On The Federal Budget (for Dummies)

People often have a hard time grasping or relating to talk on the news in which money mounts in the 'billions' or 'trillions' of dollars are being discussed.  Without an understandable frame of reference it is easy to see why most people don't really understand what is really going on in the world. 

So to do my part, I figured I would cut through the confusion and do the math for you using a skill I mastered somewhere on the road through my Minor Mathematics Decree: It is called 'Division'.

Below is a human relatable 'scale model' if you will, of the amounts of money spent on some recently controversial items.

[Note For Other Math Geniuses Such As Myself:  You can recreate my model by simply dividing any number you hear on the news by 1 $billion.  For additional reference, $1 trillion == $1000 billion.]

So without further ado, here is how your taxes are being spent (in human readable form):

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Keeping Iraqi's from accessing their own oil at gunpoint (or from forming their own democracy) so Haliburton can have their oil instead:

* Over $1,000 *

Paying off the rich banker who still took your house:

* $1,300 *

A one time check from Obama to your gramma to buy *either* food or medicine (the only item the 'liberal' media debates whether we can really afford):

* 14 bucks *

Pulling one over on the American Public in broad daylight and robbing them blind:

* Priceless! *

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I hope that was helpful. ;-) 

Remember: We are the number one spenders on defense (that means war), spending more than the next 15 countries combined! Our education system produces students that average 27th best in the world across all subjects!!! (I guess it is easier to convince someone to drop bombs for you if they are not all that bright.)

Team America! F*** YEAH!

Happy 'we repayed the Indians kindness with genocide' day!

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On A Democratic Economy: An Example Of Our Failing Education

[Forewarning: I am planning my own entrepreneurial endeavors and aim to be a small business owner myself.  If you privately email me in response to this post to call me an 'extremists', or to parrot smart sounding opposing statements without being prepared to defend them in serious debate, or subsequently become unable or unwilling to acknowledge my points or counter points on your statements, be grateful I am not the type to make a posting of our conversation 'Maddox Hate Mail style'!  The whole point of this article is to show that you, or at least the general population, have accepted blatant lies with unquestioning faith!  Advance further evidence for my thesis at your own risk!  That said, *CONSTRUCTIVE* criticism and *CIVIL* debate are always welcome!]

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Introduction:

Before diving into more specific future discussions about education, I would like to use the topic of Socialism as an example to illustrate how people in our society generally have been programed with what to think, but not with how.

To start with, YOU, and I don't care who you are, YOU are a socialist!  You heard me!  That's right you!

But what is that you say?

"Not ME!" you exclaim?  "I am the Treasurer of the 'Socialism is Evil Club' and Vice President and Fellow of the 'League of Private is Always Better!"

Well then Please!  Accept my apology!  That is, just as soon as you make me eat my words by kindly proving your dedication to principle by example!  Just immediately forgo use and protection from all existing public and social services, included but not limited too: Schools, Libraries, the Police and Fire Departments, Roads, in some cases mass transit, and the Mail!

If you think such a demand preposterous, that society depends on such services, or that you are entitled to these in exchange for your contributions to society, then congratulations!  YOU are a Socialist!  The only difference between You, and those 'usually' labeled Socialists, is the degree of quality, and to lesser extent quantity, of specific services you expect should belong to this set of commonly accessible resources.

[Note for my Christian Readers: Jesus taught that there was a special place in hell for those who did not look out for 'the least of these' by giving food and drinking water, (yes, 'teaching to fish for a lifetime' is proper implementation) and health care to poor kids, and also visiting the incarcerated (maybe in Guantanamo).  But he didn't mean that Crap Democrats call health care!  Democrats are financed by the same Multi Billion dollar Medical, Insurance, and Pharmaceutical companies as the Republicans so it is no wonder their so called 'health care' is making people buy private insurance.  That doesn't relieve us of the duty!  If you happen to be a Christians who DOES feed the homeless, is involved in prison outreach, etc. Good job!  You still lack though, so please kindly help peer pressure our fellows to stop harassing economically challenged teens and women in need of the pill or an aids tests outside of planned parenthood!]

