My contention is NOT that the American and World citizenry are unwitting victims of some GRAND CONSPIRACY.
It is obvious that a great number of minor conspiracies and collusions are in progress at all times, but although any number of conspiratorial schemes may have occurred at various places on various occasions, myriad minor conspiracies do not add up to a GRAND conspiracy.
However, exposure of those minor conspiracies or collusions can serve to highlight flaws or inadequacies in our systems of Law, Politics, and Finance. They must be constantly sought-out and eliminated; one by one if necessary. Then, where a number of such occurrences can be attributed to some discernible common flaw or inadequacy in Law or principle, that problem must be addressed by altering or eliminating the permissive or causative factor; --just as we occasionally change the rules of athletic games to affect a more competitive or less lopsided outcome by removing inequitable effects of the current rules.
Our system appears to accomplish that to some degree, but only in a laissez-faire manner which relies upon long-established customs and procedures. This ponderously slow process allows many opportunities for short term schemes, and the sheer number of schemes possible (in a population of 281,000,000 in the USA alone) is inestimable. Even computer technology does not avail any way to track the subtle manifestations of minor political shenanigans, so if we are to be "responsible" we must perpetually try to detect and eradicate them.
Still, although these minor vagaries may have a cumulative deleterious effect on the system as a whole, they do not rise to the level of a cumulative GRAND SCHEME to undermine our government, subjugate the populace, and assert Totalitarianistic tyranny over the World.
We must be careful to separate the wheat from the chaff. These common minor infringements are the chaff. There will always be chaff.
But if the wheat can be cultured and bred (or even safely genetically altered?) to produce fatter kernels with more nutritious content, the chaff should then constitute a smaller percentage of the total harvest. That is, if major systemic corrections and improvements can be developed, the minor acts should have fewer opportunities to occur, or be proportionally diminished in their effects.
However, I have great consternation about the major problems; those which emanate from the highest levels of finance and governance. Now, although philosophers and academics of the various disciplines have expounded at extreme length upon the principles of finance and governance, my own study of that lush garden of tendentious self-effacing academic effluvium finds most issues can be reduced to a few fairly simple factors.
Here is one:
The Awareness/Responsibility/Ambition Factor
First: Most people accept minimal responsibility, avoid it purposely, and are content to live the simple life of a sheep, unaware of where they are, where they are going, what occurs beyond their range of vision, or what destiny may await themselves or their progeny. They usually don't even actually listen to the propaganda on the national newscasts, and
don't want to discuss
anything that might require "thinking." Their credo seems to be "Out of sight, out of mind," or "Whatever happens, happens."
--Effortless instant oblivion/Nirvana.
Second: Another portion of the populace (10-15%?) will accept and exercise power when it is given them. About 1/3 of these will not have the intelligence or judgment to constrain themselves to responsible or practical exercise of that power. About twenty percent of those will demonstrate ambition far exceeding their competence. But intelligent or not, responsible or not, even those in this category don't usually care much about anything beyond mundane ambitions.
Third: A certain percentage (10-15%?), mostly male, strive for power and control via political or financial venues. Most of these are fairly responsible and moderately successful, but only a very few succeed to any
great degree.
Fourth: Hardly anyone ever achieves to the highest levels of power and control, for those who have it guard it zealously, then pass it down through generations of their own families. Most of these care little about anything of importance, and simply rely up
on the rules of the game to ensure that the efforts of the "climbers" from the third group will enhance their investments.
It is one or two percent from that "third" group who command my attention. When accommodated by the apathetic mindset of most of the rest of us, these few get carried away. They have taken command of the game.
Although these aggressive people are operating within an established set of rules, and while some long-standing rules permit few alternatives and thus limit players' options, the less sacred rules
are sometimes ingeniously reengineered by innovative individuals or tight-knit groups with deliberate intent to gain advantage over competitors. However, such "entrepreneurship" is permissible under the rules; --that is the way the game is played. That these acts might be considered to be "conspiracies" or collusions is only a semantical "other face of the coin."
The highest levels of this game take on a "do or die" aura. Participants there are playing a game which requires a high level of expertise; --a game wherein to attempt anything too far outside the conventional boundaries may beget instantaneous elimination. But players at that level are addict/captives of this extremist game and, at their level of psychological entrainment, failures are but temporary set-backs; they don't quit. It happens that the top contenders are today at a level of competition where the definition of success extends to achieving control and/or ownership of the whole World, for this is simply the projected ultimate achievable goal of the game.
Still, although these players may often enter contracts or develop temporary cooperative alliances, each is acting out of self-interest. No "grand conspiracy" is required. The entrenched rules and structure of
the game itself produce the effect.
Such is the nature of this
irrational game into which we all have been involuntarily assimilated. Here are the labels of its progressive stages:
Monopolies (capitalistic excesses)
Conglomerates (multiple monopolism)
Commercial and Military Hegemony
(spreading super-monopolistic tentacles)
New World Order/One World Government
(consolidating assets and power)
Tyrannical Totalitarianism
(Ultimate absolutely unassailable ownership,
power, and dictatorial control)
It appears, as far as I can deduce, that a great variety of devastating effects are soon to be foisted upon us all, even upon the topmost competitors, during the course of an escalating number of increasingly inhumane battles between these contestants. If ever there is a "winner," that winner is likely only to have won dominion over a devastated planet of starving masses. Reduction of population will then occur, whether deliberate or not. Most of us --or I might better say most of our grandchildren-- will be the victims. Only a few million will survive, and will thenceforth live in inescapable enslavement to elite tyrants.
That final score of the game is quite predictable, no matter how long, torturous and devastating the final throes of the game may be. There is no longer any fascinating mystery or incentive to play it out to the end. Let's declare the winners, buy them out
, then rewrite the rules and start over.
--Or better yet, let's invent a whole new game.
One with a more
rational ultimate goal.
The consequences of failure to contrive such a new game are too dire to ignore, and as citizens of the United States of America we are probably the only people who have any opportunity to change the game peaceably without terrible atrocities, suffering and bloodshed. That fact alone makes it our responsibility to act.
In such a new game, a change in the nature of competition would be desirable, and the goal must be a reasonable quality of life for as much population as the planet can sustain. The sheep must be enticed to
think so they can participate and thus lead fuller, more meaningful lives. And while in any game there will probably always be "losers," let that be a consequence of their own choices, not because we have deprived anyone of opportunity. Instead of competition to dominate, let us conspire to base this new game on respect for the wondrous mystery of human life and spirit, and for beneficial accomplishment. Let the "winners" be those we've come to respect for their contributions and character, rather than for the power they exercise or how much wealth they've contrived to harvest from us all.
Let's maximize the nutrition and minimize the chaff.
New game, anyone?
If your answer is "No," I have only one thing to say:
Baaa-aah yourself, dammit!
If it is "Yes," please read my book, then let's all get together and discuss additional or alternative ideas.
But let's do
something SOON !
© Dec. 2001 G.F.H.
editorial revision Dec. 2002, Sept. 2003
