WHAT FLOATS WITH HOPE? I WORRY OUR ELECTORAL SYSTEM IS CONTRIVED MORE TO CAUSE SH*T TO FLOAT THAN CREAM TO RISE:
PERSONAL COMMENTS ---
SELECTING AGAINST RULE BY POLITICAL PSYCHOPATHS:
Some folks, despairing that modern representative governance is ill equipped to weed against mechanisms favoring the selection of psychopathic leaders, are beginning (
tongue in cheek?) to advocate stochastocracy, or the random selection and replacement of political leaders.
However, before we throw the baby out with the bath water, alternative measures for preserving the legitimacy of representative governance would seem preferable. After all, why suppose psychopaths would not evolve in paths for evading even random selection of leaders, simply by corrupting randomness of the selection process?
So, before we “storm the Bastille” in order to impose stochastocracy, we may first prefer to seek alternative combinations of methods for filtering out political psychopaths.
Examples of alternative methods:
1) Outlaw use by psychopaths and politicians of income tax revenues for the purpose of redistributing wealth to their armies and supporters.
2) Impose progressive taxes on consumption of political resources (political contributions), to render the field of competition less leveraged in favor of established family elites of psychopaths.
3) Outlaw political contributions by all entities, except from individual, adult citizens.
4) Impose death taxes progressive enough to check against rising polyarchies and aristocracies of
gross inequalities in wealth and influence.
5) Limit the voting franchise to responsible, experienced, educated, non-felonious, non-alien, adult citizens.
6) Protect borders and limit immigration, so no seditious demagogue can entice or bribe aliens to enter and vote in such numbers as to swamp democracy under a cult of personalty deluge.
7) Establish responsible means for preventing vote and voter fraud.
8) Reduce disparate power of individuals over monopolies on goods and ideas by imposing progressive taxes (on "consumption of political influence") and by taking action to bust monopolies; use tax revenues therefrom to fund jobs for servicing infrastructure and worker health.
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Snippets from
http://cassiopaea.com/cassiopaea/psychopath.htm:
THE PSYCHOPATH -
The Mask of SanityThe high incidence of sociopathy in human society has a profound effect on the rest of us who must live on this planet, too, even those of us who have not been clinically traumatized. The individuals who constitute this 4 percent drain our relationships, our bank accounts, our accomplishments, our self-esteem, our very peace on earth.
….
Most of us would not imagine any correspondence between conceiving an ethnic genocide and, say, guiltlessly lying to one's boss about a coworker. But the psychological correspondence is not only there; it is chilling. Simple and profound, the link is the absence of the inner mechanism that beats up on us, emotionally speaking, when we make a choice we view as immoral, unethical, neglectful, or selfish.
Most of us feel mildly guilty if we eat the last piece of cake in the kitchen, let alone what we would feel if we intentionally and methodically set about to hurt another person.
Those who have no conscience at all are a group unto themselves, whether they be homicidal tyrants or merely ruthless social snipers.
The presence or absence of conscience is a deep human division, arguably more significant than intelligence, race, or even gender.
What differentiates a sociopath who lives off the labors of others from one who occasionally robs convenience stores, or from one who is a contemporary robber baron - or what makes the difference betwen an ordinary bully and a sociopathic murderer - is nothing more than social status, drive, intellect, blood lust, or simple opportunity.
What distinguishes all of these people from the rest of us is an utterly empty hole in the psyche, where there should be the most evolved of all humanizing functions.
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Snippets from
http://www.newimprovedhead.com/stoch1.htm:
Psychopaths Ride the Curveby Peterson F. Whalley, dean of Grantchester College, Cambridge
February 26, 2004
….
Representative liberal democracy is in crisis. It has been for some while but the crisis has now approached a threshold; further erosion will irrevocably shift the countries that enjoy this form of government into a terra incognita in which liberal democracy will have degenerated into a new form of autocracy, which we call "spinocracy". To retrieve liberal democracy now requires radical action.
….
Democracy is the only means yet devised for the control of power by psychopaths. This has provided an interregnum, a respite of perhaps 100–200 years. The psychopaths are slowly taking over again.
….
The
massive over-representation of psychopaths among the powerful is strong evidence of a selection principle at work. That principle is the advantage psychopaths have over "normals" in the pursuit of power. Where there are large numbers of people there will, by chance, be relatively large numbers of psychos, but, in addition, where power is also concentrated, there will be disproportionately large numbers of them. New York and Washington are likely to have the largest concentrations of psychopaths on the planet.