[Cultural Reference Note: In spite of the military structure of Starfleet Command, the United Federation of Planets depicted in 'Star Trek' is a model Socialist society.  They have also completely abolished money, excepting as the occasionally needed plot device demands it for interaction with the Ferengi race, the shows satirically (yet forgivingly) viewed token extreme Capitalists.]

Anyway, without further ado, here are some common memes about Socialism, that with even a tiny bit of thought, are obviously non sequitur bullshit.  To this day people I would ordinarily consider intelligent continue to parrot these things back to me without thinking.  Don't be one of those people!

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Fallacy #1: Communism failed.

The entire thesis of Karl Marx's 'Communist Manifesto' was that the powerful will always exploit the poor and working classes, and therefore working people must unite (unionize) to collectively balance the powers wielded against them.  The Manifesto ends after a long list of grievances with the famous call to action:

"Working Men of the world, Unite!"
~Karl Marx  (Communist Manifesto)

Now I was in Berlin this summer and one of the sites I visited was the uprising of June 16th 1953.  East German workers tried to go on strike after having their hours extended and wages cut, but they were put down with military force.  This is only one example that illustrates: Communism didn't fail!  It never existed!  Governments claiming to be Communist have in fact been totalitarian military dictatorships.  They have not even pretended to tolerate collective citizen organization and action, the most basic principle of Communist theory.

So how can you claim that a system they never implemented has failed?

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Fallacy #2: Communism would never work because anyone that managed to overthrow the existing system would never give up their power.

This one was very crafty in design!  If you take off the part that says: "Communism would never work because" and keep only the part that says: "anyone that managed to overthrow the existing system would never give up their power", then the statement is so obvious as to be a truism, leaving little to no reason to even think of questioning it.  Thus most people don't.

But the logical fault here is that the situation being described has absolutely nothing to do with Communism at all.

Again remember that the thesis of the Manifesto was that normal working people must work together to secure our basic rights from the most wealthy and powerful.  That has nothing to do with a small group of people taking over the government, or any expectation of their subsequent and unlikely altruism.

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Fallacy #3: Communism is a recent invention that was created as a reaction to Capitalism.

I grant you that Karl Marx desire for, and plan to implement, Socialism came about that way.  But Socialism in general is far older and more widely advocated that most realize.

Again, because of my American Christian upbringing, and the extreme illogical fear of 'Socialism' by the American Right, I will chose an example uncomfortably close to home to demonstrate this:

According to the Old Testament (OT), the Jewish people were chosen by God due to a promise made to Abraham, the historically recognized father of Monotheism.  But what were they 'chosen' for?

According to the OT, the Jews were chosen to demonstrate the superiority of 'Gods laws' to the surrounding nations.

But what laws were those?

i) One of particular consequence was the 'Year of Jubilee' which was to occur every 49 or 50 years.  In this year all land was to be redistributed along ancestral lines, all debts canceled, and all slaves freed.  Wealth distribution!  Or Socialism if you like!

ii) A second notable aspect of this society that was supposedly given and designed by God was this: There was no king!  To quote: "Every Man did as was right in his own eyes!"

It is recorded that the first king of ancient Israel (Saul) was eventually appointed because the people grew jealous of the palaces and harems that they saw in foreign countries.  The prophets of the day warned people saying:

[paraphrased]: "Look, You *really* don't want a king!  He will make your sons fight and die in the front lines of his army for wars just to increase his personal wealth and glory!  He will take your daughters, that should have married your sons, and make them his sex slaves in his harems.  Understand that YOU will not have those palaces and harems you covet!  They will come at your expense!"

It reminds me a lot of Bill Mayer doing stand up and saying: "The GOP is fat cats convincing people who could never be fat cats that someday they might."

But here is a million dollar question: What kind of government was ancient Israel prior to King Saul?  It wasn't a kingdom, or an empire, or any kind of military dictatorship!  It was not a democracy, or a republic.  Their government was... well no government actually.  By modern definition, ancient Israel was an Anarchy.  A Socialist Anarchy to be precise.

Now I am not Biblical literalist, but I think one of the greatest ironies of our time is that the Conservative Right in America claims to be Bible believing Christian literalists, in spite of the fact that according to the Old Testament, 'Gods' preferred style of society for mankind is a Socialist Anarchy.

