Primary Loyalty, Primary Identity

Can we have more than one fundamental, primary loyalty?  Consider that we could have at least four different kinds of primary loyalty e.g. to a person or persons (wife, children, family), to a group(Tribe, State, Race, Nation, Religion), to a geographic area, or to an idea/principle (God, freedom, justice, truth, honesty, communism). And if we were then to rank which of these categories of loyalty should  come first, we could have a significant discussion.  Should brother(person) come before freedom(idea) or Nation(group)?   Is honesty more fundamental than religion?  Supporting your wife more important than justice?

I suspect we assume our fundamental loyalties are NOT in conflict.  They clearly are in competition for one's time and devotion.  You could always spend more time with one or another of them.  I fail to see how there could be a right amount of commitment to each of several responsibilities.  It's a living in the moment problem.  It defines you.

Do we need a central organizing principle of our lives?  Do we have to know what it is?  Do we have to defend it against all change?  Are we blessed with it or do we have to find it?  Can we and do we need to rank our most important loyalties - to put them into consciousness say or should we wing it, so that we imagine we are supporting all our many hopes?

I reflect on the idea of highest virtue or greatest good because there are so many necessary virtues but not all can be first.  Shakespeare's Polonius counseled "to thine own self be true" but it is considered simplistic to think whatever is good for you is actually an optimal state of the world.  We cannot help but be selfish because whatever we think we are doing right is a product of our limited, flawed selves.  We are tangled in cross-cutting loyalties.  If our priorities today can change, and they do, then our hierarchy of values is constantly changing and we have no one essential guiding loyalty.  If we place God there and I very much think that is a good idea then we have still not answered any of the subsidiary questions about what comes next after God.  We imagine all our virtues as being connected to God and so are serving our highest good at all times--no matter what ranking value we place on it.  Is that a rationalization then?  We consider that today we are grateful--and serve God and tomorrow we are honest-and serve God and after that we are patriotic and so love our country--and so are serving God.  It is I fear a sleight of hand.  We are changeable creatures and not consistent.

It is thought that we should stand for something.  To stand for something, and change, is Inconsistent.  It was Emerson who suggested "a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds".  But if we promised our wife to be true then a duty that calls us away or a change of affections may or may not be considered a "foolish" consistency.  It is not a condition that can be "optimized" unless one has a faith that there is always a best solution--definitionally.  But to never stand for anything is a weakness.  If we go along to get along and allow the group to define our tastes and the value of our efforts, we are as Nietzsche suggests herd animals with a slave mentality.

I would propose that the genius of gender is to allow cross cutting primary loyalties that are fused in the vows of marriage.  My wife puts persons (family) first and I could put Group (Religion) first.  God is, after all, more important than me (or my wife). Once you have decided upon your hierarchy of primary loyalty, does time and circumstance, change it?  If being American is more important than supporting Justice then we could say we are being loyal to the State because it is a transcendent organization that is the vehicle for delivering Justice.  Our individual assessment might be flawed and we defer to the greater wisdom of the representative group.

Almost by definition our primary loyalties are good (to us).  Nietzsche would call that value creation.  Our sacrifice to the values we promote creates their "goodness".  Could who we are be determined by what we believe we are and sacrifice for or is it equally determined by everyone else with knowledge or an opinion of us?  So we have heard a suggestion that we should "follow our bliss".  That's a comfortable formulation.  It is also suggested that we should recognize ourselves as sinners and repent.  Not just try and change--actually repent, fall down in humility and fundamentally recognize our inability to save ourselves and do something differently. That "saves" you. That's a less comfortable formulation to me because every time you ACT, you have to apologize for being flawed.  I do not quite "get" the concept of salvation--Jesus forgives us before God or atones for us and what we do is no longer on us.  I'll leave the problem of doing Evil in the name of God alone... There seems to me to be plenty of that.

How do we manifest fruits of the spirit?  We sacrifice for them as values and create their worth.

Are we ever off the clock so to speak?  We could have bursts of energy toward our goals and then rest time or me time.  When I look at the clouds I am not saving the whales.  I would prefer that someone not criticize me for what I am doing or not doing unless they are willing to share what they consider most important and why they think what I am doing is thwarting it.

Is your primary identity your primary loyalty?

Personal Idiocy

    I seem to be a Fool.  It has finally occurred to me that citizens/voters don't care that the government can produce whatever money it needs and spend it on whatever it wants.   It is as if I had a neighbor who had a money machine in the basement that could produce perfect $100 bills.  He has a beautiful estate, all the latest appliances and beautiful furniture, late model expensive cars and so do all his friends!  I am jealous. 

  But I think to myself, it's not my problem. I'm an honest guy. Someone will inform the authorities and he will go to prison.  Then I notice that all the authorities seem to have their own source of extra funds!  So everyone knows and doesn't care! The authorities don't work for me (and maybe not you) anymore, they work for who pays them.

I can’t define what money is and yet I go to work every day to earn it.  I have missed a lot of chances to be rich but I have almost ended up there anyway due to steady work and good fortune.  In 2007 I just got fed up with the outright rank fraud of our government leaders and business leaders. Some people get to create money and everybody else has to use it.  It continues to irritate me. The whole "I can" but "you can't" is so fundamentally unjust.  The elite have this attitude; "I know best, you--STFU." Talking about "the deficit" for 30 years is just that, talk.  No action.  No responsibility. When you say audit the fed, they say crawl back in your Neanderthal cave.  When you say how about a real political solution for debt reduction, they say our debts don't matter.

There is a huge chasm in a rational thought process that considers debt repayment important in a fiat currency. The creators of money are in a different situation than those of us that simply use it. If I could make perfect $100 bills in my basement would I have to worry about "a job" or my credit card bills? Of course not! Governments are the largest debtors on the planet but get to create whatever money  they think is necessary.   Economists seem dismissive of the shattering fact that the government owes more than the country produces. No big deal they say, after you’ve spent the money you owe to yourself perhaps at some future time, you can just ignore it.  So they want me to SAVE money so they can use it.  Sweet deal for them.

How much is enough?  Travel, knowledge, experience,  intellect, wealth, military preparedness? Always more? I am neither Epicurean nor fond of austerity.   I have been given the Goldilocks place at the table.  On this whole collapse topic, I have been prepared for 40 years.  All good things come to an end—even my singles tennis game.   I agree with Yeats, the best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate intensity.  So, who is driving the train?  Casey Jones?  What is to be done?  The question has been asked before and answered with various revolutions to no good effect for the majority.   When you knock off the big boys the edifice falls on the little people.  

