Re: [SCARE]: "If you only knew what we know..."

[jim bell <jimbell@pacifier.com>]

At 12:23 PM 5/26/96 -0400, Subir Grewal wrote:
>On Sat, 25 May 1996, jim bell wrote:
>
>:At 09:48 PM 5/25/96 -0400, Subir Grewal wrote:
>:How "removed" do they have to be to be innocent, in your opinion?
>
>If they didn't pull the trigger or give the order, they're innocent.
>Making these criteria any laxer will cause problems as more and more
>people are drawn into the category of offenders, pretty soon you're the
>only victim, everyone else is out there to steal from you or assist in the
>theft.

Qualitatively, perhaps.  But quantitatively, no.  I think that blame for any 
given situation or government behavior will be distributed in a reasonably 
fair fashion, with those directly responsible for abuse becoming "dead meat" 
while those on the periphery only marginal targets.  Your generous 
interpretation of their guilt is certainly not binding on me.   And in any 
case the fact that the people involved will usually be able to resign will 
be a logical "out." 


>:Nuclear bomb design.  Done with funds stolen from taxpayers.  Done to
>:protect the leadership of this country, not the public.
>
>Pure mathematics as far as the people working at the lab were concerned.
>You really think if the receptionist had died, it would have been
>self-defense?  A couple of kids died in computer labs at other schools
>where this happened, they were there feeding punched cards into the
>machines.  Somehow that doesn't sound right to me.

I agree.  Which is why I'd much prefer a method to preferentially target a 
relatively smaller number of people, and I've invented (discovered?) just 
such a system.  Why not let it work?

>:And isn't it immoral for George Bush, for instance, to choose a solution
>:that results in the deaths of tens of thousands of comparatively innocent
>:Iraqis, both during and after the Gulf war, rather than bumping off Saddam
>:Hussein?  Think about it.  Exactly why does he do the former, rather than
>:the latter?
>
>And the Iranian leaders really think Clinton is an ungoldy kafir for
>meeting Rushdie the apostate.  Why not kill him, after all various
>Americans have suggested this is a valid tactic? 

Why not kill those Iranian leaders, using AP?  And if you're afraid they'll 
retaliate against "our" leaders, I see nothing wrong with that, either.  
It's the leaders who maintain the dispute.

> Your methods will be used for ends you do not agree with. 

Hey, I realized that long ago!  But I'm not under any illusion that this 
system can be molded to conform to my wishes alone:  If I could, I'd become 
a dictator and the cycle of tyranny would continue.  


> From what I've learnt of the Gulf
>war (I was reading most of the time, kept away from the TV), they did try
>very hard to kill Sadaam Hussein, but got nowhere. 

"Very hard"?  If they'd tried "very hard" they would have succeeded.  No, 
the various leadership groups controlling different countries have far more 
in common with each other than with the ordinary citizens.  They all are 
perfectly aware that if a precedent is established that killing the 
leadership is to be used to solve a dispute, eventually they'll all be dead. 
 Thus, they reject this solution like the plague.  The government only 
pretends to not be able to succeed at this task in order to assuage the 
natural desires of the public.


>As is apparent,
>political leaders value their own lives more than they do those of the
>foot-soldiers.  Many among the foot-soldiers belive their lives would be
>"brutish, nasty and short" without the mechanism of the state and are
>willing to defend it and those who currently operate the machine. 

They are misled, of course.

 >Of
>course George Bush I don't trust at all because the man was practically
>glowing during "his war", anyone who enjoys a war, revels in it, is not
>someone I admire, respect, or even talk to.  However, when you propose
>that we kill this person, I'm not going to stand with you either.  Rest
>assured, there will be many others waiting to take his place when he is
>killed, and some of them will spell potato like the English feudal lords
>did.

The only reason there might be "many others waiting to take his place" is 
that assassination is actually a rare event.  Make it easily accomplished, 
and who would want to take any politician's place?

>:"Another set of costs"?  Yikes!  Read the essay, governments as we know them
>:can't possibly survive post-AP.
>
>Oh no, I think they will survive post AP.  The odds are quite high that
>the people who are convinced to act on the AP philosophy will be branded
>terrorists and become the objectives of many witch hunts the world over.

Unless I capture the public's imagination, and they realize what kind of 
improvements it promises.  Or, at least they recognize that opposition by 
those in government is entirely self-serving.

>:Well, I disagree.  Until recently, public opinion was almost entirely
>:manufactured.  It was a joint project of the government and the news media.
>
>I too think Chomsky has perceptive vision when it comes to the media.

It doesn't take a great deal of perception to see this.  The media and the 
government are dependent on each other:  The media needs access to news, the 
government needs a pliable sounding board.  Chomsky has gotten smart on this 
subject, a little bit late in my estimation.  Chomsky's main advantage is 
that he's been a public figure for years, which means when HE spouts this 
stuff it's considered news.  When we talk about it, it's ignored.

>:Is there any significant likelihood that the people in power today will
>:relinquish power absent a system such as AP?  I'm not optimistic about that.
>
>No, noone "relinquishes" power.  They fight to keep it, but the struggle
>does not always have to be violent,

It isn't that it "has to" be violent.  Resignation is always an option.  
Problem is, they don't want to give up their positions of power.


> and it hurts our cause to instigate
>violence when none has been used directly against us.

That depends entirely on what your definition of instigating violence really 
is.  I happen to believe that the act of collecting taxes, involuntarily, IS 
the "instigation of violence" even if the victim gives up his assets without 
a fight, if there is the prospect of eventual violence should he refuse to 
cooperate.  Until you see this, you'll have a warped view of the propriety 
of AP, not to mention the libertarian non-initiation of force  principle.  
(NIOFP.)





Jim Bell
jimbell@pacifier.com