Quis Custodiet?

One of Indonesia's leading newspapers, Kompas, ran the above-the-fold headline today that said, "Political Corruption is Systemic."

Wait for it...

NO SHIT SHERLOCK.

Why is it that people are continuously surprised by the obvious?  I mean, if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten.  It's one of those basic rules in life that we all have to learn.

Corruption is endemic to ANY political system.  Any time a group of people is empowered to take the productive work of any other group of people for supposed services rendered, there will be corruption.  It is a fact of life that is as old as government itself, especially when that power involves a bureaucracy to maintain the systems of government.

The way it works is this: first a government will create a list of "services" that it performs for the general populace; then it creates a bureaucracy to shuffle the paperwork to obtain those services; then the piles of paperwork grow to the point that obtaining those services takes months, if not years; then the bureaucrats start taking bribes to "expedite" applications; then the politicians all want a cut of the bribes.

It's a very simple process from A to Z, and when the politicians and bureaucrats continue to get away with the corruption, it reinforces the system of corruption and it continues to grow and become more endemic until it either becomes completely stalled and untenable, or the people rise up and throw the bastards out.  History tells us that one or the other is inevitable.

One of the key signs of a fascist state is that the legal code becomes so complex and Byzantine that the average citizen is a felon just for waking up in the morning.  This creates a system of corruption as the citizens try to maneuver their way through this system without going to jail.  Naturally, the citizen is willing to pay whatever it takes to stay "free" and out of the tangled nightmare that is The System.  Naturally, the politicians and bureaucrats are willing to take the money to leave people alone.

Until the last couple of years, Indonesians have been very provincial.  They could not afford to leave the country, so they had no experience with other governments and other systems.  Therefore, they tended to see their own system as being the most corrupt, and others (like the US) as less so.

Indonesians demanded, and received, a governmental body called the KPK (corruption eradication commisiion), whose job it was to investigate and punish corruptors.  However, it too became corrupt as the politicians and bureaucrats, swollen with bribe money, were willing to pay the overseers a portion of their take to stay out of the spotlight.

It goes as far back as Ovid, the Roman poet, who asked the famous question, "Quid custodiet ipsos custodies?"  Who will watch the watchers?  It is a problem as old as civilization itself.

What it comes down to is human nature and what Lord Acton so rightly observed, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

The more centralized and remote power systems become, the more corrupt and uncontrollable they become.  It is a fact that cannot be disputed.  It is human nature to become more corrupt as the ability to catch and hold a person responsible for their actions becomes less of a threat.

Ultimately, this is the central problem with a global government.  Ironically, it is also the reason that it will never come to be.

The problem is this: as we plod ever closer to a central world government, the more corrupt those at the core will become.  In the end, they will factionalize and begin infighting the closer ultimate power comes to reality.  Finally, the whole thing will collapse as the sharks begin feeding on each other for every shred of power they can secure.

It has already begun.  Joseph Farrell, in his book Babylon's Banksters, makes a compelling case for the fact that the erstwhile global governors are already eating each other for ultimate control.  Ultimate control means ultimate corruption, and no system that is totally corrupt can stand.  It must, of its own corruption, collapse.

Many books have been written on the rise and fall of great empires.  Without exception, they are studies in corruption and decay.

Therefore, it stands to reason that the least corrupt governments are the most likely to survive and offer the best possible state for the citizenry.  Given the fact that large systems collapse, it is thus only small and controllable governments that work best.  For that reason, decentralized regional governments are the most feasible, and governments on the level of communities are the best.  It must be kept in mind, though, that any amount of power will corrupt any number of bureaucrats.

We end up with the most logical solution to this mess we humans tend to create: the government of ONE is the best possible form of rule.  If the individual becomes corrupt, he cannot infect more than what he can control, and all he can control is that which he owns.