 As a professional with a good business for 30 years, I could have made a lot more money than I did but no one could say I wasn’t “comfortable”.  My parents were well off, my brothers and sisters are doing well, my three children are healthy  and have their college paid for with no debt.  None are married or have “good” jobs yet but are seeking a place in the world that currently exists. I have cautioned them (but not persuaded them) that  “good times” are an illusion.  My wife and I are upper middle class bordering on rich without being in the 5%.

I have heard the suggestion that I should "collapse now and beat the rush".  I can afford 40 acres and a mule but have no clue how to farm so that is probably a poor survival strategy. I agree with the formulation that “collapse” is individual.  It just gradually happens to more and more people until finally America is a third world nation with a few mega-rich and everybody else poor.   I have considered running for political office to point this out but I am much too liberal to win in the South. I have been anti-military since Vietnam and pro-environment since Earth Day.  If I accidently revealed my opinion that Bush and Cheney should be prosecuted for war crimes and Obama should be immediately impeached as a tool of financial interests, I would be shunned.  I like quirky Ron Paul, I supported Ross Perot but have typically voted Democratic.  So where would I try and lead this Zombie nation?  A Constitutional approach of trying to exercise more power locally would be a start but a Southerner that argues for States’ Rights is racist before the words are out of his mouth.  I don’t mind the whole “less taxes” thing but I think we miss some real opportunities  to do some great things together as a society.  Suppose we really wanted a good public health system?  I am partial to education too, just not the current mandatory semi-incarceration, no child left behind idiocy.  And who wouldn’t want better infrastructure—cheaper power bills, low cost housing, public transportation?   

So where does Peak Everything fit in this worldview?  Suppose we do adopt a devolution strategy?  Jettison the cornucopia nonsense and aim for sustainability.  Motto:  Back to the 1950’s while avoiding war.  Our first requirement is trustworthy money.  A practical means of cancelling debt, removing the elites, without creating mayhem.  Old money has to go. What about a Jubilee?  (I don’t really like this solution since I have money BUT some sacrifices are required)  All money is invalidated and therefore all loans.  Banks become buildings.  Everybody owns the house or apartment they live in.  All contracts must be re-written in new money.  This reset would not be without pain for most.  The rich would strive mightily to protect their privilege.
There are steps that could make the transition less disruptive.  It is at this point that I am supposed to show my hard money colors and unfurl the gold as money flag.  It's an option.  The point of course is to define the idea of money so that it is tangible and fixed as a measure of value.  We want to limit its production.  We can only trust our leaders to the degree they are able to be good stewards of our social resources.  When they Midas-like produce unlimited quantities of what is supposed to be valuable then the value tends toward worthlessness.
    We have pretty good historical experience with the use of precious metals as money and I think it could be re-instated.  The criticism is usually that there is "not enough" gold and silver to underpin the financial system.  That seems naive to me because we have huge stocks of stored and hoarded gold that could be activated to flow and support the domestic currency and international trade.    Yes the nominative value would be higher but the point would be to hold the value of money to a defined "something".
    What most people don't seem to understand is that money should be a claim on some resource i.e. labor or some product or asset. But the creator of that "tool" can produce too many claims and suddenly invalidate a lifetime of "saving".  Governments have a tendency to do that.  Given the large mess they have made by running up debts they cannot pay with the tax revenues they currently have, we will suddenly get a new monetary system--one fine day. I am unsure how to prepare for that eventuality.  People with nothing will be unaffected because they will still have nothing but anyone with something will have their assets - revalued.  If debts are to be repudiated then a good strategy is to have a lot of debt and nothing as collateral.  Max out the credit cards and then claim insolvency.  The law could take a dim view of this and re-institute something akin to debtor's prison or simply garnishee whatever wages you make in the future. But it might be a brilliant business move.  I have heard of businesses that bankrupt leaving their corporate owners with the spoils. Of course some of the profit goes to pay the lawyers and legislators but it appears to be a viable enrichment strategy.  But it is not right to shaft your creditors.  That is not a viable economic system.  We want people working together.
   I do not have a clue the mess we are getting ourselves in to by electing Donald Trump.  Most of the people I know voted for him to "shake things up".  I have a bad Jerry Lee Lewis premonition about that as a solution to anything.  A narcissistic real estate developer that doesn't read suggests disaster to me.  As a thoughtful person, I seem to be an idiot.  I hope events prove that to be the case....

Deep State: Primary Loyalty

The Deep State is a relatively recent term that I equate to the much older term by C. Wright Mills called the power elite.  The idea that there is a small  powerful group that runs things. What is their primary goal? How large a group are we talking about? Who are they?  We currently are using this 1% vs the 99% formulation but that division  would be a "decision" group of 3.3 million people in the USA alone. That's a bit too large for a group of decision-makers but it certainly makes sense that the successful would be working to maintain the conditions that support their status.  In fact, in a relative sense, it would be reasonable that the upper fourth of the population might be satisfied with their circumstances and would continue to support the status quo that enables them. A fourth of the population is no hidden cabal.

  A more manageable "elite"-the .1% - would therefore contain 330,000 people in the USA with a minimum net worth of approximately $43 million.  Are they the people who run things or do they need to be richer to be the elite deep state?  What about the 30-year bureaucrat in the Department of Agriculture that enforces and approves national agricultural policy?  He might make only $135,000/yr. but is part of the "unelected" bureaucracy.  How about the deputy undersecretary for African affairs? Head of the IRS?  Are they puppets or, as decision makers, part of the "Deep State"?  These actors have positions of responsibility but are not necessarily "rich".  The "Deep State" is thus a conspiratorial but vague term.  How many people have a say-so in running things in America today?  Is it even possible to say who the 100 most influential people are?  What kind of agreement could we get?  We need a definition before we get too far down this rabbit hole.

