I’m not sympathetic to the current regime or the theological fascism it employs to keep control. But bombing Iran now would be the worst thing that could happen for the region and for the West’s declared values of peace and democracy.

The nascent democratic revolution emerging in Iran would be crushed under a resurgence of Persian nationalism if Iran were bombed. Eric Hoffer said, “Mass movements can rise and spread without belief in a God, but never without belief in a devil.” The U.S. was the 1979 Islamic Revolution’s devil. Israel has long been a pet devil of Iran, and particularly of President Ahmadinejad. But this hatred of the West and Israel has been distracted by the internal strife in the country since the disputed election this summer that kept Ahmadinejad in power.

The Iranian regime knows the power of a devil to galvanize and unify a group and to promote sacrifice for a cause. And if they can provoke the U.S. or Israel to bomb them, sure there will be casualties, but the rift in the 3000 year old Persian nation will quickly close, and the emerging democratic movement will be destroyed. For those who don’t believe this, see the comments of Charles Rangell and Hillary Clinton closing ranks with George W. Bush after Hugo Chavez of Venezuela bashed Bush at the U.N. in 2006.

Surprisingly the regime doesn’t see the devil it’s making of itself in the eyes of the democratic movement in the country. With truncheons and torture, the Iranian regime is tempering and galvanizing the revolution.

So even though the militaries of the U.S., Israel, and Iran all want the same thing—for Iran to be bombed—if we want peace in the region (delayed though it may be), Iran should not be attacked. It would set back peace by decades.

Every revolution before it happens seems impossible and after it happens seems inevitable. Let’s not inadvertently scuttle the first great and significant revolution of the 21st century.

Dear Governor Huntsman,

Please veto House Bill 357. Considering the number of accidental shooting injuries and deaths in Utah recently, especially among children, it is irresponsible to increase the danger to children and adults alike. I know that proponents of the bill say that handguns are necessary for self-defense.

But when considering handgun bills, legislators and governors should consider several things. First, how often do handgun carriers successfully defend themselves with their handguns? Then contrast that with 1) how many accidental shootings there are with handguns (this bill increases the probability because they are loaded and more accessible); and 2) how often handguns are stolen from legal owners (this is where criminals get handguns—not from gun shows—and the bill makes it easier because now handguns are in glove-boxes). Reason dictates that, if we must have handguns in our midst, they should be treated in as safe a way as possible.

Bill 357 is a bad bill with no real usefulness to the public. Please veto it.

Price and Demand
The regular interaction of price and demand (demand should react inversely to price, and price should follow demand up and down) is invalid in the healthcare market. No matter how high prices go for healthcare, demand does not decrease. This is called “inelasticity of demand.” Why doesn’t demand react the way it’s supposed to? Because we aren’t dealing with “computers and cellphones”; we’re dealing with our health and our lives. People don’t say, “I’ll wait until next year for the the current chemo technology; the older it is, the cheaper it gets.” Or “I’m fine with my dialysis [landline]; I don’t think I need a kidney [cellphone] right now.” Or “Maybe my anatomy-savvy [computer-savvy] brother can reconnect my Achilles tendon [wireless router].” We are willing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to not only preserve our lives, but also to make our quality of life good. This invalidates the textbook relationship between price and demand. I think Newt knows this and is being disingenuous. If he doesn’t know it, no one should be listening to him anyway.

Slavery – the Ultimate in Economies of Scale
The Market has no conscience or soul. It does not shy away from evil, abuse, or exploitation. One of the most obvious cases for this is the concept of slavery. Why did our Founders guarantee the continuation, even the propagation of slavery in the Constitution? Because the South said they wouldn’t ratify it if slavery were not protected. Didn’t the North find this unacceptable? Well, the South made a very convincing point that Northern shippers (including the ship-building, merchant, seamen, and harbor industries, primarily from the North) would also be hurt if the agrarian economy of the South were stunted by prohibiting slavery. This was convincing enough to get our Founding generation to formally and officially condone a principle that the majority personally felt was immoral.