Many people ridicule this idea as 'anarchy', but it is what the libertarians call "enlightened self-government".  The individual will do everything possible to protect what is his, thus he will avoid corruption in order to enlist the support of others (friends, family, etc.) in his effort to protect his possessions.  The theory is that the less corrupt a person is, the more likely others are to assist him.

In the end, 'anarchy' produces the best form of governance for any group of people.  Those who are least corrupt will engender the most support and goodwill from the most number of people, and so will be the most successful.

Vendors who routinely short-change customers will not stay in business for long.  In the same way, in an anarchic system, only those who are perceived to be the most honest will receive support of large groups of people.

Anarchy does not require voting, which can be corrupted (a la United States).  It does not require licenses, deeds, titles, or any other form of bureaucracy, since those who perceive you to be honest in your public dealings will most likely protect your interests against outside challenges.  Anarchy requires individuals to be honest, upright and competent.  It is the nature of that system.

The minute I delegate power to someone else, then they -- no matter how honest and trustworthy -- will have the temptation to become corrupt and abuse your power, since it is not theirs and they perceive no loss to themselves in squandering what is yours.

The solution is deceptively simple, and it is the most likely to protect rights and property, but it is also the most difficult thing to convince people of this fact.  We have become so used to centralized government and we have become so spoiled by the ability to leach off the productivity of others (welfare, socialized medicine, etc.) that we cannot see any other solution.  Yet the logic is inescapable.

Under the system we currently subscribe to, we have only escalating layers of 'watchers', creating ever more vast bureaucracies, engendering ever more corruption and in-fighting for control.  It is an untenable system and must collapse of its own weight and corruption.

Two of the most successful governments on Earth are the Icelandic and Swiss systems because they leave the greatest amount of power in the hands of the individuals.  However, as we have seen in recent years, even those systems are subject to corruption, though they are the most able to deal with it, since the power is still closest to the individual.

In a system of delegation of power, the individual is most likely to get run over by that system, since the inherent mentality is that the good of the many is more important than the good of the individual.  But, the opposite is true.

When the individual feels secure in person and property, he is more likely to work on behalf of the group, since he will have surplus that he is able to deploy in the community to build the perception that he is a good and trustworthy person, thus reinforcing the desire of the community to protect his rights and property.

So-called anarchy -- or enlightened self-interest -- is the only system of governance that can possibly work over the long term, while preserving the rights and property of the individual.  It is the only system that is self-righting, automatically correcting corruption and similar problems.  There is only one weakness...

Humans have an in-born desire to serve a leader.  It is part of our genetic code and is pounded into our brains from birth, though education, religion and other community forces.  As long as humans view themselves as servants, both willing to hand over power and accept scraps from a master's table, then we will have the corruption and decay and power-hungry elites that we have suffered under for millennia.

It is only when we, as individuals, take full responsibility for our actions and well-being that we will throw off the yoke of government that is corrupt and ultimately self-defeating.

The only thing wrong with anarchy is that it has never been tried on any scale that could prove the point.  As a species, we have been so hell-bent on servitude that we don't even trust ourselves to act in our own best interest.  Rather, we must establish organs of State (and make no mistake, religion is an organ of State) to force us to do what we know is best for us in the first place.

If you do not delegate your power, then no one will have power over you.

So simple, yet so hard to achieve.

The Unbounded Joy Of Blogging

Part of the fun of this blogging stuff is making a wide, diverse set of contacts throughout the world.  If I shut up too long, folks start writing to check on me.  If I go overboard, I get immediate chastisements.  And occasionally, when I do something right, I get great feedback.  And I'm not just talking about, "Yo dude!  Great stuff man," though there are a few of those.  Instead, I get these fantastic, thoughtful letters with real ideas in them.

That's what I like...real ideas.  Because in the world to come, that will be the new economy.  People will trade on their original thoughts and concepts derived from other thinkers.