I guess to 'fair', they do *claim* to be for less government.  The trouble is in practice 'less government' means: no laws that restrict large corporations!  Property laws, Copyright laws, Patents, Estate Exemptions, bills for massive big business subsidies, and anything that keep new people from competing with our established powers, those laws we want in droves!  But Citizen or Consumer protection?  Regulation?  Forget it!

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General Observations:

I think it is useful at this point, to point out that in a way, the message of the Manifesto is very much the same as that of the United States Declaration of Independence:

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The claims of of both documents are basically the same:

i) That power must come from the people
ii) That the current system is abusive and exploiting them
iii) It is in their collective interests to collectively abolished the existing rule, and set up in its place a system which is beneficial to the masses instead of benefiting just, for example: a king, bankers, land owners, large Corporate CEO's, or stock holders short term gains.

The most immediately obvious difference between these two is that in the Declaration of Independence was a successful case of specific colonists throwing off rule of the English Crown in the 1700's, whereas the Manifesto is the yet to be realized act of all working people throwing off upper class rule everywhere for all time.

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If you think about it, the only type of government which could probably have a chance to be truly Socialistic is a direct (or true) Democracy.  True Communism is basically democratic control of economic resources, of production, and general infrastructure.  A true Democracy is citizens acting collectively to enable and enforce the majority will; and to throw off and hold off any particular person, class, or faction from acquiring to much power.  Arguably you also cannot have true democracy without some form of Socialism because money is ultimately power.  If you can limitlessly acquire money you can limitlessly acquire power until eventually you control everything via the financial side.

[Note: I do NOT believe that in practice this should necessitate the destruction of small businesses.  In fact I am lead to believe that even Capitalism as laid out by Adam Smith in 'The Wealth of Nations" assumes ALL businesses are small and locally owned, and that Capitalism is unstable and breaks down otherwise.  Modern Capitalism claims it can make all men kings of their own private empires.  In reality there is a convergence of all industries towards monopoly (or duopoly) preventing all men from being kings and establishing only a few the rest must serve.  Otherwise democracy, as well as a form of self organizing socialism, would likely coexist surrounding a Capital society consisting solely of small local businesses.  (Imagine a Socialist infrastructure jelly with small private business berries in it that all contribute to their local community.)]

Anyway, if you can limitlessly acquire money you can limitlessly acquire power until eventually you control everything via the financial side.  This is easily demonstrated in practice by pointing at the Corporately controlled United States Government, especially the recent examples of our Occupation of Iraq, and the Bank Bailouts.  These are only the most superficially obvious examples.  But it boggles the mind that in full view of everyone they can publicly subsidize Haliburtons oil field acquisition and protection, and private Banks control our money supply, using such volumes of public cash as to make most social programs look like pocket change, yet the public doesn't even consider THOSE things as the cause of, or rightful target for, 'tightening our belts'.)  "Spectacular Achievements of Media Propoganda", no joke!

But the 'money is ultimate power' philosophy was probably best spelled out by one of its best exploiters:

Permit me to issue and control the money of the nation and I care not who makes its laws.
~Mayer Amsched Rothchild

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In Conclusion:

I think this is good time to mention that our current education system was designed during the industrial revolution.  Historically, schools were deliberately designed to be factories that created factory workers.  They wanted a uniform product that did not think, but only obeyed.  The ideal product of schools did not question authority, did not strike, only memorized the 'facts' handed down to them, along with number tables, and assemble things to spec without question.  They should behave as a cog in the machine, as Citizens of 'Metropolis', and as a harvest-able work crop that never question the reality of 'The Matrix'.


In the information age, being able to regurgitate answers from the book and memorize times tables are nearly worthless skills.  We need people who can think critically!  Producing and processing information, solving advanced problem, these are the required skills for the next level of the ideal civilizations development.  Such systems are known to require self organization, freedom, critical thinking, and freedom from financial concerns (RSA Animate - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us), which is theoretically possible with wise use of available resources.

In a previous post I mentioned that Einstein had lamented the lack of Great minds and Great Artists in proper proportion to our population.  If you compare the educations given through out history to most of the government leaders, and to many of the greatest minds of the sciences, the religions, the political systems, and military's, you will see that it embarrass the crap out of our public school systems even in the 21'st century.

