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It'sUglyOutThere's avatar

Agreed Eugyppius. The forces of tyranny are unrelenting, and currently have no small degree of momentum. Inroads may have been made in slowing their roll, but I still have not quite reached a state of even cautious optimism. Our current state of affairs should be proof that the past 40 years have been a largely one sided push to the edge of a cliff for western society. Can we save it at this point? I'm not so sure.

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SCA's avatar

The reason I'm a little (well, entirely) scornful of works of philosophy and political thought is because human nature cannot be altered, and cooperative systems that might work in small related groups always start failing once you get to bigger groups that must create artificial, constructed relationships to hold themselves together. No one can engineer a utopia, and benevolent monarchal systems (as you discussed in a previous post) require not having a moron as one's hereditary leader. Odds always run against you.

And even tiny related (by blood or common interests and cultural values) often become tiny despotic regimes too. People do love their titles and the privileges that come with them and they fight with remarkable ferocity to hold them, no matter how ridiculously trivial they are in the scheme of village life.

And none of us want to give up whatever purported entitlements the regimes dole out to us, and them regimes make it so expensive to try that it's really a fool's game anyway to opt out. Shortly after qualifying for Medicare I had a silly household accident resulting in a sprained ankle, fractured foot and gashed forehead, and even though I merely spent a night in an emergency bay rather than having been formally admitted, the bill for sewing up my forehead and giving me a dinosaur boot to hobble home with came to more than $30,000, and I was pretty relieved, between Medicare and the supplemental insurance policy I had, to have therefore owed $0 out of pocket. But obviously it's a complete scam system between the "healthcare" providers and the government. And even if, say, I'd not had insurance and negotiated a lower cash payment bill, I don't have that cash. They got our necks in that noose and keep wringing 'em.

We need to stop believing in political heroes, hone our skepticism till it's razor sharp and never let it get rusty, and do the best we can. Someone always always wants power and they will always be corrupted by it.

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