Defy Authority… Build Trust In One Another

So it now seems that Chris Hedges (TruthDig) and James Kunstler (CFN), both of whom have typically shown an underlying support for, and belief that the Curriculum was salvageable, have taken a more circumspect position of late. From Hedges we now read:

 It is time to build radical mass movements that defy all formal centers of power and make concessions to none. 

While, for his part, Kunstler shouts:

…consider that it will be generations before anyone believes the ‘authorities’ again… 

I believe these two post-liberals are moving more dramatically in the direction of a post-civilized anarchy, not negatively construed as chaos and mayhem, but rather as the realization that hierarchy can never deliver what is best for our Paleolithic genetic makeup – trust and egalitarian sharing!

And, these two statements were both made prior to revelations about the Obama administration’s media surveillance, seizing phone records from the AP and FOX News, as well as labeling reporter, James Rosen, a co-conspirator for releasing information that disclosed the CIA conspiracy to manufacture a false-flag incident of domestic terror.  Tell me, please, dear reader: has this administration gone completely bonkers, along with its diverse cadre of secret police, paramilitary units, and covert domestic ops.  Or is this just standard operating procedure in an imperial dictatorship that is finally now coming into full flower?

We, the people, have always labored under the assumption that democracy was real.  But, perhaps it is dawning upon the unwashed masses that democracy is only a wishful fantasy, an illusion, wherever hierarchy exists.  And in this State – The United States – hierarchical arrangements are no less formal and institutionally determinative as they are in any other modern political system, whether autocratic, parliamentary, or otherwise. The institutional power of political hierarchy, deriving from the administration of any contractual or imposed arrangement between the body politic and the head(s) of State – whether those powers be executive, legislative, or judicial – such power structurally undermines the very possibility of truly democratic social or economic arrangements.  Either a single author or a select cadre of authors will ultimately determine the rules that apply to such arrangements, and the influences on those author-ities will become increasingly determinative.  SLowly but surely, if not immediately, the consolidation of power in the hands of one or a few will show itself.  And here, in the corporate State, those with capital will ultimately determine the rules of the game.

You can see this in the way ‘justice’ is administered among the parties within our ‘democratic’ State: the little people with no money have no political clout, those like Bradley Manning (or a host of others); and so they become targets for a hierarchy (head of State) that seeks to cover its own ass; while those with the bucks and therefore, the political clout… well they are just To-Big-To-Jail!

And then, of course, we have the recent witch-hunt by the IRS, peeking inside the panties of politically un-favored groups; first they came for the Moslems and their NFPs, then the Tea Partiers; while treasure troves, like  General Electric, Boeing, Verizon, Honeywell, Wells Fargo, and DuPont go along their merry way paying virtually no corporate tax,and the powers that be don’t bat an eyelash.

So much for transparency and fair play in a democracy!  While there really never has been any, we increasingly are coming to grasp that fact with each passing day.  And we also understand that we have been spoon-fed by those in power, over our many years, only what they wanted us to know.  So, it is not now surprising that more of us become increasingly suspicious of the government’s actions, and their explanations, and the conspiracy theories become more plentiful, if not believable, every passing day. As the lies and half-truths mount, one increasingly questions everything heard from TPTB and their merchants of propaganda.  What did happen on 9/11? Was bin Laden really killed? What happened at Sandy Hook Elementary?  In Boston?  In Yemen?   The number of questions multiply with each questionable story released.

Trust, if it ever really exists in a modern State, or a least the illusion of trust, evaporates rapidly, and a growing chorus of the body politic continues to raise concerns and voice doubts.  In a world that is rapidly shrinking, overpopulated, with diminishing vital resources, starving and disillusioned populations (even in a land flowing with milk and honey), the potential for civil unrest, even insurgency, becomes palpable.  There is a point at which once the water is on the stove it begins to boil; maybe we are close to that boiling point.  And so what does a hegemon do in such a case?  Of course, the social contract becomes malleable because we are in a state of constant war, the State must be defended, the lies and cover-ups mount, the security apparatus of the State becomes both more entrenched and more obvious to the public, and so the concerns continue to grow.

I am not sure where this is all headed folks, but it does look like a ‘ClusterFuck’ is underway in our Nation (thank you JHK), and around the globe for that matter.  It is not as if the administration of your country cannot address the real issues; they do not want to address them!  Besides, it is already too late, and some others have their feet on the gas pedal.  They know we are heading fast to the wall, and they are busy making preparations for their own endgame.  Meanwhile our drones are on active duty killing American citizens around the world, without direct provocation, and without trial, fair or otherwise – just protecting the homeland.

Yet, the biggest question still looms.  If the proverbial 800-pound gorilla does fall, what replaces him?  Is it possible to reconstitute modern urban society, American society, on a foundation of trust and mutual sharing, on a foundation of reciprocity?  How does one orchestrate that in the context of a modern State with several hundred million people, or even in a small city of 100,000 citizens?  Perhaps the long emergency (thanks JHK) will result in a concurrent Reduction-In-Force (RIF… not to be confused with RIP) among the body politic.  And that may leave us with some more manageable numbers.  But, who really knows?  And can we overcome millennia of ‘psy-ops’ (a.k.a. enculturation to the Curriculum) and learn to serve one another rather than servicing an anonymous master?  Who really knows?