With the vast majority of people being programmed for prole-hood, designed to be Delta's and Epsilon's or at best Gamma's, is it any wonder we suffer the lack of great minds that Einsteins lamented?  It is any wonder we face global warming, the end of oil (and thus the majority of the worlds food supply), that their is no cure for cancer, or aids, or faster than light travel?

A mind is a terrible thing to waste!

Yet we are wasting the vast majority of 6.5 billion of them by design.

What can you do to help change that?  If you don't know, isn't that a conversation we should be having with everyone in our various circles that we come in contact with?  We have been given so much by those who came before us, should we not give back something so little as this, for those yet to come?

Think about it.

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**Appended Dec 1 2010**

I recently saw the film version of 'The Shock Doctrine ' which pointed out that there *have* been successfully working 'Socialist' governments in the 20'th Century.  One was in Chile, which was focusing heavily on getting a good health care and education system that people were increasingly happy with.  Unfortunately for the Chileans, there were some American companies who had private financial interests within the country, and for keeping things the way they were.  As a result their government was forcibly put out, and their economy destroyed.

While watching this film, specifically during the footage of a Chilean being removed by security for his protests to Milton Friedman receiving the Nobel Prize for Economics (for work that led to, and his involvement with, the destruction of Chile), I recalled the words from the Poem by Alan Ginsberg, and sung by the band 'Rage Against the Machine':

It had to be rich and it had to be powerful
They had to murder in Indonesia 500000
They had to murder in Indochina 2000000
They had to murder in Czechoslovakia
They had to murder in Chile
They had to murder in Russia
And they had to murder in America
~Rage Against the Machine; Hadda Been Playing On The Jukebox (Alan Ginsberg)

I would also like to point out two additional things:

1) That we ALREADY HAVE systematic wealth redistribution.  (Mostly in the forms of bailouts and subsidies)  It just goes up instead of down.

2) In many parts of the world (outside the US), Socialism and Democracy are seen as the same thing.  Ironically the United States has neither Socialism nor Democracy, but rather a mere pretense to representation as a so called 'Republic'.

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On Patriotism

There are those who say that many of the really good ideas have been thought of already.
Since I *mostly agree with this statement, but mostly because you will probably think he is smarter than most other people, I figured I would start by seeing what Albert Einstein has to say on the subject:

[Note: The following comes from the book "The World As I See It" by Albert Einstein.  He had personal and direct experience with extreme patriotism having escaped Nazi Germany.]

"This topic brings me to that worst outcropping of the herd nature, the military system, which I abhor. .. This Plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished with all possible speed. Heroism by order, senseless violence, and all the pestilent nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism--how I hate them. .. And yet so high, in spite of everything, is my opinion of the human race that I believe this bogey would have disappeared long ago, had the sound sense of the nations not been systematically corrupted by commercial and political interests acting through the schools and the Press." ~Albert Einstein

He goes on to say that the advancement of human civilization, from the discovery of fire and agriculture, to the invention of the steam engine, along with advances in morality, have come from creative free thinking individuals. Yet in modern times there seems an absence of great minds in proper proportion to the population. (He proposes a theory about the cause for this, and I myself have my own which I will undoubtedly go into at another time.) A consequence of this is that:

"In two weeks the sheep-like masses can be worked up by the newspapers into such a state of excited fury that the men are prepared to put on uniform and kill and be killed, for the sake of the worthless aims of a few interested parties." ~Albert Einstein

And later quoting Emil Fischer he says:  " 'It's no use, Gentlemen, science is and remains international.'  The really great scientists have always known this and felt it passionately" ~Albert Einstein

Elsewhere I recall him saying (although I can't find it at present) something along the lines that: internationally scientists, doctors, lawyers and other such professionals often have immediate understanding with one another over and above that shared with many of their countrymen.

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Now I am an American.  Since a large portion of Americans claim (falsely) that American is a Christian nation (as opposed to one of religious freedom), and because he is viewed as a moral authority by a notable percentage of earths citizens, I think it would be useful to appeal to what Jesus taught on this subject.

