Heinlein Reader’s Discussion Group
Thursday 11-10-2001 05:00 P.M. EST
Governments in Heinlein
Here Begins The Discussion Log
You have just entered room “Heinlein Readers Group chat.”
AGplusone has entered the room.
AGplusone: Hi, Dave. I may have to leave early depending on when my dauther’
DavidWrightSr: Hi David
AGplusone: daugher’s class breaks up.
AGplusone: can’t type or spell
DavidWrightSr: daughter? 🙂
AGplusone: that one, yes!
KultsiKN has entered the room.
KultsiKN: Hello, everybody
AGplusone: Hi, Kultsi
DavidWrightSr: Been trying all day to upload the log from thursday. Can’t get tripod to work
AGplusone: that’s a shame … but doubt whether anyone will miss the words of wit for a day
KultsiKN: There’s been quite a lot of trouble on the Internet lately
Paradis401 has entered the room.
AGplusone: thanks for trying … how so, K?
SAcademy has entered the room.
DavidWrightSr: Hi Ginny. Welcome
AGplusone: HI, Denis, Ginny
SAcademy: Good afternoon
Paradis401: Hi all.
KultsiKN: Hello Ginny, Denis
AGplusone: I may have to leave early. My daughter’s class make break and I’ll have to drive to Westchester (near the airport) and pick her up.
SAcademy: Took a nap and my fingers aren’t working yet.
DavidWrightSr: I see that you did get a response from Gordon on your last post
KultsiKN: David, we’ve had trouble in our connections at work, as well as at home, and I got similar reports from my son in Sweden
SAcademy: Bill P. sent regrets
AGplusone: Yes, I did. Hope he’ll stop by.
AGplusone: Even if I’m back to fighting WW III with him on the other board
DavidWrightSr: What board is that?
AGplusone: the sff.net one
DavidWrightSr: Oh. Haven’t checked that one lately.
KultsiKN: Which one on sff.net? I’m not getting any messages on the Heinlein ones.
AGplusone: heinlein forum
SAcademy: Is that still running? I used to help them with
KultsiKN: No messages.
SAcademy: now and then
AGplusone: may be the same people, Ginny
DavidWrightSr: I see the ‘war’ now. I’ll have to read them later.
SAcademy: Chuck and Linda Coffin etc.
AGplusone: Coffin’s name is familiar
AGplusone: may very well be the same
SAcademy: He’s still working for the Army
SAcademy: Did you know him there?
AGplusone: haven’t seen him post lately … in quite a while. Shall I say “hi” to him.
AGplusone: ??
SAcademy: They bid us in for a breakfast at a con once.
SAcademy: That’s how we met them
AGplusone: I’ll let them know you remember there.
AGplusone: “Dee2” comes over to afh from there.
SAcademy: Does she?
AGplusone: yes …
AGplusone: nice person
SAcademy: She lives not too far from here.
AGplusone: Does she … ? That ‘bama girl is closer than I thought.
SAcademy: Wish I could still drive.
AGplusone: So do we. You need a driver, Miss Daisy!
SAcademy: I guess I do.
AGplusone: that was a lovely movie if you had the chance to see it
AGplusone: Academy Awards well deserved, etc.
SAcademy: Nope. I seldom see movies.
SAcademy: Can’t get to those either.
SAcademy: Denis said he was coming.
AGplusone: Gordon suggested that the government in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress was ‘libertarian’ in a Freedman sense … having run screaming from the ‘Chicago school’ of everything all my life, can anyone ‘splain to me what Gordon means?
AGplusone: I see him here.
Paradis401: I’m here Ginny.
SAcademy: Okay.
SAcademy: Well, the Libertarians have adopted Moon as a bible.
DavidWrightSr: David. I haven’t the foggiest. I have often wondered about why the libs think TMIAH is such a bible.
DavidWrightSr: Because, the government they get sure isn’t lib at the end
KultsiKN: Nor is it when Mike & Co are managing things.
Paradis401: Who is Mike and Co?
SAcademy: The computer.
Paradis401: Boy am I sloow today!
DavidWrightSr: Mike the computer and Mannie and Prof etc
DavidWrightSr: GMTA
KultsiKN: Mycroft Holmes, i.e. the computer, Mannie, Prof, Wye…
AGplusone: Gordon says: “I should be clear that I by “anarchy” I mean a “propertarian” anarchy, such as that described by David Friedman or Murray Rothbard.”
AGplusone: and then he goes on to say … lemme get it …
DavidWrightSr: Never heard the term.
DavidWrightSr: ‘propertarian’ that is
AGplusone: “I think that there are good reasons from evolutionary biology to argue that any anarchy will have some, and perhaps a great deal of, order.”
DavidWrightSr: As I argued in my essay, there was a great deal of ‘order’ to their anarchy based on ‘customs’
AGplusone: Do Friedman and Rothbard and the ‘libertarians’ believe that governments evolve biologically, like social Darwinism for example?
SAcademy: People accused Robert of being a social Darwinist.
AGplusone: I know, a thing that infuriated him.
SAcademy: Yes. it did.
AGplusone: But is there any argument that governments evolve biologically?
SAcademy: I still don’t really understand the term
SAcademy: Look at ours here lately!
Paradis401: I’ve given up on libertarians, I am now an antiquarian.