But, I digress.  What I want to share is a very thought-filled letter I received overnight, to whit:

Hello Bernard Bearheart:

Just a note to praise your latest rant and to find out if you know about a brother living in Kalimantan named Imron Comey who recently wrote, "The Generosity Factor: A Message From Borneo."

http://www.amazon.com/2012-Generosity-Factor-Message-Borneo/dp/1463541082/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334426711&sr=1-3

I knew Imron (from Subud) when he lived in the U.S. and my wife met him when when she was studying permaculture methods of gardening in Kalimantan about 12 years ago.

Do you remember Ayn Rand? I have already seen two glowing documentaries recently from Netflix about her life and a third one is on the way. There is also a new movie out, "Atlas Shrugged" in two installments, and the infamous Kock brothers along with an assortment of other multibillionaire "takers" are regurgitating her philosophy and force-feeding it down the throats of the new generation via the school systems through funding controls, and the mass distribution of her books. You can pretty much sum up her philosophy in her own words when she said she hates "altruism." According to her, altruism is the very root of all evil. Allen Greenspan and company, the Neocons, Zionists, neoBolsheviks, and oldMachiavellians, mostly adhere to the common thread of this idea.

If I read your latest blog correctly the aforementioned gang are in their death rattle and gasping for survival. And according to Imron Comey,  it seems just in the nick of time God is about to reprogram our DNA so that we aren't so greedy anymore.

My old English professor lived in Kalimantan with her husband during the Kennedy administration as Peace Corp workers. She once told me a story about when they asked a group of Penans ( true hunter/gathers)  what they considered the worst sin. The group went into a huddle for some time and finally emerged with their answer. The chief quietly said, "Not to share."  --RF

Wow!  A lot to digest there.  I suppose we should launch at the beginning...

Just to address the initial paragraph, I have heard of Imron Comey, but I have yet to come across him or his work.  However, based on this letter, I shall make a concerted effort to do both.

The next order of business is Ayn Rand.  Now, since I never met her, I can't say I remember her, but I am surely familiar with her work.  Among my crowd, "Atlas Shrugged" was required reading in 8th grade, along with "Lord of the Rings".  We were a somewhat advanced bunch, I suppose.  However, the book started a craze with us for a couple of years, and heavily influenced my thinking even until the present day.  We considered it a sort of response to "The Wasteland", in that it showed a way out of the cultural dead-end that had emerged at the dawn of the 20th century and culminated in the 60's cultural revolution (which I daresay is a misnomer).

At any rate, Ayn Rand preached anti-altruism as ultimately ending in communism, where there was no private property, industry or social life.  In other words, altruism ultimately led to Marxism, but to truly appreciate that statement, you must read Marx.  For those who think the Soviet Union or any other political entity has ever been Marxist, you are sadly mistaken.

Marx proposed unwinding the capitalist/bankster system and slowly returning control of everything back to the common man, so that when the revolution was complete, there would be no State, no corporations and no system of control above the immediate collective.  Marx' ideas were a direct threat to the so-called capitalist system, and has led to more than a century of ideological war between two diametrically opposed concepts.

Ayn Rand proposed a middle road.  If altruism led to Marxism, she reasoned, and capitalism led to totalitarianism, then there must be a happy medium.  This, she proposed, was 'enlightened self-interest'.  It is the central concept of true libertarianism and has aspects of both Marxism and capitalism woven into it, but which seeks a third outcome.

Enlightened self-interest (ESI) is a form of anarchy, which also has a bad name, but in its ideal form is rather appealing.  Like Marxism, ESI envisions the complete unwinding of the State and all its control mechanisms.  It would spell the end of borders and concepts like immigration and emigration.  Any system of governance would be strictly local without any form of centralized power.  Each community would set its own standards and then compete for economic growth based on the attractiveness of their system to other people.

Where Rand departs from Marx is in the concept of personal property.  This, she reasoned, was the prime motivator for people to innovate and create and to engage in commerce.  The ability to enrich one's self was the only reason to get out of bed in the morning.  Within the confines of one's property, one was an absolute dictator, able to set the law of the land and enforce it however necessary, as long as that law and its enforcement did not encroach on the next guy's fifedom.

