries for cooperation." Ah, but do they really want it? I don't think so. They aren't saying "let me do more for you," or "help me understand why you feel that way." What people generally mean is they want everyone else to cooperate with THEM. It's like demands for more tolerance. People who say that tend to mean that everyone else should be more tolerant of THEIR specific group. It doesn't seem to occur to them that they themselves are often the epitome of intolerance.

I think there is an innate tendency toward a "tribe" mentality. Something in us craves being part of an "us" who is against a "them". Perhaps the human brain is not capable of handling the complexity of all the real connections that exist, so we break it down to what we can manage--our schools, our denominations, our sports teams, etc. We learn from the past that a strong "one mindedness" can be an extremely dangerous thing. Perhaps the little groups we divide up into keep us from doing more real damage than we otherwise would.

Government that is limited, local, and leashed shortly is what the brilliant drafters of our defining documents had in mind, certainly. But those "roadblocks to tyranny" seem to be being pushed aside with alarming frequency and ease. Your question (if I am understanding you correctly) is; should we just let the thing fall apart and pick up the pieces and start over, or take a more proactive approach? The beast cannot have its insatiable appetite curbed under the current conditions. Eventually it will have to be starved into submission, but how?

I cannot envision a scenario where the masses living on entitlements willingly give them up in an effort to facilitate a return to the ideas of self sufficiency and individual liberty which they are wholly unfamiliar with. Even the proposal of such a thing would result in nationwide violence on a scale that would make what is happening in Greece look like a picnic. Are you aware of an organization of active and retired military and law enforcement officers who have listed 10 orders they will not obey, all of which violate the Constitution? Lines are being drawn.

As for "some action, any action," the beast could, I think, be brought sufficiently to heel if a majority of the producers decided to stop paying for the destruction of their own liberty. Ayn Rand would love the John Galt style of that; you've pushed us to the limit and punished us for our success, let's see how you get along without us and our money. There is more likely, however, to be some event that will force things to a head. Either a crisis that those in power use to seal near complete control, or a line which they may cross unaware that it would be the tipping point. The latter would be something that would cause the populace to finally yank hard enough on the bit placed in the mouth of the beast by the Framers to cause it to, however reluctantly, lumber in the direction that "we the people" want it to go. The "something" would be, as you indicate, "painful," but that may just be the price for letting it drift so far from what the Founders left us with.