So let's say we have the 'obvious' leadership and the 'hidden' leadership.  If the Obvious Leadership consists of the President/White House, all senators/representatives/SC justices, the top .1% of all federal government department employees, 50 state governors, 300 mayors of the largest cities,  all people with $100+million dollars, all 4,000 CEOs of the Wilshire Index 5000 companies in America, all college presidents, all NGO's with a budget over $1million, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, leaders of foundations, unions, biggest law firm partners, and actors making more than $10 million/movie, some outspoken sports heroes, and 1 comedian to keep everything in perspective THEN we seem to be talking about maybe 20,000 leaders. These are the obvious leaders, who are the "hidden" leaders?  Who are the people who are "more equal" than others? If we consider someone like Dick Cheney--is he both ex-Vice President and a member of the Deep State cabal?  Is ex-President Clinton in the loop or out of it?  There seems to be some confusion here about who the actual decision makers are.  If the obvious leaders are puppets, they serve at the behest of the hidden leaders then we want to know how do the shots that are called get transmitted to the puppets?  Where are the strings?  The deep state proponents will typically say something like 1) they are paid off with money and status and 2) know that if they cross their overlords they will be ostracized. So the deep state could be an imaginative state of mind where you feel yourself part of it and act according to precepts that you have gleaned from a lifetime of pursuing political influence. The deep state is a gravitational force.  But why call it deep?  It is just the current ruling consensus.  People who are trying to accomplish things work together in a particular way.  There is no mystery hidden leadership.  It is a governing state of mind.  Instead of talking about hidden manipulators we would be analyzing the governing consensus.  My take is that the deep state is a conspiratorial term for the people who oppose the current governing class and its policies.  The imprecision of the term allows acolytes of the concept to sometimes name obvious leaders and other times hidden leaders for decisions.

The Deep State is thought of as subterranean monolithic force in its support for the status quo and how things are currently decided but may itself be divided about the direction of the American Project.  There are many different interests among several groups with different goals. The 'deep state' could be divided into many competing groups. If I don't like the influence of the so called old money Republicans I might identify with the internationalists or 'globalists'.  I view the status quo as a balance of competing forces, not a hidden master plan executed by unknown leaders. We could name all these groups but would it get us any closer to seeing who has real influence?   Old money WASP financiers.  19th century industrialists. Progressive secularists.  Multiculturalists. What about the secret society Masons, Illuminati, Catholic Church, Religious evangelicals that are organizing society to be fundamentally religious?  One schism in the so-called Deep State developed from a split between the fundamentally nationalist conservative corporatists and a more liberal international minded secular leadership. For a shorthand, we could say the WASPs vs the Jews but I don't want to project any anti-Semitic nonsense about this interaction. They both agree on the conditions that support their elitism but they could have different goals. We might say they are America First(Nationalism) and Internationalism.  "Globalism" is often criticized as supporting a New World Order of World government.   The NWO is a smear term.  I am not privy to the hoped for plans of the power elite but I can say that if you are governing then you are looking for levers of power to exert your influence.  So, I ask again, What is the goal of the "Deep State" and who are its members?   It is fair to answer that there is no such thing as the "Deep State", it is a conspiracy term that imagines a cabal of secret people who are a bogeyman for one's own imagined helplessness and irrelevancy.

 What is the essential primary Mythos of the American Project?  Liberty and Justice for all. Or are we really about "show me the money"? My interest is directional clarity. What is the vision for America?  We talk about Freedom, Equality, and Justice but is it what we are primarily about? If you are reading this, you should create a vision statement to guide your own criticism.  I created one as a guide to my own political participation and hopes for the future.  Our task as citizens is to create a substantially just, eco- sustainable, multicultural, representative democracy.  Some might say we have exactly that but it just works poorly.

Deep state theorists would laugh at that formulation.  They know money runs things and the oligarchy is not interested in your input.  You are not in the club.  We have a government that  the rich direct and support.  Voting doesn't matter.  Political participation only counts if you count.  Voters are mesmerized by showy issues of no substance that distract them from the decisions that would make a difference if they were aware of them.  Propaganda rules and hardly anything is as it appears.  The world we think we are living in, is illusory, while the power merchants secretly create more for themselves. Deep state acolytes are conspiracy theorists.  I don't use the term judgmentally. There are plenty of secret plans that have been carried out with minimal public knowledge. Conspiracy types believe the Kennedy assassination, 9/11, and even Sandy Hook and the  Boston Marathon bombing are secret government efforts to gaslight the public and influence policy in preferred directions. One successful conspiracy is possible--I don't dispute it, I am suspicious of the Kennedy assassination-it appears our own CIA was involved--how much is a good question.  I am not comfortable with the 9/11 story--quite frankly the buildings appear to "blow up" not collapse but I am willing to let the jarring facts sit out there crying for a more comprehensive explanations.  I think it less credible that everything that is presented by mainstream media is false.

America is multicultural.  It absorbed the ideals of immigrants as it grew and provided opportunities for them not possible in their home countries.  We are, all of us, grateful for that.  But we have an unknown  future and to my mind it is one of contraction and decline.  We are a flawed people with an outdated Mythos of American exceptionalism and it is inappropriate to our problems today.  If growth is currently transitioning to contraction then our current governing consensus is busy readjusting the terms of participation in the American Project.  Why are Southern White guys suddenly so politically aggrieved, voting for Trump at an over 75% rate? The current focus on a multicultural, diverse, body politic nourished by streams of immigrants is changing their world.  Could it be true that all of the many minorities agree their political situation will be better if the WASP majority is gradually demographically turned into a minority?  "We" would then ALL be minorities. I can see a confident majority not wishing for that.

I am suspicious of the formulation that there is a deep state cabal running things.  I know Jeff Bezos is a billionaire and has more influence as a citizen than me. He has more money than any single person should have and I do not have any problem taxing a lot of it away.  If he is pushing Alexa as a surreptitious spy in my home as prelude to dictatorial control of the internet and as a member of the deep state then I should be savvy enough to organize some opposition, decline to participate, and pay attention to the things that matter.  My question is primary loyalty.  We all have a multiplicity of loyalties and a desire to thrive.  Who has to compromise and who gets their way?  We should remember that a society that works is preferable to one falling apart and participate accordingly.

Immigration

I like to think the immigration problem in America would not be hard to fix by enforcing clear rules and setting a precise number of approved immigrants in the respective categories.  But it seems as if 1/2 the country thinks more immigrants would be better and the other half goes for fewer than our historical average.  Could we agree on a compromise "number" that given our current population would be considered optimal?  Is that a strategy? I realize there is a NONE crowd and there is a proportion we could call generous  that considers more is typically better.  So let's start with the facts.  For the last several years we have had approximately 6 million applications for refugee status, asylum, legal residency, and citizenship every year.  Last quarter we admitted 160,000 new citizens (I know one of them and America is definitely getting a good deal) and the DHS approved approximately 1 million green cards last year.  That's a typical number since 2000.