In a nutshell, if you took one part Marx, one part Rand and one part Robber Baron, shook it thoroughly and strained into a glass, you'd have the perfect way of life.  No controlled markets, no authoritarian central governments and no communal ownership.

Here's the problem with Marx: you have a construction project at the house.  All the community hammers are crap.  The heads fall off and the handles break.  So you go an buy a fine Estwing.  While working on your project, you put the hammer down and go inside for a glass of iced tea.  You neighbor walks by, sees the great hammer lying there and takes it for his project.  The same thing happens, and in less than a day, your investment is gone without a trace.

Here's the problem with Rand: you buy a fine piece of land.  Good dirt, running water, rolling fields.  One day, your neighbor wants to build a nuclear waste dump.  You have no say in the matter because it's his land, and as long as you can't prove damages, he is free to do as he likes.  To prove damages, you need a judiciary of some sort.  The judiciary forms a syndicate, and the syndicate forms a centralized political body.  Then you're back to where you started.

Here's the problem with capitalism: I seel shares in a project to raise capital, but I retain just enough shares to have controlling interest, even though the shareholders put up the capital to do the project.  Since the shareholders' interest is to make a profit, they really don't care what you do, as long as you show a profit.  So now you are motivated to bend or break all the rules to produce a profit so all your shareholders keep their money in your project.

You can extend these examples ad nauseum.  In all cases, you come up with abuses and legal conundrums that are virtually impossible to solve without resorting to a system pretty much like what we have.

The problem is human nature.  Throughout all human history, and even among the ancient gods, behavior is the same.  Ultimately, greed and avarice seep in and take over.  Altruism is great until you are faced with having to enforce it.  Enlightened self-interest is great, but you are left with the same problem.

Ultimately, I've only been able to derive a handful of solutions that involve modifications to what we have now.

The first is remove all concept of the Corporate Veil.  Do not allow corporations to act in the collective as if they are individuals.  Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was a morality play about just this idea.  By stitching together bits and pieces of dead matter to create artificial life, you inevitably create monsters that are nearly impossible to kill.

Next, remove the power of governments to create legal entities, to tax anyone or anything, and to create systems of tracking and identification.  If people feel compelled to serve their communities, they should do so for altruistic reasons, not for self-enrichment.  Take away government's incentive to grow, and it will not grow.

Do away with all centralized currencies.  Let the markets decide how they will trade and allow people to offer competing systems, such as BitCoin, e-Gold and NotHaus' Liberty notes.  Open up barter to trading ideas and concepts.  Let people trade in anything they want.  The best systems will thrive, and the rest will fall away, but in no case will anyone be able to monopolize currencies.

Finally, do away with the current concept of policing.  Return to the elected sheriff system.  In all cases, the voting ballots must be marked and signed (whether by hand or by electronic means), stored for 10 years and open to public scrutiny.  If using e-voting, the code must be open source and viewable by the general public to ensure an above-board system.

This is not perfect, but it cleans up many of the current problems.  Unfortunately, there can be no perfect system when those who create and administer it are imperfect.  Until and unless there is some mass awakening, some fundamental change in the human condition, none of the ideal system will work.  All we can do is create systems that encourage people to grow and expand until such time that we are a species capable of much bigger thoughts than the extremes of personal or collective property.

If the markets and the systems are open to encourage the invention and dissemination of such things as zero-point energy and Star Trek replicators, and the basic needs of power and food and clothing are rendered mute, then we will have launched our species on a new and fantastic path.  But as long as we are scrambling around trying to get more than the next guy, we will never have the time to expand our consciousness to the point that mundane pursuits no longer interest us.