Slavery is ingenious, from the perspective of the market. Higher productivity with lower costs is the dream of every profit-oriented enterprise. This is what capitalists have been killing themselves to achieve since the beginning of time. And slavery is the perfect solution. The problem is that it’s despicable, immoral and inhuman. But the market doesn’t care. This is why I wince when people say, “Let the market decide.”

It’s June 1, 1941 – Where’s YOUR money?
Germany has conquered Czechoslovakia, Poland, Holland, Belgium, Norway, Vichy France, Yugoslavia, Greece, Hungary, and Romania. They have invaded Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and North Africa, and have begun bombing the UK. The USSR has conquered Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. Italy has invaded Egypt and British Solmaliland, and Japan, while maintaining a loose hold on China, is sweeping unhindered across the Pacific.

Where does the market go? Where are stock prices on British and Canadian investments? The market is betting on the Axis. From our hindsight, we can say what WE would have done, but the market doesn’t have a memory; it is a function of fear of or greed for the future. It does not know right from wrong or stand up for principles; it follows after money relentlessly and without deviation.

Importing the Autobahn
One of President Eisenhower’s great accomplishments was the interstate freeway system, an idea born from his observation of Hitler’s Autobahn. Could “the market” have produced this? I don’t think so. Not even Halliburton could have done this (and would we have wanted it? “[I]n April 2008, the Government Accountability Office issued a report after having looked into 95 major defense systems, concluding that the projects had surpassed their original budgets by a total of $295 billion and were delivered, on average almost two years late” (ABC News, March 4, 2009)?). How would the market have made revenue on this; toll booths? That kind of defeats the purpose of a FREEway, (meaning libre, not gratis) doesn’t it? What has been the ROI in the interstate freeway system? I think it has been worth my tax money, but it would have been hard to sell the business plan in 1952.

Competition from GM to Wal-Mart
Every market tends toward two to three major players with several smaller players exploiting niches. Think Delta, United, and American; or GM, Ford, and Toyota; Wal-Mart and Target; Nike and Adidas. Your argument will be that GM has been knocked off its pedestal by upstart Toyota. True, but will Wal-Mart make the same mistakes? Can anyone foresee Wal-Mart writing its own ruin by being too generous to its employees? Can we foresee Wal-Mart ignoring long-term trends (fuel efficiency) in favor of short-term gains (the SUV boom)? I can’t. And if someone comes along that can out-Wal-Mart Wal-Mart, doesn’t that seem extremely frightening?

This market tendency limits our affordable selection and ruins local economies. We can either get crappy jeans from Wal-Mart or Target, or get good ones from a specialty store that must pay more to compete, and therefore must charge more for its products. These businesses absorb local economies, then, when the local economy has collapsed because Wal-Mart has driven out all the local businesses, it closes its doors because there’s no longer volume to sustain the store.

The market is powerful, but it’s only good when we make it good. And that requires oversight, sometimes called regulation (gasp!).

Why does English have so many cognates with Romance languages if it’s supposed to be Germanic? One of my linguistics professors told our class that 80% of the words we use everyday are Germanic, but 75% of the words in the English dictionary are of French origin, adopted into the language during the centuries-long reign of the French in Britain after the Battle of Hastings in 1066. French became, well, the lingua franca, literally translated as “French language,” but meaning the language generally spoken or the universal language. English is the modern lingua franca, follow closely by Mandarin.

So are we more Germanic or more Romantic because of our language uses? Does language affect society? Yes, but not linguistically, instead semantically. And those who have begun to change American English are not conquerors in the traditional sense, but they are leaving their imprint on the language—and on society. There is a list of words I hate to hear, and I want to change their usage.

Productive - “A productive member of society.” Are we a bunch of bees or ants, killing ourselves for the queen, building a hive or colony for the sole purpose of propagating the species? No. Can someone be helpful to society without “producing” something for future consumption? Yes. Therefore, I propose ditching “productive” and using instead “contributive.” The contemporaries of Socrates, much less himself, would not have called him productive. And yet his contributions are going strong millennia later. Composers, artists, writers all contribute greatly to society, but capitalists would disagree, unless their works could be sold for profit. Think of the greatest thinkers of all time versus the greatest producers of all time. Which has contributed more to society, made us what we are, stood the test of time? Which will be remembered in future millennia?