[For the sake of honesty I wish to make it known that much of the following comes from, or is based on Leo Tolstoy's "What I believe" and I did not think of it myself.]

Tolstoy points out that 'neighbor' as used in the New Testament is more accurately translated as 'kinsmen' or 'countrymen'.  So when considering Christs famous parable: 'The Good Samaritan', it becomes immediately obvious that Jesus claimed that a foreigner of a different religion IS your kin or countryman, and in some cases is to be considered more so than your actual 'kin' and 'countrymen' based upon their actions.

The irony of modern biblical literalism is a topic which knows no bounds, but for the moment I want to point out one specific irony related to Patriotism which I also picked up from Tolstoy:

Christ taught that one should not swear oaths.  This is quite important if you think about it.  It means one cannot swear to obey a human chain of command, eliminating traditional military service, or take any position that is 'sworn in', including public office.

[Note: Tolstoy also mentioned Christs: "do not judge" is not "don't be judgmental" as taught by churches.  He restricted one from serving as judge jury or executioner.  Christ stood by his teaching here by refusing to condemn the adulterous woman to death as was the law in the famous "let he without sin cast the first stone" case.  In a court of law society distributes and hides guilt for violence across judge jury and executioner.  Similarly in the military it is within the chain of command.  The wealthy sleep easy giving commands to enrich themselves.  Officers train soldiers to override their conscience and 'just following orders.'  Soldiers enforce the will of the humans at the top.]

When I was in Rome this past summer I was talking with an Archeologist staying in my hostel.  She confirmed Tolstoy's insight and that this was the original interpretation of Christianity.  Rome was extremely open and adopted all religions it came across.  The reason for the famous 'lions eating Christians' persecution was not for religious but political crimes:

1) They refused to recognize Caesar as a god or swear allegiance to a human government or military.

2) They also considered 'Gods law', or the 'Natural law' as higher than 'Mans law' and therefore chose socialistic ideals and the 'good of all' in the community over obeying the laws of the nation.

[Note: This Civil disobedience was the example Mahatma Gandhi followed to create his life work after reading, among other things: Tolstoy.]

So originally, Christians were committing treason and disrupting society, and were therefore considered unpatriotic traitors of Rome.  Contrast this with modern political views.

Ironically the acceptance of Christianity in Rome was spread largely by returning soldiers who related to the willingness to die for higher principles, and who were disgusted by the ways that the wealthy were abusing their sacrifices in war merely for personal pleasures.

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Someone might ask me: Don't you love your country?

I am grateful and lucky to have been born in America.  Undoubtedly I have been the recipient of many tangible benefits for the fact.  But why should I wish to prevent others from attaining the same benefits (and more) regardless of their nationality or religion?  Such results are those of nationalism: a superiority complex, and a degradation of the humanity of 'outsiders'.

Most everyone in the modern world is taught to hate the Nazis, and for good reason.  Their evil carried out under national pride is well know.  What is truly dangerous though is to fail to see that the Nazi's are not some unrelatable alien 'other'.  The same pride exist within each of us, even if to a lesser degree.  If we are not wary of Nationalism and Patriotism then we have learned nothing from history.

At the present moment I feel the danger to my fellow Americans and many others in the world, is more from within my country than from without it.  Right is right.  Fair is fair.  Justice is justice.  Peace is peace.  These know no nationality (or religion).

Before fighting abroad, does it not make more sense to help those exploited or abandoned in the wake of Katrina?

We blamed the Germans for not acting but claiming ignorance of the death camps.  They showed our Torture chambers at Guantanamo on the nightly news.  What have we done of this?  We don't even have their ignorance defense.  So I ask you: are we really any better?

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Thanks to Wikipedia for the following quotes (if you never donated money to Wikipedia, please do):

"My country is the world, all men are my brethren and my religion is to do good." ~Thomas Paine (Founding Father of the United States)

"To us all towns are one, all men our kin." ~Kaniyan Poongundran (Tamil poet)

"I am not an Athenian, or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." ~Socrates

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Hello World

[Note: "Hello World" is the name of first program that new computer programmers usually learn to write when starting to learn to program.  It simply prints "Hello World" to the screen.  (I have a slightly longer introduction.)]