One of my favorite Bible Bits (Matt 6:28) holds, I believe, the key to true enlightenment: Look at the birds of the sky and the lilies of the field.  They do not sew, nor do they reap.  Yet in all his glory, Solomon was not arraigned such as these.  How much more precious in the eyes of God are you than these?

If altruism and self-interest were not mutually exclusive, we would be well on our way to something better.  The keystone of enlightenment is educating one's self.  The irony is that at the end of education, you come full circle to find that it is the child who is best able to see the world.

To Everything There Is A Season

As humans, we live in paradigms.  We model the external world around us and come up with concepts that seem to explain what might otherwise be random Universe playing jokes on us.

In science, we had Pythagorean geometry, then Newtonian calculus, followed by Einsteinian relativity, and now Quantum Mechanics, with its sacred Planck unit.

Religion has had as many models as there are cultures.  There have been the multiple deities, the single deity and the agnostic models.  All in some way are anthropomorphic and lead more or less back to self-worship.

Every aspect of our existance has had a model, a paradigm, to explain the way things work.  Our brains are hard-wired to find patterns in everything, and we try to make rules from those patterns, which hold until mounting exceptions lead us to making new sets of rules.  The failure of the old paradigms is rarely pretty.  People cling to them because we fear the One True Constant of the Universe: Change.

In the legal and business realm, we have labored under the Corporate paradigm.  A few hundred years ago, we began creating artificial 'persons' to use in the course of doing business.  The idea was to create entities that would outlast the life-span of the individuals who created them.  If the business model worked, why must it die with the originator?

Over time, those entities acquired the rights of human beings.  They were granted 'civil' rights (those which can be given or taken away by humans) and developed 'corporate' existance.  'Corporate,' of course, means 'in the flesh.'  In other words, corporations became physically manifest, much like the gods of old taking on physical form to interact with humans.

We developed the 'corporate veil,' which shielded the individuals running corporations from liability for the actions of the 'person.'  And what usually happens when humans are divorced of responsibilty for their actions?  They typically lose all moral and ethical balances.  It's the same problem as if removing the concept of 'hell' from religion.  Without punishment, what's to compel people to follow?  Humans will eat their mothers for lunch if there is no punishment for wrong behavior.

By the time we arrive at today, corporations have received supra-human rights with almost no responsibility.  They are, in every respect, merely a replacement for monarchs.  They are run by self-selected autocrats for the sole purpose of enriching the 'corporate' body.  They exist above legal, national and ethical boundaries.  As OJ Simpson showed us, justice is for sale, and there are few deeper pockets than corporations.

Like royalty, they marry and divorce (we call is M&A, but it's the same thing).  They have white knights and black knights.  They have blue-bloods (divisions and subsidiaries) that are beholden to the sovereign.  And they are immune from sanction for their actions.

Throughout history, Mankind has sought ways to centalize power without losing sight of humanity, and it has failed miserably at every turn.  We have tweaked and trimmed so that every conceivable permutation has been tried, and yet the mere act of accumilating power has created monsters that are all but impossible to destroy, a la Frankenstein's Creature.

What we can hope is emerging today is a new paradigm, one in which the finest aspects of communism (with the little 'c'), cooperatives and democracy (again with little 'd') are joined in a new Enlightenment.  I can hear the howls about being a 'commie,' but bear with me here.

Having been a Benedictian monk for a time, I have experienced first-hand genuine 'communism' and cooperative living.  Monasteries could be a model for the future of humanity.  Small, self-organizing communities come together around a common goal, becoming self-sufficient in the necessities of life, while trading with other co-ops for specialized goods and services.

If one looks at monasteries, which are a paradigm that has survived for millenia, they tend to grow and produce enough food and water for the community, and above that specialize in some product or service.  There are monasteries that produce very fine beer, wine and liqueur.  Some are famous for cheeses or cakes.  Others produce fine arts and crafts.  They sell their specialty items to earn the money to trade for yet other goods and services that they lack.