Bipartisan – This is just the most common of many words that imply the inevitability and irrevocability of the two-party system in the U.S. The plurality of Americans are neither Republicans nor Democrats—they are registered independents. Guess who came up with the phrase “the big-three auto-makers”: Chrysler, of course, because it wanted to be lumped in with its MUCH bigger brothers, GM and Ford. Guess who propagates the implied inevitability of the two-party system through terms such as “bipartisan”: the two parties who don’t want any competition. If Libertarians could ever get a cogent message together or a charismatic leader, they could really upset the apple cart.

A corollary to this is the concept of the “aisle,” as in “both sides of the aisle,” or “the other side of the aisle.” It makes it seem like there is this huge void between right and left, where ne’er the twain shall meet. In fact, the majority of Americans sit in the aisle, between left and right. The aisle deserves to be listened to, not just walked on.

The national interest – Although this term seems innocuous enough—the nation is the whole of its people—it is abused to undermine the interests of the people. National interest usually means one of three things—economic interests, governmental interests, or military interests. This category will include unfair trade relations, pressure to establish military bases (you go, Kyrgyzstan!), torture, war in general, deficit spending, and many others. Citizens must constantly remind their representatives that we make up the nation; not the economy, nor the military, nor the government itself. Otherwise, politicians will continue to believe their own erroneous definitions.

Christian nation – In the movie Cry, the Beloved Country, based on Alan Patton’s book about racism, forgiveness and redemption, the white murder victim, a champion for the poor native South Africans, just before he is shot (ironically by an African youth), pens sardonically something like, “When we say we are Christians, we mean we are white.” We can substitute “American” for “White” and encapsulate the philosophy of too many of our countrymen. For them, the two words are interchangeable in their inherent righteousness. And yet, this “Christian nation” does too many unchristian things, with the knowledge and approval of the self-professed Christians living within it. We do not “turn the other cheek,” “sell that [we have] and give to the poor,” or even try to “[have] all things common.” We, as a nation, ignore the Ten Commandments and the Two Great Commandments. Also from Cry, the Beloved Country (this time the book) comes the following quote: “The truth is, our civilization is not Christian; it is a tragic compound of great ideal and fearful practice, of loving charity and fearful clutching of possessions.” If Christian conservatives understood and lived the laws of Christianity, we would indeed be able to shrink the size of government, a favorite rallying cry, because the hated entitlement programs would be moot, because “public assistance would simply be Christians “lift[ing] up the hands which hang down.” We would not fear the terrorists, illegal immigrants, or higher taxes. If Christian liberals lived the laws of Christianity, they would abandon their salvation-by-legislation philosophy and strengthen their stances against abortion and the disintegration of the family.

How many Christians in American do you know who would have a hard time saying, “I am a Christian before I am an American”? All Christians in America should be able to say this freely and with deep sincerity, but it sticks in the throat of too many who believe America to be the true source of salvation, focusing on the temporal—ignorant of the teachings of Christ.

Thinking Americans need to take back our language. We need to be the drivers of politics, government, society, and language. Words should not be misused by our representatives to confuse, control, and hypnotize us. Only when we can use a pen effectively can it be mightier than the sword.

However, in order for conservatives to prove, in the famous words of Saint Ronald that, “Government is not a solution to our problem; government is the problem,” small-government types need to unplug the mouths and plug in the helping hands.

Here’s the list of things that must be taken up by the community if the state and local governments are not to do it:
- Higher education
- Public education
- Libraries
- Workforce services
- Prisons and jails
- Courts and Law enforcement (we do have a lot of guns here; hmm. . . )
- Healthcare
- Public health and safety
- Fire departments
- Zoos and parks
- Care for the elderly, disabled, poor, homeless, abused, orphans, etc.
- Infrastructure (roads, mass transit, communications, etc.)
- The National Guard
- Policing and regulation of whatever government functions are left
- Natural resource protection and/or development
- Ad infinitum

That’s quite a to-do list, and it won’t be done with tax-deductible donations or by Filling The Boot with loose change. It will take actual physical participation in all of these endeavors.