In my last post I noted that there were in 1965 approximately 260,000 new immigrants per year and since 2000 about 1 million new legal immigrants per year.  If we look at the population as a percent of those born in the USA and those that are foreign born, we see that in 1965 about 3.8% of the population was foreign born while today the number is 14%.  We have become more international and diverse.  The big unknown is the illegal immigrant population which is estimated at 12 million.  There are claims that it is much higher--and there are claims that the number is not actually a set of people but a rotating group of different people that work here illegally and then go home.  At any given time there are about 12 million here "undocumented".

What is frustrating is that the immigration problem has worsened for 50 years because of a deliberate refusal by the leadership to address it intelligently and comprehensively.  They have preferred using it as a foil to score points against the political opposition. They make half-hearted efforts to appease the citizenry but allow complexity to give them payoffs from clients that need cheap agricultural labor in the central valley of California, Iowa meat packers, or large hotel chains that need low cost room cleaners. Others claim they don't see the need for immigration control at all.  The situation requires "flexibility" so that there can be no number placed on the total allowed.  They have a fundamental belief that more diversity is better.  Why more hardworking poor people in America is "better" is assumed, not clearly stated. There is an almost unstated conviction that more diversity is strength. But I think controlled immigration is necessary for any country.  We need a mechanism that allows citizens to determine it.  There should be NO illegal immigration.  All cheaters go to the back of the line.  You cannot have a system  that rewards cheating.

The above is so obvious it is amazing that 50 years of "talking" about it has been unable to solve it.  .  It has been known for 50 years how to manage the border.  Building a wall is stupid and counter productive.  The main reason people come is for economic opportunity.  Others are subject to existential threats of political or social violence. It was 40+ years ago when I worked in Germany as a "Gastarbeiter" and they required that my employer pay me into a bank account.  I could not get a bank account until I showed my work permit.  Voila! How hard was that?  As an added inducement, the taxes that were taken out of my paycheck were returned to me when I left the country.  If the fine were $10,000 to an employer for payments 'under the table' and if immediate deportation was the result of working illegally then the incentives would be aligned to have very limited amounts of illegal work.  In addition all temp or guest workers would have to provide their address in the country.  It's called registering with the local police department.  Any mayor or county commissioner could say, "we have X guest workers in our area". 

I notice the headline in my paper last Sunday asks, should the census ask people if they are citizens? It is curious that that is controversial.   It could be amusing to hear that a certain percentage of people queried wouldn't know.  "No one has ever told me I am citizen and I don't have a citizenship card", they might say.  Addressing immigration may require that we consider National Identity. What is it? To prove it requires presenting a birth certificate but there is no current status card or ID proof. I am by looks and manner an obvious American. I am also 65 years old and get a little miffed when the clerk asks me for my ID to buy a bottle of wine.  It is "required", they say.  How annoying to have to prove the obvious.  I may realistically only be able to assign 10-15 nationalities to their appropriate countries if I was asked but I am quite sure that almost anyone in the world shown a 5 minute video of me talking in an unmarked room would have no problem identifying me as American.   So I do not like the implications of requiring a national identification card or number.  I am an American and slightly rebellious.  But I want to solve this immigration problem and it may require that all of us citizens be listed.  We need to know who we are.   Is a unique national identity number a solution?  Perhaps I would feel better if I called it a citizenship number.... You would have to have a citizenship number to vote or get a passport.  So we wouldn't have a national identity card but we would be on a state and local "citizenship list".  You could get a card if you wanted to.  I don't know how many different classifications we need-but we could talk about it.  The objective is for any city or State administration to be able to say, "this is the list of citizens in my district and this is the list of visa holders and permanent residents".  When you are granted citizenship--you are given a citizenship number.  Employers would be required to have citizenship numbers or a work visa to deduct payroll expenditures. People couldn't get paid unless they provided their immigration status.

Is there anyone worried about fraud?  Fake SS numbers and/or fake national ID #'s.  You can make up a citizenship number.  It is not RFID or tattooed on our left shoulder.    But I note that when I want to get money out of an ATM in an hotel in Bolivia--Citibank is able to verify that it is me fairly quickly and get me some cash.  The identification problem is not intractable.   Congress considers this periodically but the big question is whether having an identity number is an invasion of privacy. Nobody wants to be asked for their papers.  It sounds like the Gestapo.  So do we have to say who we are? Must we identify ourselves?

Some of us may not wish to identify ourselves. Are we free or not?  Sometimes I think the government assumes you are free to do what you are told or pay the consequences.  Perhaps though we are hoping to become better people and are not satisfied with who we have been.  We want the freedom of defining ourselves in a new way.  So we don't like having to say who we are.  We have to accept who we have been but we want the freedom to determine who we might become.  So some of us don't like our identity being who we have been.  We are already using the SS number as our national ID.  Do we need a another # specific for citizenship?  I think we do.  It could be abused unless it was made legal not to be required to give it.  It would only be required for defined purposes.  So if I am walking down the street could a police barricade require me to produce national identification or be arrested? No charges of wrong doing, just a general legal survey to determine whether you belong on the streets or should be shipped back to El Salvador. No.  I do not support that.  Illegal immigrants would be detected in the process of accessing services.  When they register their children in school, when they run a stop sign, when they are hurt and treated in the hospital.  They could live as homeless vagabonds but that would get old.  How would they get paid, buy a house, rent an apartment?  Do anything?

To me the essential problem is public information for public policy. We need to know what is going on.  We have to feel assured that the people we are interacting with are legal status Americans. I cannot determine whether a business I hire uses illegal workers.  Several years ago I had my roof re-done because of hail damage.  I got 3 quotes and one was significantly lower.  I suspected that the workers were illegal.  I received several good recommendations from previous jobs they had done.  I hired them, they did a good job but they arrived in a white Suburban with Texas (Brownsville) plates and not a one spoke English.  The supervisor was from Puerto Rico and spoke English.  When quizzed about their work status, he assured me that they all had their papers in order.  Do I believe it?  Should I ask him to prove it?  Is it my job as a citizen to discriminate against those I suspect may be illegal or is it worse to suspect lawful workers?  Is there any way to assure--I am hiring legal workers?  Does the Hilton hotel in San Antonio even care?  I do not think they do and that makes them fine global citizens but suspect Americans.

