[extropy-chat] letter concerning presidential growth

[Jeff Davis]

--- Brett Paatsch <bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au> wrote:

> The people who enjoy US citizenship are a specific
> class of people in the set of people on earth. 

As a person one quite naturally tends to homogenize
large groups of folks by the use a broad noun/label --
ie American, Australian, Mongolian, etc.  As an
Australian it's easy to lump any non-Australian group
-- ie all Americans -- into a class.  Think about
doing the same for all those folks who are your fellow
Australians.  Homogeneous clone mob or fabulously
diverse community of groups, sub-groups,
sub-sub-groups, etc?   
> 
> What that class of the people on earth does more
> than any other class determines the progress or
regress of
> humanity. 

Gotta disagree with you here, Brett.  The wealthy and
political elite are the class that determines the
non-progress or regress of
humanity.  To be sure, there are a bunch of Americans
in that group.  But there are plenty more of other
nationalities and in other places.  

The technological elite mediate progress.

> 
> Americans have a special responsibility to
> international law 
> because they are Americans. When America breaks
> international
> law its worse than when Libya does, or Australia
> does, because
> it sets the moral tenor of the planet. It tells the
> people of the world
> what sort of world the world is and what sort of
> humans succeed
> in the world
> 
> I think America is on the slide.

I date the beginning of the end of American greatness
with the election of Ronald Reagan.  That was the
moment when the "Hollywood-ization" reached critical
mass, and the "non-reality-based" segment of American
society became a solid majority and embarked on a
Hollywood-based plan for the American future. 
Otherwise known as the "We're really fucked now!"
plan.

> 
> I think that with the end of the USSR, and indeed
> slightly before it successive US Presidents from
Reagan,
> encouraged by characters that might call themselves
neo-cons, 
> have increasingly dispensed with the inconvenience
of 
> international law because they thought that *they*
would not be 
> held accountable by Americans. 

Americans totally befuddled by the Hollywood mythology
of a SupremeAmerica incapable of ethical or factual
error.

> They have gambled that Americans domestically would
not
> care enough about what they do internationally, and
they have
> figured pragmatically that foreign nationals don't
vote and so 
> don't count. They have thought that they could
weaken the UN 
> and still make use of it. And so far, they have been
right. 
> 
> If Bush is not impeached,

Not surprisingly I'm four square behind the
impeachment of Bush/Cheney, followed by the criminal
prosecution of the whole cabal.  Despite ample
evidence to support impeachment, there is almost no
non-fringe overt and forceful public invocations for
this course of action.  Certainly no established
political figure that I know of has advocated
impeachment.  (Note the phrase "that I know of".  I
would genuinely like to hear from others about efforts
toward impeachment.)
  
> the next US President will
> come to power *knowing* that Bush was not impeached
after 
> invading a sovereign country and member of the UN to
find 
> weapons of mass destruction that didn't exits. What
possible 
> grounds could there be for impeachment in the future
that would 
> top what Bush has done?
> 
> The next US President will think with good reason
> having watched and learned the lessons of history
that he
> or she is untouchable and unaccountable because the
system is
> such and the citizenry is such that they will not
care
> and they will have diminished mechanisms for holding
him or her 
> to account. 

The essence of the "We're really fucked now!" plan.

Best, Jeff Davis

   "Men occasionally stumble over the truth, 
    but most pick themselves up and hurry off 
    as if nothing had happened."
                    Winston Churchill



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