So, are you with me? Are we gonna do it?! Are we going to take back our government?!?! I have a feeling there’s a lot of hemming and hawing going on; why? Because we’re too busy with other stuff. Socrates’s model of specialization is as valid today as it was then. “We are not all alike; there are diversities of natures among us which are adapted to different occupations. . . . And will you have a work better done when the workman has many occupations, or when he has only one?” Or written by Thomas Gordon in Cato’s Letters No. 38, “What is Government, but a Trust committed by All, or the Most, to One, or a Few, who are to attend upon the Affairs of All, that every one may, with the more Security, attend upon his own?” This is the concept that the “consent of the governed” is based on. But as Mr. Gordon points out, “A great and honourable Trust; but too seldom honourably executed; those who possess it having it often more at Heart to encrease their Power, than to make it useful; and to be terrible, rather than beneficent. It is therefore a Trust, which ought to be bounded with many and strong Restraints, because Power renders Men wanton, insolent to others, and fond of themselves.“

Can we have hobbyist public works crews, police, judges, librarians, prison guards, or bus drivers, people who only do these jobs when they get around to it? No. This is why we have government. Because it provides that same specialization that too many of us spit out as “bureaucracy.”

Why do we expect the product of our imperfect Constitution to be perfect? Why would we expect the execution of that Constitution to be any less difficult than the establishment of it, where some of the greatest of the Founding generation walked out of the Convention, refusing to sign? Government has two strikes against it: 1) it is created by man, therefore deficient in its design; and 2) it is run by man, therefore deficient in its execution. A third strike in modern America is that most of us don’t know anything about it, but that doesn’t stop us from criticizing like a bunch of Pointy-Haired Bosses. I’m not saying we shouldn’t criticize the government; in fact I think it’s our duty to watch every move it makes. But in the end I think we need to acknowledge the good it does. Gandhi said “History is really a record of every interruption of the even working of the force of love or of the soul.” The picture we get of government is the same: we are never told of how much good it does, but only of how it screws up. We need to accept that a human-built and human-run system is going to have failures. The other option is no government at all—I think I’m a lot closer to that than most, and it still scares me.

Two things the government has going for it are 1) its specialization, and 2) its economies of scale; nobody can negotiate, buy, spend, help, hurt, save, or kill on the scale the government can. Who else could have built an interstate freeway system, saved the world from Nazism, and put a man on the moon? I know what you’re thinking (to quote Magnum): the markets could have done it if given the chance. No, they couldn’t. Because the market would have to raise the capital to start, and would have to prove that its plan would pay off in order to do so. Who would have invested in a man on the moon? (Actually, what good has it brought us besides Tang?) The smart money was on the Nazis in WWII. Sometimes the market is actually slower than the government, because the market has to obey the laws of fear and greed, where governments can do things for simple necessity and altruism.

So, let’s see what happens as our governments shrink. Will there be a groundswell of “conservatives” striding forth to take up the banner government has let fall? I’ve got a bowl of popcorn and a comfy recliner because I think it will be that interesting.

The vessel for this criticism is a story about Nekhlyudov, a child of privilege who falls to the temptations of his society. He seduces a peasant girl on his aunts’ farm and never looks back. He recognizes her years later as he sits on a jury trying her for murder. He finds out that he had left the girl pregnant, and that she has eventually become a prostitute. This shakes him so deeply that he decides to reform and do what is right. He slips a few times, but does not fall, in his resolve to do right by the girl. He eventually follows her to Siberia, intending to live at least close to her throughout her sentence. I won’t give away any more of the plot than that.

There were many great quotes from the book. Believe it or not, I did exclude some of them from the list below:

On Prisons
“Terrible were the brutalized jailers, whose occupation is to torment their brothers, and who were certain that they were fulfilling an important and useful duty.”

“[The prisoners] were deprived of the chief motives that induce weak people to live good lives—regard for public opinion, a sense of shame, and the consciousness of human dignity.”