If the government will not address the problem then we citizens will have our opinions and frankly they are divisive.  The government can get this right but it will take money and they should appropriate it.  They might have to dial back the Empire and sharpen the domestic focus.  I am not advocating isolationism, only a principled internationalism.  Can anybody become Swiss just because they like Heidi and their opportunities have narrowed where they live?  Of course not.  Europe is in an immigration crisis and America is confused about its own identity. We need to remove the confusion.  We are the generous nation that admits 1 million new citizens a year but we don't accept illegal immigrants and they must go home irrespective of their good reasons for coming.

The key point is that anybody can become an American but not everybody can become an American....



  

Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism

If every American brings a different story to their citizenship, what is it we share, besides a location? If it is a belief in a happy future of "success", what happens if the happy future disappears?  The American motto of "E pluribus unum" deserves a re-think.  I don't know that most of us WANT to be one. Isn't identity (one) somewhat opposite to diversity (many)? So perhaps our American identity is stretched thin by diversity? Multiculturalism is a vibrant palette but not a unifying ideal.  Who are "we", if we can choose our loyalty?  It cannot be that anything and everything is permitted. To be something, we must choose.  The Christians have their Apostles Creed, what is our American Statement of Faith?  We should think about that carefully. As a first principle we should not define ourselves negatively by an opposition to other people or another ideology.  We are not a coherent people because we are not Chinese, French, or Russian or because we hate Communism, Fascism, or Socialism.  What are the principles Americans stand for that distinguish us?

A nation is commonly thought of as the representation of a people. It begins with a people that have a culture and it develops into a civilization.  But America is an intentional Nation.  It is a work in progress rather than a representation of a people. It was founded on the principle of consent of the governed.  The  Lockean idea that one joined a nation and assented to its governance in addition to having a cultural identity.  It grew out out of the Age of Reason and was predicated upon the constant exertions of constructing a representative democracy and an effective government.  It is a future project not necessarily a shared history.

America is thus not "a people".  It is an opportunity.  There is an idea that we somehow epitomize "E pluribus unum" because we all seek to improve ourselves but that strikes me as wishful thinking. Is being American our first and highest loyalty? Even in revolution against Great Britain, we, Americans,  have never been as one mind as a nation.  We are a collection of federated parts.  Our origins were a compact, a contract among disparate colonies: Quakers, Catholics,Dutch traders, planters, Puritans all creating a community to advance their ends.  And we, their successors, are the successful progeny of that collaboration.  Our current identity is built on the successful choices our ancestors made to advance their goals. Did they engage in "oppression" of others? Say native Americans, imported slaves, or fellow colonists that were British Loyalists? They did not LOSE to Fate and so we are winners.  We necessarily celebrate the efforts that have brought us HERE, to this point in time.  Our success was not inevitable.  We may be at a crossroads but we have been staked to one of the better seats at the table of opportunity.  So where to from here?

I would like to suggest an American Vision going forward:  a substantially just, multicultural, eco-sustainable representative democracy.  How we accomplish that requires some negotiation of course. I hear the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation on NPR suggest just, verdant, and  peaceful. Sounds vaguely similar.  I am thoroughly in favor of "peace" and the Christian idea of loving ones' enemies is a very deep strategy, but practically that strategy may have its flaws.  Fighting is sometimes necessary. I don't propose that we all vote on the Vision Statement but I think it important that one have a picture in mind of where to head before entering into political discourse.  So go ahead and envision your "goal".

So who is "us"?  According to current law and constitutional understanding--everybody born in the US is an American even if the parents are not, anybody born to Americans in another country, and anybody naturalized through a legal citizenship process.  Illegal immigrants are not USAians.  I have to say it this way because we norteamericanos have no exclusive claim to the American moniker. Do we have responsibilities to these people?  Yes, as human beings.  Are we required to make them Americans because they desire it mightily and would in fact be better citizens than those of us simply fortunate to be born here?  No.  Can we be generous with citizenship, should we be generous with citizenship? Perhaps.  The crux of the matter seems to be that the people doing well, that are privileged and protected in our society, want to be generous and be seen to be generous about admitting needy "other" peoples. However, the less fortunate and those currently suffering from 30 years of  job outsourcing have born the brunt of adjustment to rapid immigration and see their opportunities shrinking.  The leadership elite in this country seem to have a global perspective that unites them with elites trans-nationally.  They appear to be closer to the successful people in other countries than to their own "deplorable" countrymen.  They are therefore steering the ship of state toward a globalized world undermining the foundations of American national governance.

I have included multiculturalism in my vision but it is reasonable to question whether diversity is a unifying goal for America.  I believe it requires sacrificial leadership to accomplish.  We do not have that. Is the Vision possible? The future I see is one of contraction, not growth and I doubt inclusivity is possible when we are trying to cope with having less.   I am an optimist but not a fool and to get from here to there in a future of decline will be hard.  I have not met many Americans who are willing to accept "hard" or even be capable of performing in it.  We have a self serving leadership that is addressing most of the wrong kinds of questions.  The responsibility for modeling multiculturalism falls to the elite.  If they think that accepting the elite in other cultures is their primary responsibility because it shows their own "acceptance" of differences, then they are mistaken. This is "globalism" and it is an undermining of a specifically American ideal. If the thinking is that they will hob nob with the world's rich and everyone else has to then accept those of their own class who are different,  that is impractical AND we have a problem of identity.  The rich are saying,  I am more connected to the rich in other countries than my own countrymen.  My global interests and loyalties are far more important than my identification with you, my fellow citizens.  What does being an American mean if the leaders do not identify as leaders of their own people?

It is suggested that we think globally and act locally.  Somehow that formulation leaves out the middle--the nation. If we are humanists and  accept the principles of the  Universal Declaration of Human Rights, then the claims of equality and justice by those who are not American highlights our privilege and argues for a less nationalistic and more humanitarian (read global) identification.  It seems axiomatic to me that human loyalty is hierarchical beginning with family to community to locale to State and Nation and then world.  What are we to make of claims from those we not only don't know but don't recognize as being central to our limited concern?  We can love, but we can't love everybody.  We are conceptually required to delineate our locus of concern, our primary loyalty.
If we put America first we put our people (whoever they are) second.  We can all put our families first practically speaking but what comes next as our primary identification?  Is it race, culture, State, gender, or religion?  I think it matters how we answer, we cannot just assume that what is good for my group is good for America as a whole.  To me that is where sacrifice enters the picture.  Someone has to sacrifice to make America work.