In very small groups psychopaths are rare, soon discovered and shunned (or jailed, or killed). In larger groups - typical of tribes - they are likewise rare, discovered, shunned but given some socially-acceptable function, like shamans.
In larger societies they are much less rare, much harder to discover and, precisely because they are unfeeling and manipulative, often rise to assume political authority.
This, then, is what we assert the historical record shows.
Civilizations, as we call them, are largely the history of competing psychopaths and the war of psychopaths against the normal humans.
This is pretty shocking. You mean Alexander the Great was a psychopath? Julius Caesar? Attila? Charlemagne? William the Conqueror? Napoleon? Peter the Great? Surely not!
This intuitive test of historical leaders seems to confirm our working hypothesis. But what about Cromwell? Washington?….Lincoln?
This is where it gets murky. Why? These names coincide with the rise of liberal representative democracy. In this form of government, to gain power you have to get people to vote for you. This radically undercuts the natural advantage of the psychopath. Unfortunately, as the population has grown and the selective advantage of psychopaths has gone to work we have entered an era in which the psychopaths have found ways to gain control.
Our analysis of and solution to this problem is basically that proposed by Karl Popper [*PERSONAL COMMENT –
GEORGE SOROS IS A FAMOUS FORMER STUDENT OF KARL POPPER]. Representative democracy is to be preferred because it provides a method of preventing authoritarianism. Unfortunately, Popper's favoured solution - proportional representation - will not work. This is because it neglects the rise of psychopathic control of the system that governs the elected leaders - which is to say the giant private and public bureaucracies, especially the former.
As
the electoral system has become increasingly a money game, elected politicians have turned to the largest sources of money - private business corporations. These are ideal breeding grounds for psychopaths.
The promotion process in large private and public bureaucracies
embodies a selection principle that heavily favours the psychopathic personality. Psychopaths have no difficulty denigrating fellow workers or claiming credit for work done by others. They are the quintessential power-lunchers, breakfasters, stay-after-workers.
….
The majorities of managers and executives are likely to be normal. This is what makes the problem intractable. There's no way to weed out the psychopaths. Yet, we assert, as you go up the chain, the chances of encountering pseudo and genuine psychopaths increases.
Moreover, it is likely that
psychopathy runs in families, not so much because of genetics as the subtle but pervasive influence of family mores and behaviours. The single
biggest factor determining who is in the senior ranks of large organizations is socio-economic status, which means family. Which means that what is still relatively rare among most of the world's inhabitants becomes quite prevalent at the exalted levels occupies by the World's power elites.
As another intuitive test, think about the following list of names, from robber barons to contemporary high-profile figures: Henry Ford, Andrew Carnegie, John Rockefeller, Kurt Waldheim, Boutros-Boutros Ghali, Kofi Annan, Jeffrey Skilling, Chainsaw Al Dunlap, Martha Stewart.
….
Remarkably, political authority is quite like Puff the Magic Dragon: once those subject to authority cease to believe in it, it fades away.
….
There are now so many groups that have achieved or seek "equality" before the law that it's impossible to tell which is the "fundamental" equality. Am I equally obliged to the government of the land or to groups with which I identify? If bespectacled, fat bigots of anglo-saxon descent who demand the right to be smeared in marmite in public can't get charitable status, like thousands of other groups, do I organize a coup?
….
… that people's attitudes, which are what underlie any
opinions they may give to pollsters or anyone else, are very unstable. Reported attitudes have been shown to be heavily influenced by such matters as: the tone of voice in which the questions were asked; the physical conditions in which written surveys were answered; etc.. In other words, factors that would not affect measured attitudes
if they were really measuring anything worthwhile. This is all the more so if the elicited attitudes are about topics about which the subjects may not have thought very much, like the interest rate elasticity of government debt.
Focus groups have taken this sham to a new level.
Focus groups don't even pretend to be "representative". Rather, the
spin-doctor gurus search for meaningful revelations of the underlying angst of the populace as
revealed by the verbal entrails of people at the mall with nothing better to do for a few hours.
….
… Americans now apparently grant the Courts more legitimacy than their Legislatures. This warms the hearts of psychopaths.
….
Next week, kiddies, we'll teach you how to cure all known disease.
***********************
Snippets from
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/168879-The-Road-to-Hell-is-paved-with-Free-Market-Capitalism-Imperialism-and-Psychopaths:
The Road to Hell is paved with Free Market Capitalism, Imperialism and PsychopathsSimon Davies & Donald Hunt
SOTT.net
Mon, 10 Nov 2008 13:38 UTC
….