“The only explanation of what was being done was that it aimed at the prevention of crime, at inspiring awe, at correcting offenders, and at dealing out to them ‘lawful justice’ as the books said. But in reality, nothing in the least resembling these results came to pass. Instead of vice being put to a stop, it only spread farther; instead of being frightened, the criminals were encouraged (many a tramp returned to prison of his own free will); instead of correction, every kind of vice was systematically instilled; while the desire for vengeance, far from being weakened by the measures of the government, was instilled into the people, to whom it was not natural.”

“[T]he only certain means of salvation from the terrible evil from which men are suffering is that they should always acknowledge themselves to be guilty before God, and therefore unable to punish or reform others. . . .”

“Vicious men were trying to reform other vicious men, and thought they could do it by mechanical means.”

On High Society
“[S]he thought more of him that anybody else and therefore evidently understood him. This understanding of him, that is, the recognition of his superior worth, was a proof to Nekhlyudov of her good sense and correct judgment.”

“Nekhlyudov . . . felt with his whole being a loathing for the society in which he had lived till then: that society which so carefully hides the sufferings borne by millions to assure ease and pleasure to a small minority, that the people comprising it do not and cannot see these sufferings nor the cruelty and wickedness of their own lives.”

“’But they suffer. You are a Christian and believe in the Gospel teaching and yet you are so pitiless.’
’That has nothing to do with it. The Gospels are the Gospels, but what is disgusting remains disgusting.’”

“It was clear that everything considered important and good was insignificant and repulsive, and that all this glamour and luxury hid the old well-known crimes, which not only remained unpunished but were adorned with all the splendor men can devise.”

“The law . . . is only an instrument for upholding the existing order of things to the advantage of [the ruling] class.”

On Law
“[T]hese people acknowledge as law what is not law, and do not acknowledge as law at all, the eternal, immutable law written by God in the hearts of men.”

On the Carnal Man vs. the Spiritual Man
“[A]ll this terrible change had come about because he had ceased to believe himself and had taken to believing others. This he had done because it was too difficult to live believing one’s self: believing one’s self, one had to decide every question, not in favor of one’s animal I, which is always seeking for easy gratification, but in almost every case against it. Believing others, there was nothing to decide; everything had been decided already, and always in favor of the animal I and against the spiritual. Nor was this all. Believing in his own self, he was always exposing himself to the censure of those around him; believing others, he had their approval.”

“All men live and act partly according to their own, partly according to other people’s ideas. The extent to which they do the one or the other is one of the chief things that differentiate men.”

“The tempter that had been speaking to him in the night again raised his voice, trying to lead him out of the realm of his inner life into the realm of his outer life, away from the question of what he should do, to the question of what the consequences would be and what would be practical.”

“In Nekhlyudov, as in every man, there were two beings; one the spiritual, seeking only that kind of happiness for himself which tends towards the happiness of all; the other, the animal man, seeking only his own happiness, and ready to sacrifice to it the happiness of the rest of the world.”

On Man’s Stewardship for his Fellowman
“It was simple because he was thinking now, not of what would be the results for him, but only of what he ought to do. And, strange to say, what he ought to do for himself he could not decide, but what he ought to do for others he knew indubitably.”

“The earth cannot be anyone’s property; it cannot be bought or sold anymore than water, air, or sunshine. All have an equal right to the advantages it gives to men.”

“If once we admit—be it only for an hour or in some exceptional case—that anything can be more important that a feeling of love for our fellows, then there is no crime which we may not commit with easy minds, free from feelings of guilt.”

On the Military
“Military life in general depraves men. It places them in conditions of complete idleness, that is, absence of all rational and useful work; frees them from their common human duties, which it replaces by merely conventional duties to the honor of the regiment, the uniform, the flag; and while giving them on the one hand absolute power over other men, also puts them into conditions of servile obedience to those of higher ranks than themselves.”

“[The General] had received [the Order of the White Cross], which he greatly prized, while serving in the Caucasus, because a number of Russian peasants, with cropped hair, dressed in uniforms and armed with guns and bayonets, had killed at his command more than a thousand men who were defending their liberty, their homes, and their families.”