And that leads me to citizenship.  Citizenship requires participation.  It has at least 4 requirements:  voting intelligently, caring about the whole, volunteering our time, and contributing our money (taxes).  We all give of our money and our time to support the group.  Every moment we neglect that responsibility undermines our goal of a substantially just multicultural eco-sustainable representative democracy.  If we all ignore our responsibility to choose engagement--then the leaders will choose for us, in their own interest.  And that is what has happened.  Years of neglect of the processes of democracy and we are looking at an America that is failing.  It has no central ethos.  It hearkens back to an exceptional past but it has no future story of where we are headed.  The national Vision appears to be "show me the money".

So you could put me in the category of having a complaint about our culture and government but not a grievance.  I think we citizens have been lazy and foolish (to criticize equally those who tend to be conservative and those that are more progressive).  Many of us have shirked our responsibilities and we are now in danger of suffering the consequences. The consequences I foresee are going to be grave;  a breakdown in social order, race wars, even more foreign wars of distraction to maintain the empire.  I am unclear as to how a gender war could actually occur but it is possible that multi-genderism has already declared it and it is supported by those with something to gain.

So those of you who would like a Christian nation--I say model it.  To those who categorically reject diversity and multiculturalism and stand for their own people, prepare to negotiate in good faith because the whirlwind can sweep us all away.  And what do the diversity advocates want?  A rainbow coalition of all for all with no barriers and tolerance for Everyone?  But who really wants a mixed up confused nation that is just a place, unclear about its past, future, or priorities?  I am willing to negotiate with all the diverse groups already here BUT I'd like to refrain from making the solution even more difficult by supporting unlimited immigration.  It has been a "problem" for at least 50 years and I want it addressed by leadership sooner rather than later.  If we reflect on the immigration Act of 1965 we see the rough outline of a nation full of its own success and long on hubris.  It would not take long for the successes of the Civil Rights Era struggle to dissolve in war(Vietnam) and riot(Watts,Detroit,Boston,DC, Chicago) and assassination.  Our exceptionalism was quickly shown to be misplaced.  We were unlikely to "civilize" the world when we could not manage even our own affairs.

Prior to 1965 it was "understood" that the most appropriate immigrants were from Europe.  They shared our history(or we shared theirs) because they founded us.  It was an act of unconscious hubris then to suggest that America was so exceptional that anybody from anywhere could become an accepted and productive American.  But surprisingly, it turned out to be true!  Immigrants from everywhere could make it in America and have.  But do they want to embrace another culture (melting pot) or stake out their own terms of participation retaining some of their former cultural identity to "improve" the whole?   Are they fully committed citizens or detached because they feel different?  I cannot answer for  our many more recent ethnic groups,  I imagine they like the freedom to be left alone.  Wherever they came from did not value them.  So if we take a group, say Mexicans in Texas,  What do they want?  A better life than could be had in Mexico surely but perhaps Spanish speaking and Catholic. Do they want America to accommodate them or do they desire to change their cultural identity and become more "American"?  What about sub-continent Indians?  They presumably would like to remain Hindu. Do they wish a freedom to maintain their caste distinctions and their cultural marriage practices?   Do Chinese want to escape their long and glorious history, forget their Mandarin, and become suburban Americans with only marginal connection to China?  Or are new immigrants "dual nationals"? First loyalty to their people and only secondarily America?  Do they truly want to become something new or re-make America in their own image?    Is America greater because it has dual loyalty citizens? Do new cultural practices strengthen America? Those of us who are historical citizens are concerned about the effort to accommodate the world in the American project.

There is a good argument that the cultural differences change and improve America.  New immigrants bring new ideas and new energy to the polis.  But the speed and pace of change is the kicker.  When things change quickly many begin pulling back to retain or conserve the characteristics they find important.  Christians do not like to consider America a fundamentally secular nation.  Blacks want the injustices of their state recognized and addressed.  So I come back to it, what are the principles we share?

The 1965 Immigration Act has changed America. The level of legal immigration was 295,000 per year in 1965 but has risen to more than 1 million per year since the early 2000's.  In 1965 the foreign born population was 9 million of 250 million (3.8%) and in 2015 it is 45 million of 325 million (13.8%). The illegal population is estimated at 12 million (3.4%).  These are the facts.  What are we to make of them?   The leadership of this country has acquiesced in creating a more diverse America without a full assessment of the ramification.  Native Americans both Indian, black, and rural white have been marginalized in this new environment and are struggling. If they are questioning the policy that oppresses them I don't see the elite that represents them protesting it. 

But there is a lot of dissatisfaction.  That is why Trump was elected.  Some say, I want an America like the old America. WASP. You know, the one where I had a certain unchallenged privilege and opportunity. Well that is gone. An interesting statistic: In 1976 whites were 81% of the (18-64) work force but in 2015 they were only 43%. This is an immense change! The cultural milieu I grew up in has disappeared.  Is it any wonder that WASPs are seeking to define their place? Whose country is it?  Conditions in the past favored the majority. New immigrants were encouraged? forced? to adapt to how we did things.  Their ways were fine but they were here now and needed to accommodate, right? We'd like to make conditions for "accommodating" fairer today. What  should I expect for my children and what about the future?  Who gets into medical school and who gets to play pro football?  Are we angling for a strict meritocracy? Equality of opportunity is the goal not equality of outcome. We should think very carefully about signing on to a principle of equality of outcome because it seriously undermines another of our primary goals, freedom.   I recall the 70's affirmative action controversies when a white student with better grades was denied entrance to a Texas Law School as they tried to increase the proportion of black students. A very necessary change, black communities need lawyers too and it seems reasonable to me to encourage their admission to law schools.  States have minority citizens who pay taxes and they should have support for their children and their communities.   So we went for a more inclusive culture with affirmative action. And now we seem to be a little bit lost in the weeds with a plethora of different groups that need "recognition".  If we give everyone a voice-they use it for their own ends. Where is the American "center" in all this tolerance?