What I forsee as the future paradigm to strive for is a blend of the monastic model with the new age of networks.  Using the internet, there is no need for corporations or any of the trappings that go with them.  If you are reading this article, then the power to sell yourself and your goods worldwide is sitting right in front of you.

All we need to do is dismantle the centralized paradigm of power and wealth, and bring it back down to the neighborhood/village level.  Policing, security and the rules of communal living are all kept at the local level.  Each community sets its own standards and lives or dies by the success of its own paradigm.  If one community sees gambling and prostitution as the Golden Promise, like Amsterdam, then so be it.  If the next community over wants to be pious and intolerant, and it works for them, great!  If you live in one, but prefer the other, you move.  Simple as that.  If you live in one, but prefer to vacation in the other, everyone wins!

Just as in the Old West, each community establishes its own rules and standards.  They then contract someone to act as sheriff, who in turn, can deputize others in times of trouble.  If someone doesn't like the way things are done in one place, then they don't have to go there.  They can still buy the goods and services of the town through co-operative networks.  No need for hate laws over vast populations, because folks are free to associate with whomever they want in their areas, and they must abide by the rules of other areas when they travel.

While all of this sounds very retro, in fact it meshes perfectly with modern technology and communications.  Private companies provide transportation, cargo and freight handling, and manufacturing.  Employees are hired by contract and whatever compensation they get is based on their own negotiating power.  Everyone, from the top down is responsible for the products and services provided.  There is no limited liability or corporate veil.  By the same token, consumers are on their own.  No suing McDonald's because the coffee was hot.

The key to all this is 'personal responsibility.'  We have spent centuries trying to pawn off our duty to ourselves and others by delegating the responsibility to others.  Consequently, the act of delegation has given enormous amounts of power over to centralized brokers, who have used it against the very people who were hoping for protection.

Every effort at security ever tried over thousands of years has failed.  Every one of them.  Rome was sacked.  Babylon vanished.  Jerico fell.  Castles crumbled.  Forts destroyed.  Not a single one has withstood a concerted effort to breach it.  So why do we keep giving away the store for something that doesn't exist?

The ideal situation is the Enlishtened Village.  Folks grow their own food and stores for hard times.  They purify enough water to serve their needs.  They specialize in skills and crafts that they use to compete in a global marketplace.  They have ideas and get others to invest in them by contract.  And for defense, every man, woman and child is armed to the teeth and trained in their use.

It is a model that has served monasteries for millennia.  It was quite successful in the Old West, until the feds came along and stole everything by promising 'security.'  In fact, the united States were conceived as a cooperative of communities, who delegated certain powers to a central entity.  That was their one big mistake.  Keep the power at home.  Though the model was quite successful for a time, there are always those who are not happy until they own all the nuts AND the tree they fall from.  That kind of ambition is what must be checked, and how!

Sure, in its broadest strokes, this is a simplistic idea, and really the concept is simple.  How we institute it and grow it into a world of enlightened people living peaceful and fulfilling lives will be for us to decide collectively.  I'm just one lone nut in the jungles of Borneo here.  But, I see these concepts in practice every day in Indonesia, and I have lived the model as a monk.  I know it works, and has worked since history began.

What is certain is that what we have now does not work.  It always ends in death and destruction, with millions living their lives as slaves to corporate and government interests, which are often at odds with the needs and desires of the individual.

The Libertarians call it Enlightened Self-Interest.  I have to agree with the broadest outlines of the idea.  If you allow me to do whatever I think is best for me and mine, and I give you the same latitude, and we respect each other's rights to pursue Enlightenment, then how can it be wrong?

Let the family first, then the community in which it lives, be the final arbiters of what is good for the individual.  Mass government creating mass corporations that rape and pillage the planet for the profit of the few is a self-defeating paradigm.  History has show us this as long as there has been history.

Time to re-think our weltenschauung.  There are many ideas that have yet to be tried on a global scale  The time is ripe for fresh thinking.