Many years ago when I was going into college my mother, a devout Christian, gave me a bookmark she made that said:

"Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman than needeth not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. 2 Tim. 2:15"

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Not long after that while tutoring in the University Math Lab, someone ridiculed the idea that one could be 'educated' if one was an expert in just one thing, even if it was a scholastically regarded subject such as Math.

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A while later a fellow tutor in the Math Lab said one of the most important things I have ever heard in my life!

I don't remember what we were talking about, but I replied to something he said with: "I may not be the biggest genius in the world, but I do know that..."

To which he replied: "How do you know?"

I immediately launched into an explanation of how I knew the thing I claimed to know on whatever we were discussing.

He interrupted with: "No, I mean: How do you know you are not the biggest genius in the world? You *could* be!"

He said: "When I was in High School there where people who could tell you the make, model, year and owner of every car in the High School parking lot."

He said: "I couldn't do that. But I was really good at math. Maybe it just depends what you spend it on."

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There were other factors involved in the following decision, but the above were the most memorably influential.

So I decided: I would read the most important works that mankind has created, in as many fields as I could. I would only have time for the highlights, so I did need to be picky. But I didn't want to be like most people who make up their minds on something without having thought about it from as many angles as possible.

So I set out to read (not a comprehensive list):

1) The primary texts of all the major world religions: The Bible (already had been required reading growing up), the Koran, The Bhagavad Gita, the Tao Te Ching, Confucius, (and later the Hagakure).

2) Major figures in the modern Sciences such as: Darwin, Dawkins, Hawking, Einstein... and atheist philosophers such as Bertrand Russell.

3) Major philosophers in modern political and economic thinking such as: Plato, John Locke, Karl Marx, and Adam Smith. (I also later discovered Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and David Korten all of whom I think are quite relevant in current times and going forward.)

4) Classics in literature, from Homer and Dante and Chaucer to Jane Austin, Charles Dickens and Tolstoy and more...

5) The Hugo Award Winners for Science Fiction (which overlaps with classics, such as Huxley and Orwell) (I got that idea from the behind the scenes of Babylon5. And there are some great visionaries in this field!)

6) Military and Political Strategy such as Sun Tzu, Machiavelli, and Von Clausewitz

7) Whatever else seemed really important or a legitimate controversy.

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I have not finished the list above, and there are other things I have finished that are not on it. However, constantly cramming as much of this material into my brain as I can means I have a considerable number of thoughts on a variety of topics, and I am at least passingly familiar with major and diverse views on it. Sometimes the 'extremists' are more right than they are given credit for, but usually not exactly in the ways they themselves think.

I have reached a point where there seems almost no division between subjects. I see something more like an evolving continuum of knowledge that forms a single non conflicting narrative about humanity and even to a small degree, the universe. Everything is connected, and making new connections between topics takes up much of my thought process.

With so much going on in my head, I often find myself writing for hours. I wrote over 100 pages of a book over the summer, titled: "How to Save the World." I am currently stalled on that project over some thoughts about restructuring education; video games could be a key here. ;-D (I DO intend to finish it.) But also too many hours of thought and writing go into emails to whoever happened to email me, or replies on FaceBook comments that stimulated my thinking or agitation.

So today I finally started a blog so that my thoughts can be accessed by whomever is interested, and so I don't spam unsuspecting victims with huge amounts of unsolicited thoughts on whatever topic they casually mentioned in their FB posts. (Actually, I still plan to do that, but at least it will be in the form of a link to my blog posting so they can more easily follow, or ignore it.)

While this blog is currently aimed to be mostly about my philosophical and political views, I am also a professional video game developer. I expect some percentage of postings will also be about topics related to the industry, programming, and my planned independent projects, business ventures, foundations, etc as I take them on going forward. I plan to sort various posts into topics to maximize usefulness, allowing people can look at only things they find personally relevant to them.

I don't expect everyone to agree with me, and my opinions are not set in stone. So challenge me on something if you think I am wrong. (But be prepared for a debate if you do. *Most of what I think is based on lots of thought and research.) But in the end, regardless, lets look for/at the commonalities more than the differences.

That is my intro in a nutshell.

So regardless if you are starting here at the beginning with me, or backtracking through it later, welcome to my blog.