 Liberals  like myself want a multicultural, ecologically-sustainable, 'fair' society. We want everyone to treat everybody else with fairness, a golden rule culture.    It is difficult to define what exactly this means since I treat my friends and family better.  Can we all treat all others the same?  I don't have any problem with striving for any of these goals:  justice, environmental sustainability, less war, inclusivity.  They seem like "good" goals.  I would prefer to call my political position progressive rather than liberal because just the word seems to inflame so many people as if liberals were insistent busybodies viewing opponents as stupid ill informed deplorables. I am respectful of those that want to conserve the good things in our society.  But do conservatives share in the goal of honoring others different than them?   Their goal is not "multiculturism", it is honoring their own past.  Turns out, that is what worked and got us to where we are today. But it is exclusionary.  Conservatives talk of a "Christianity" that is fundamentally intolerant of  religious differences.
And what about ecological stewardship?  I do not detect that ranks high on the list of conservative concerns, though definitionally it should.


Multiculturalism and Diversity are typically not goals of successful states.  They may be results.  Something like happiness--NOT a pursuit, but a product of a successful life.  Garrett Hardin was quoted as saying, "Multiculturists, in effect, urge that we eat borscht with chopsticks".  I want to argue that Immigration control of some kind is essential to retain the historical idea of America.  Diversity proponents are idealistic but seem to be aiming at cultural dissolution.  What is the structure of the new culture they envision?  And in the context of the failures of economic growth and increasing peak resource limitations, it seems positively Pollyann-ish to put massive cultural assimilation into the mix.

The crux of the E pluribus unum challenge has always been black Americans.  White acceptance and black identity. So the problem is finding and agreeing on the terms of inclusion. Other "white" ethnic groups to America slowly blended but blacks were too noticeable to follow that model.  The Irish were discriminated against for years and then blended, same for the Italians.  The Poles and the Swedes in the Midwest retained some of their heritage but in general slid into the acceptance of the "E pluribus Unum" model.  Black people have not been able to because they were not allowed to and surely somewhat because they didn't want to. They are proud of who they are and should not accept the crumbs of an indifferent society.  They have been here far longer than these other ethnic groups but have been routinely marginalized.   For at least 300 years, white America has had difficulty with black America.  I don't feel this is intractable, it is not, but it is difficult.  A nation is loosely thought of as, A People,  and despite racial heterogeneity, ALL people are MORE THAN 99% genetically similar.  How do we find the Vision that honors that obvious fact?

Melting pot or stew?  I am suggesting stew.  The implications are important and begin with the question, "Who is US?" and what kind of society are we trying to create.  The idea of melting pot has vanished and we can now only make the concept stew work.

Bitcoin as Sour Grapes

With Bitcoin, we have the glimpse of something important.  Whole cloth imaginary money outside the control of the government.  That is, two characteristics that suggest "impermanence" to my mind.  I am wrong about most things financial so I would not rely on my opinion.  But I am here to inform your thinking and care not a whit whether you get rich or not.  Bitcoin is 20 million units of made up money that has already had 15 million of it distributed to users but has an additional 5 million yet to be found sprinkled devilishly around in complicated computer problems.  It is sustained like everything on the internet by a distributed network that is here, there, everywhere as long as the power is on.  Nothing prevents the manufacture of other block chain currencies.  The supply is potentially infinite but many will not "catch on".  They will be offered in the market and like a slow day at the trade fair wilt into so many spoiled vegetables and thrown out at days' end.

The problem of money that exists only in the ether is that you have to sell it to know it's there.  Otherwise you have an artificial statement of "gains" from somebody like Bernie Madoff.  It's all about trust.  What if I give you my bitcoin and you say you never got it?  Whatever I bought, still sits in your hands. So I appeal to an online exchange:  "Make Mr. Deadbeat give me my purchase"!  Can they?  Who are "they"? So I go to the police.  I gave some imaginary money to this guy in Dayton, Ohio named Wanker on craigslist and he told me it never happened--it must have been in my imagination.  But Here's my e-mail log with the criminal.....

Imaginary money exists because other people say it does.  When they don't--it doesn't.  The value of imaginary money is whatever you can exchange it for.  It has use value and exchange value but no intrinsic value.  As a store of value it might fluctuate or disappear.  Of course it might make you rich!

And the second problem of being "outside the control of government" is important.  The government gets to decide what can be done "outside" the oversight of the government.  But they can't touch it!  Technically true since it's imaginary but they can touch you and that's the problem.  What if Bitcoin trading is made illegal? Whoever logs in to a bitcoin exchange is a criminal and their civil assets are forfeit.  Yes, you can be clever and perhaps evade detection but government could put a few computer whizzes on the payroll and go treasure hunting.  If Bitcoin stays at $1,000 then 20 million of them is $20B.  I am unfamiliar with the FBI's budget but it might be worthwhile to scarf a few of those Bitcoin ledgers up.

So my take on the Bitcoin craze is as a proof of concept.  A lot of people could be induced to use an e-money with the right incentives.  Bitcoin has rewarded the early adopters. Most people however do not have any bitcoin.  I believe 1,000 people hold 1/2 of the Bitcoin already created.  This is a condition similar to the current skewed distribution problem with the dollar.  However, the government could take over the whole concept and make it "fair" as in establishing a lucrative role for itself in the formation of a government e-currency.  They would launch this currency as a UBI (universal basic income) which could be distributed to ALL citizens based upon whatever political criteria they desired to use.  Like the dollar--all other forms of electronic money could be made illegal.  Or they could set up an exchange where ALL currencies could be frictionlessly exchanged with a tight spread and a minimal transaction tax.  What would be the harm in that?  We could all diversify worldwide, paying instantly with the money in our digital wallet that is exchanged instantly by the seller into whatever money they prefer.

Does the government have any bitcoins?  The government closed the illegal Silk Road site and confiscated the accounts in the exchange because they were dealing in contraband.  If a particular money is made "contraband" then there you go.  The government normally "disposes" of illegal drugs that are confiscated but when it captures illegal money through civil asset forfeiture, it claims it and spends it.  The government is able to criminalize the money by allowing the dealers to exchange the contraband into cash and then confiscating it.  Let the deal go down and swoop in for the  profits.  Do they do that?  I am a trusting soul and don't think so but surely the temptation is there.