Expansion became an end in and of itself and its protagonists became "nothing but functionaries of violence [who] could only think in terms of power politics. They were the first who, as a class and supported by their everyday experience, would claim that power is the essence of every political structure."
The perpetual cycle of accumulation of property/capital begetting the accumulation of power begetting the accumulation of property, onwards forever, requires perpetual expansion. The great waves of change of the Industrial Revolution, the age of Imperialism and the age modern empire, whether under the guise of Cold War or War on Terror, have led to the
ceding of all power to the financial/capitalist elite. Since the age of colonial imperialism this elite has succeeded, in complete accordance with its creed of perpetual accumulation of property and power, in gathering ever greater amounts of both.
….
… referred to "High society's admiration for the underworld....its step-by-step retreat on all questions of morality, and its growing taste for the anarchical cynicism of its offspring".
….
… published on Sott.net.
From
The Psychopath - The Mask of SanityImagine, if you can, not having a conscience, none at all, no feelings of guilt or remorse no matter what you do, no limiting sense of concern for the well-being of strangers, friends, or even family members. Imagine no struggles with shame, not a single one in your whole life, no matter what kind of selfish, lazy, harmful, or immoral action you had taken.
And pretend that the concept of responsibility is unknown to you, except as a burden others seem to accept without question, like gullible fools.
Now add to this strange fantasy the ability to conceal from other people that your psychological makeup is radically different from theirs. Since everyone simply assumes that conscience is universal among human beings, hiding the fact that you are conscience-free is nearly effortless.
You are not held back from any of your desires by guilt or shame, and you are never confronted by others for your cold-bloodedness. The ice water in your veins is so bizarre, so completely outside of their personal experience, that they seldom even guess at your condition.
In other words, you are completely free of internal restraints, and your unhampered liberty to do just as you please, with no pangs of conscience, is conveniently invisible to the world.
You can do anything at all, and still your strange advantage over the majority of people, who are kept in line by their consciences will most likely remain undiscovered.*****
The entire fabric of Free Market Capitalist societies is governed by fear, an all pervading, overwhelming fear. A world where one is perpetually in competition, where what ever one has can be taken by the next man in his pursuit of property or through crime, where the fundamental basis of society is based upon the accumulation of unlimited capital and unlimited power for their own sakes, that is a world based on unlimited fear. A world entirely reflective of the psychopaths manipulation of the psyche of normal people.
***********************
PROPOSALS ---- STEADY STATE ECONOMY VS. CONSTANT GROWTH ECONOMY:
Snippets from
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/168879-The-Road-to-Hell-is-paved-with-Free-Market-Capitalism-Imperialism-and-Psychopaths:
Herman DalyThe US economist
HERMAN DALY,
delivered a paper to the Sustainable Development Commission in the UK in April this year in which he reiterated his idea of a Steady State Economy that can replace the "failed growth economy".
In this paper Daly was challenging the basis of free market capitalism as summarised by Arendt, the perpetual accumulation of property/capital. He implicitly acknowledges the fact that free market capitalism has to consume to grow and has to grow to survive. Logically this is not possible perpetually when one looks at the world as a finite system. He therefore proposes that a move away from the growth economy of the last 300 years to an economy that is stable, one that does not grow. On a global basis this would mean that the developed economies would have to use their resources more efficiently, allowing the developing economies a greater share of the world's resources until such time as they had achieved a reasonable quality of life amongst their citizens.
Daly proposes:-
A more equitable sharing of basic global resources
Reform of the tax systems to an ecologically based tax system
Limit the range of inequality in income distribution-a minimum income and a maximum income. Without aggregate growth poverty reduction requires redistribution. Complete equality is unfair; unlimited inequality is unfair. Seek fair limits to inequality.
Change the way we work so as to provide work for everybody rather than slavery for some and unemployment for others.
Re-regulate international trade. Limit the freedom of movement of capital, restrain globalisation.
Downgrade the IMF, the World Bank and the World Trade Organisation to a new model designed for equality amongst nations.
Abolish fractional reserve banking. Give the control of money back to governments and away from banks.
Put scarce resources under public control and remove the private control on knowledge and information. Stop treating the scarce as if it were non scarce, and the non scarce as if it were scarce.
Stabalise world population.
Change national accounting to reflect reality so as to be able to see when growth ceases to benefit a nation as a whole.
Whether all Daly ideas are good ones is not really the point. What they serve to illustrate is that serious economists, (Daly used to be at the World Bank), do have ideas as to how our world could be run differently. So when you hear the liars telling you that this and that 'reform' is necessary to keep the existing system running hopefully now you can see through their lies and can tell anybody else who'll listen.