“These regulations had inevitably to be fulfilled, and hence it was absolutely useless to think of the consequences of that fulfillment. The old General did not even allow himself to think of such things, counting it his patriotic duty as a soldier not to think of them for fear of becoming weak in the execution of the obligations that seemed to him so very important.”

On Society Generally
“[T]he opinion of the [jury] foreman began to gain ground, chiefly because all the jurymen were getting tired, and preferred to take up the view that would bring them sooner to a decision and thus liberate them.”

“People whom fate and their sin-mistakes have placed in a certain position, however false that position may be, form a view of life in general which makes their position seem good and admissible. In order to keep up their view of life, these people instinctively keep to the circle of those who share their views of life and of their own place in it.”

“It was clear that she considered herself a heroine ready to lay down her life for the success of her cause; yet she could hardly have explained what that cause was, or in what its success consisted.”

“[A]ll sorts of violence, cruelty, and inhumanity, are not only tolerated but even sanctioned by Government when it suits its purpose.”

Even if the President, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, decided he didn’t want to leave office and commanded the Armed Forces to enforce his wishes, America’s Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines would laugh him out of office. Why? Because the President is subordinate to the Constitution; and that is deliberate and intentional.

A recent NPR Morning Edition story (the audio is more complete than the text) interviewed Marvin Pinkert, executive director of the National Archives Experience about the development of the President’s Oath of Office. It reads:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

The earliest extant version of the Oath, on George Washington’s working copy of the Constitution, states “I ________ solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States.” Washington had manually added a note about “defending the Constitution,” as proposed by George Mason and James Madison. This is very important, because it subordinates the President to the Constitution.

The final draft was near the current form, except that after the final version was printed, there was a revision added replacing “to the best of my judgment” with “to the best of my abilities [later changed to “ability”]”. This made the President further subordinate to the Constitution, because he could not use his judgment to second-guess or undermine the Constitution.

Why is this relevant today, when we have 220 years of peaceful transfers of power? Because our outgoing President subverted the Constitution in SO many ways, and would have done more if not half-heartedly stopped by the Legislature and Judiciary.

The whole justification for preferring a republic over a pure democracy is that republics move slowly and are not as likely to be swayed by the temporary opinion of the majority. A President who makes decisions behind closed doors and outside the parameters of the Constitution is a majority of one. WE THE PEOPLE cannot permit this ever again.

I have hope that President Obama (T minus 17 hours) will, through his exploration and knowledge of the Constitution as a Constitutional Law professor, have more respect for the document—and the President’s subordination to it. This is the CHANGE for which I HOPE most as another miracle occurs tomorrow.

Until 2003, the U.S. Army had the following “Soldier’s Creed”:

I am an American Soldier.
I am a member of the United States Army — a protector of the greatest nation on earth.
Because I am proud of the uniform I wear, I will always act in ways creditable to the military service and the nation it is sworn to guard.
I am proud of my own organization. I will do all I can to make it the finest unit in the Army.
I will be loyal to those under whom I serve. I will do my full part to carry out orders and instructions given to me or my unit.
As a soldier, I realize that I am a member of a time-honored profession–that I am doing my share to keep alive the principles of freedom for which my country stands.
No matter what the situation I am in, I will never do anything, for pleasure, profit, or personal safety, which will disgrace my uniform, my unit, or my country.
I will use every means I have, even beyond the line of duty, to restrain my Army comrades from actions disgraceful to themselves and to the uniform.
I am proud of my country and its flag.
I will try to make the people of this nation proud of the service I represent, for I am an American Soldier.

In 2003 a new “Warrior’s Creed” was adopted to replace the old “Soldier’s Creed”:

I am an American Soldier.
I am a Warrior and a member of a team.
I serve the people of the United States, and live the Army Values.
I will always place the mission first.
I will never accept defeat.
I will never quit.
I will never leave a fallen comrade.
I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough,
Trained and proficient in my warrior tasks and drills.
I always maintain my arms, my equipment and myself.
I am an expert and I am a professional.
I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy, the enemies of the United States of America in close combat.
I am a guardian of freedom and the American way of life.
I am an American Soldier.

