The Decline
and Fall of the American State; Enjoy It
By Karen Kwiatkowski
March
13, 2015 "ICH"
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The
headlines at Drudge are an excellent
barometer of what's up with government and
culture. Glancing over cops being killed
by the other side of law enforcement (the
people), Hillary's
new Whitewater files (this time
electronic), Army and Secret Service
partying, drug use, and sex rings, the
predictable result of partial "legalization"
of pot (neighborhood informers), we find a
report that, "Confidence
in government is lower than ever!"
Whaaa? The poll, taken in 2014, looked at
consumer and investor faith in the
"product", i.e. the president, judiciary,
legislative as well as mainstream media,
banks, big business, organized labor,
organized religion, education, medicine and
the scientific community.
We are government consumers and investors in
these products, although we have little
choice. The massive unitary state, this
lock-stepping, integrated, wealth-consuming,
constantly expanding Rube Goldberg machine
is what we the people have bought, and we
feed it daily. We are afraid not to, lest
it fall down in a million pieces and smash
us.
The poll designers were either extremely
naive or extremely perspicacious. They have
cogently asked how we like our fascism,
sunny side up or easy over? Not surprising,
the people indicated they'd prefer to skip
breakfast, due to a growing queasiness in
the pit of their stomachs, and a sense that
something is going to fall on our heads.
The poll indicates that we are disgusted by
government media, government legislation and
15 straight years of diktatcracy. We have
no faith in the justice system and organized
religion, and our discontent with the
corporate state of big business, big
medicine, big education, and big science is
seething. All good signs of course, that
change is coming. Our identity as "US
Citizen" is becoming something we'd rather
not talk about. This is how all empires
collapse, and the one led by Washington,
D.C. is not special. Unlike all the
children in Lake Wobegone, we are beginning
to recognize our child in D.C. is not above
average or exceptional; rather he is a
pretty nasty devil who is never going to
make something of himself.
Maybe it's the weather, or Snowden, or
independent media, or our empty bank
accounts. At some point, hard facts around
us inspire calls from the crowd of "Why, the
emperor isn't wearing anything? He's buck
naked! And butt-ugly, too!
Hahahahahahahahaha!"
Each day brings more lies from government,
military, intelligence apparatus, law
enforcement, big banking, big business, big
pharma, "common core," and the whole global
warming conglomerate. With each revealed
lie, each uncovered fantasy of our
overlords, each example of our two-track (in)justice
system, faith is lost, and anger grows.
We who are interested, curious or invested
in living a free life watch the headlines,
and their sub-currents, closely. Anarcho-capitalism,
for me and for millions of people around the
world, is the most logical and reliable
theory of human liberty and its antithesis,
the parasitic and sin-oriented state, which
is to say, the State. Anarcho-capitalism
informs us, and on a day like today, and
every day, shines a happy light on the
headlines.
Like this one! "Bomb
Sniffing Elephants? Not so Nutty, US Army
Says." At first glance, the title
instantly brought to mind the image of a
modern-day and slightly Bollywood Slim
Pickens gripping a nuclear missile between
his legs and holding on to his cowboy hat.
I thought of what this could mean for
domestic air travel in the US, with
elephants installed in airports supervised
by legions of TSA agents checking in the
passengers, and the US Air Force demanding
hundreds of billions of new spending on
elephant-suitable transportation. I could
see a refreshed and powerful relationship
growing between the PETA, wildlife and
organic poo crowds, bolstered by the Agenda
21 crowd that hates traveling humans anyway,
and the military industrial complex that
lives to serve! Of course, American farmers
would need new subsidies to raise elephants
for the military, and to provide retirement
homes for the old ones who have lost their
sense of smell (or knowing an elephant,
probably just faking it to get their social
security!). This could be a real shot in
the arm for a military-industrial-welfare
state that has lost public support for
foreign wars and titanic waste. Of course,
the Democrats would be angry because of the
undue lobbying for elephants everywhere, and
all the potential photo ops, and we'd surely
need to subsidize an equal number of
donkeys. The 14th Amendment would certainly
come into play here. The Air Force would
need hundreds of millions more for separate
donkey transportation as well, and at this
point AMTRAK would offer, at the price of
major new subsidies, separate train cars at
vast savings to the taxpayer, of course.
For the sake of the innocent animals, both
proposals would receive full federal
funding, in a new age of bipartisanship.
Elephants, donkeys, and state capitalism, oh
my!
But upon reading the article, I discovered
that while we are funding this bomb-sniffing
elephant research, it actually takes place
in South Africa where, in Namibia and Angola
(due to another USG funded war in the 1980s)
fighters for freedom left landmines
everywhere after both sides lost. Rather
than just running a traditional goat lottery
over the fields to clear them (PETA wouldn't
like that) it turns out the US Army is
collecting field samples with drones, and
delivering the samples to the elephant and
asking him to determine any explosive
content. Of course, this also brings to
mind any number of uses of the elephant by
the USG, and ultimately should boost the
elephant industry, putting a lot of
elephants on thrones or heavy duty pedestals
to pass judgment on all kinds of samples
brought to them. Elephants are not only
known for olfactory talent, but they are
very wise, I'm told. I mean, they could
probably tell us the future just by
sniffing.
Of course, allowing my train of thought to
proceed this way is truly nutty, I suppose.
The fact that twenty years ago I would never
have thought government capable of pursuing
such silliness, today I not only believe it
is possible for government to take such
insanity and run with it, but I have little
doubt that in some unknown corner at the end
of some interminable hallway in some massive
building in D.C. someone is actually
developing a plan.
Who knows for sure? What we can conclude
from the Drudge headlines -- today and any
other day, is that Washington, D.C. -- the
whole of mess of dictatorial money-printing,
warmongering, bread and circuses madness --
is building
palatial barges on Lake Nemi, ships
designed for government excess and partying,
sex rings, drugs, vanity and murder, and
these ships don't sail. The lasting
contribution of these barges, like much of
what our federal government has constructed
in the late 20th and 21st century, survives
only as a symbol of a hated all-consuming
state. Like the Lake Nemi barges, the
fanciful and frightening creations of
Washington, D.C. will be sunk, destroyed,
and shattered sooner than anyone expected.
LRC columnist Karen Kwiatkowski, Ph.D., a
retired USAF lieutenant colonel, blogs
occasionally at
Liberty
and Power and
The Beacon. To receive automatic
announcements of new articles,
click here or join her Facebook page.
She ran for Congress in Virginia's 6th
district in 2012..
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