So what about confiscation in Bitcoin?  How can the authorities access the private network?  My understanding is that they can't now but if they were able to create their own e-money then they of course could (like the communication wiretap problem) have a backdoor created that with court approval would allow confiscation. How many alternative currencies could the authorities allow?  Currently we have at least 50 besides Bitcoin. The central question to me is at what total value of private e-money does the government shut it down?  The total value of dollar financial assets is over $100 Trillion.  The current value of Bitcoin is $15 Billion.  Chump change.  Spare change in the DOD budget.  But I think the critical number is 10% of total asset values by ALL digital currencies.

Because of the small relative distribution of Bitcoin ownership, the increase in value is subject to a rapid fall when the original issuers "diversify" into some other more fungible type of money.  I suspect that at $10,000 they will have "earned" enough and gradually exit leaving the marks with their digital wallets holding imaginary value.  Since Bitcoin is limited to 20 million units it would require a value of $350,000 per Bitcoin to replace the minor value of gold($7 Trillion) in the world financial system.  To actually replace the current world value of assets, let us say $300 Trillion, would require a Bitcoin value of $15 Million dollars.  I think it unlikely that will occur....

I am in awe of the possibilities in private, distributed monetary networks and my own analysis strikes me as "sour grapes" because I have no Bitcoin.  The future, as ever, will be interesting with the Donald at the helm.

Vision and Illusion

     There is a fine line between vision and illusion.  Without a vision, the people perish but I fear that in our need to have a vision we create fanciful illusions. Our search for meaning turns up an answer we can believe in and then, satisfied, we are comfortable with our place in the universe.  Our existence then has value, we have a destiny, and we are cradled in a foundational myth.  I have come to the personal conclusion that our old Gods are illusions. We are currently searching for new Gods.  I do not claim that spirit world does not exist only that our human measures of meaning and value are flawed.  

I am a “cultural” Christian and dependent upon its faith and stories for my heritage. If you ask me, are you a Christian, Hindu, or Muslim?  I can only reply, Christian.  And if we go further and say, are you Christian or atheist—I say, Christian—a secular Christian for sure but definitely not antagonistic to the faith. How can I reject what has formed me? But some ask the question a different way, Are you saved?  No, I am not.  Do you believe the Bible is the one and only authoritative Word of God? No, I do not.  I find meaning in other written words and sometimes in direct experience of beauty and tranquility.   I feel like a seeker.  God has not “spoken” to me in unmistakable terms.  He has not forgiven me for all I may or may not do.  Do I believe in God?  Yes-he undergirds the universe.  Who is Jesus then?  No more God than Buddha, St. Augustine, or Mohammed. No transcendental divinity there.

Christianity has, in modern times, been gradually superseded by the Faith in Secular Progress.  Since Darwin, more and more educated people have jettisoned Faith in a deity for Faith in a hoped for vision of human progress.  But faith in technological progress is an illusion too.  For the 2000 years after Jesus the Church has been the central organizing principle of Reality(for Westerners not Muslims, Hindus, or Chinese). And for that I am grateful. However, I don’t think Moses got it right in Genesis about the details of creation:  the Garden, the Flood, the Pillar of Salt, the burning bush, or the parting of the Red Sea.  They are Ur-myths painted on the unknowable.  Good myth but poor journalism. Billions of people agree (and contest) that Jesus is the one and only son of God. To me he is, like us, the progeny of God.   Our fundamental stories of who we are and where we come from are somewhere between vision and illusion. 

Having been critical of what our Society has made sacred, I will digress for a moment to tell you my creation story.  God in his/her infinite perfection for an infinity of time deigned to become “Real”.  He/she can return to perfection and close down the Reality we currently experience at any time. Thus the essence of God drives the universe. There are then two eternities: a former one, in the past, when God was everlastingly perfect.  And now the current one in which we “progress” toward transcendence. WE don’t go to heaven (or hell). God is in the particulars of living. Some find this materialism dispiriting.  I don’t.  You have your God illusions and I have my Truth illusions, now can we all get along?

The God illusion has us humans quarreling,  but the money illusion is another affront to Truth.  Money is a human idea that has perverted Man’s relation to Nature.  We have too much money.  We DO too much.  We have allowed too many people on Earth. I say this not because I think you (or I) should leave but because of the effect on other species.  We have fairly small populations of tigers, elephants, rhinos, polar bears and the like and an overabundance of fellow human. Our servitude to the Money Illusion has perverted our economics.  We wanted to become rich and we wanted others to also become rich and so we created a plethora of redemption chits called money that has put too great a strain on the natural world.  Money commoditizes Nature and we sell our birthright thinking we are becoming better off.  For a time it appeared with industrial civilization that we had found a marvelous way to all become richer but we were blinded I think by our real dependence on the stored energy in fossil fuels.  Currently, Nature is at peak everything.  What I mean is that our growth model has reached a necessary plateau—because we cannot increase the fish catch, the timber harvest, or the oil production any more.  We are tapped out.   Technology is not a solution for inputs.  We could become more efficient and we should but it will not save our Progress myth.  Progress henceforth should be known as “right sizing”.  Progress is generally thought of as onward and upward, but– to what?

 Sustainability could be considered a re-building of the connections to the natural world and that would be aided by jettisoning the idea of money having value.  Can we walk this money illusion back to some more helpful arbiter of exchange between people or are we content to push the boundary conditions—make up enough money to make everyone rich?   Right now I feel we are in “Let her rip” mode.  And I do not think it ends well. 

So how can we power down industrial civilization?  Many will say it can’t be done because our financial system depends on growth.  Credit is spending money you don’t have with someone’s expectation that you will repay.  A lot of us are doing that.  First we expanded money and now we are growing credit.  Both processes strip value from the natural world and convert it to human commodities, things that can be priced.  We don’t price a tree in the forest but we do at Home Depot.  Everything has a price that destroys its soul. 

But I don’t really believe in a soul either. Perhaps what remains is the ineffability of excellence.  A scent from the past of the Truth lingering in the present.   We should just try to do more with LESS.  It’s practical and does not require war on Nature or on our fellow creatures and neighbors.  I have been a long time member of the Church of Reason and Religion of Progress and I will admit that it is threadbare these days.  It looked like a sturdier Faith when I was younger.   Can the Christianity of the future become  again more Vision than illusion?  What must it jettison, what must it affirm?  Without a Vision the people perish—