I see a not-so-subtle shift in the desired mindset of Army personnel. The Army calls it a “Warrior Ethos” which is represented by the lines “I will always place the mission first. I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a fallen comrade.”

I see a problem with this, encapsulated in the transition from the word “soldier” to the word “warrior.” To me a solider is a duty-bound citizen, reluctantly defending his people (perhaps a romanticized view). A warrior is a killing-machine, a mercenary.

I don’t know what demanded this official change in the Army. I don’t know if the Army saw too many soldiers thinking for themselves and questioning superiors and their motives. But it’s disturbing to me that the people who are risking the most to defend the principles for which America stands are having those same principles denied them to an inordinate degree. I know that a military must be organized and disciplined, otherwise it would not be as effective in killing and destroying as it must be to fulfill its raison d’être. But there must be other ways to command discipline.

I think the new warrior ethos in the military repudiates humility and moral purpose, a consciousness that must accompany a soldier if he is not to go crazy as his conscience rebels against his duty. I think this is part of the reason we see more depression, suicides, PTSD, etc. in soldiers returning from Iraq than we did in those who returned from WWII.

I’m not a very good Christian Anarchist in that I think that war is occasionally (rarely) justifiable. But if my sons have to go to war some day, I want them to go as soldiers, not as warriors.

The first concerning point is whether the school system should be where children should “learn to be responsible citizens.” Citizenship is learned at the feet of parents through discussion, everyday choices, and exposure to influences. This can often give a very bad result. The school system may serve as a stopgap against crummy home environments, but this highlights the other problem with Mr. Bush’s comment: the system is too focused on “skills necessary to take advantage of our fantastic opportun[ity-abundant] society.” Citizenship should be taught in the home, but isn’t because the responsibility has been abdicated to the schools that are too concerned with job training. So where is the citizenship education happening? It’s not.

And the result? “A major study by the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University of the 2000 election asked respondents about six key positions held by Bush or Gore. Most Americans questioned could correctly identify only one of the candidates’ positions. In the average answer, 46 percent of those surveyed said they did not know and 16 percent got it wrong.

“Three fourths of U.S. citizens queried in another survey about key aspects of democracy could answer only 13 percent of the questions correctly, though many of the facts known by relatively small percentages of the public seem critical to understanding—let alone effectively acting in the political world: fundamental rules of the game; classic civil liberties . . . the names of representatives; many important policy positions of Presidential candidates or the political parties; and significant public policies’” (Give Me Liberty, Naomi Wolf, p. 177).

John Adams said, “The preservation of the means of knowledge among the lowest ranks, is of more importance to the public, than all the property of all the rich men in the country.” But we have abdicated our citizenship to those rich men. We don’t discuss politics and we don’t write to or otherwise pressure our representatives to do what we want them to. We don’t study or even read the Constitution or the writings of the founders. As long as we can get a tee-time and a hair appointment, we figure our country is being well-managed. Well, in a sense it is—being managed, that is. It’s being managed by an oligarchy, an aristocracy, because the rest of us either feel we have no say or don’t care.

“We the people” was a very profound statement in its time. Never before had a government been established by planters and printers. Even in previous attempts at democracy, successful to some degree, the governments were established by (and maintained for) an aristocratic elite.

We are letting our legacy be gently wrested from us by power- and money-hungry elites. And as long as we don’t throw up a stink about it, they’ll keep tugging. If it were a purse or wallet, we would scream, “STOP IT! THIEF!”

So how do we scream at these thieves? Our representatives aren’t as insulated as a lot of us think. Most of our state representatives have their cell phone numbers published (at least in their campaign literature). All of them, state and federal, will respond to a constituent’s message. And if you have a dozen signatures on a letter, you become a special interest group, a voting block, something to be attended to. Why? Because 1) you’re organized, and 2) you understand your role as a citizen, and they know you’re watching your legacy wallet.