AGplusone: I don’t understand how an order as complicated as a government evolves ‘biologically’ … it would seem to me that whatever the shamans, the chiefs, the thinkers come up with would be what you’d get.
SAcademy: Bush reacts to the bombings.
DavidWrightSr: There would seem to be several ‘drives’, one towards monolithic and the other towards ‘democracy’. They seem to alternate back and forth or so it seems to me.
KultsiKN: Like an amoeba?
AGplusone: If Jeffersons, Adams, et al., get together, they invent whatever flavor they favor.
AGplusone: Yes, along that spectrum … I agree.
SAcademy: Which Adams?
Paradis401: What about the amoeba, Kultsi?
AGplusone: I don’t know any other spectrum, but I ‘spose there are some.
KultsiKN: Shrub reacting — like an amoeba.
Paradis401: I get it.
AGplusone: Very slowly, it seems to me.
AGplusone: But if you get a “constitutional convention” it would seem that it could quickly evolve.
DavidWrightSr: The reason I thought of this topic was realizing just how many different forms of govts were found in Robert’s works and that fascinated me.
AGplusone: You get either a Declaration of the Rights of Men, and something ‘new’ or not.
AGplusone: All invented, all artificial, per the ‘latest’ “thinking”
SAcademy: Isn’t government of any sort artificial?
AGplusone: I do see a sort of progression towards more complication, more ineffectiveness, more remoteness … in later works.
AGplusone: Has to be: it’s a compact between people.
Paradis401: I agree with Ginny. Phoney often rhymes wirh government.
AGplusone: There governments in IWFNE and Friday are: better not speak of them.
AGplusone: But all resemble a participatory democracy
AGplusone: or republic …
SAcademy: Whenever you get a lot of diverse people, you will get differences betwwen (or among) them
AGplusone: only each seems remoter
AGplusone: which is the common thread of warning in those later books
AGplusone: and, hence, the reason for the emigrations to the stars
SAcademy: Taking our quarrels with us?
AGplusone: of course we will
AGplusone: it’s our nature
AGplusone: just like the scorpions
KultsiKN: Only there are likely to be bigger problems, out there.
SAcademy: Do we have to take scorpions along?
AGplusone: unless we lay our sword and shields down by the riverside and ‘don’t study war no more’
Paradis401: No. Lazarus wouldn’t,
AGplusone: which militates against the notion that there is an evolutionary force working in governments
SAcademy: Can’t do that, David, we might need them elsewhere.
AGplusone: or maybe the scorpions are necessary traits
AGplusone: exactly
SAcademy: I am an anarchist. Robert said so. I don’t like any sort of government.
Paradis401: Good for you… Ginny!
AGplusone: difference between ‘anarchists’ and anyone else may be really only a matter of whose ox is being gored how hard
AGplusone: I think anyone is an anarchist
AGplusone: nobody likes to be told
SAcademy: Are you really?
AGplusone: I’m as real as I get
SAcademy: You believe in lawsw, dont you?
DavidWrightSr: I said that we are all ‘anarchists’ limited only by the constraints that we accept.
SAcademy: laws
Paradis401: Laws are for Lawyers
AGplusone: the difference is that 95% want to fill their rice bowls everyday … and 5% want to tell others how to fill, or how much to fill … control freaks.
AGplusone: and all are merely tinkering with the certain allowable slack
SAcademy: And I for one am heartily sick of buying rice for others.
AGplusone: leading the herds hither and yon in varying directions
Paradis401: I’m back to Bernardo’s notion of Government….. minimum.
DavidWrightSr: Most people accept the constraints of ‘the law’ except when they don’t for whatever reason that they might find justifiable
SAcademy: Anyone else ever met Robert Le fevre?
DavidWrightSr: or ‘custom’ or ‘upbringing’ or whatever other constraints that *they* accept
SAcademy: Or read his books?
Paradis401: Who dat Ginny?
AGplusone: the Loonie society of TMiaHM. Gordon sez: “It is true that[local society] is embedded in a larger social structure with a government, but this has little effect on the day-to-day lives”
SAcademy: He ran something called the Freedom School.
Paradis401: Where?
AGplusone: He’s the one who is/was the editor in Colorado Springs.
SAcademy: Yes.
AGplusone: Perhaps a model for Hugh Farnham?
SAcademy: For one of the Freedom newspapers. R. C. Hoiles’ chain
SAcademy: No, Hugh Farnham was modeled from Hugh Robinson.
AGplusone: the contractor?
SAcademy: Yes.
AGplusone: What did La Fevre have to say on the point?
SAcademy: He was opposed to any government.
SAcademy: He liked Rand.
AGplusone: okay, an ‘anarchist’ or a ‘libertarian’ as they style themselves
SAcademy: Remember Atlas Shrugged?
AGplusone: Atlas Shudder, yes.
SAcademy: The valley in Colorado where no one told anyone else what to do?
AGplusone: named “Utopia” perhaps?
SAcademy: No., Havent’ you read Atlas Shrugged?
AGplusone: how did they breed that trait out of the 5 %
SAcademy: If not, you really should.
AGplusone: no, I’m kidding, Ginny … I’ve read it.
Paradis401: I hate to say this, but I could never get through more than two pages of Rand although I have most of the books.
AGplusone: but I’ve always felt the worlds created by Rand are utopian
SAcademy: Try again Denis, She makes a certain amount of sense.
AGplusone: and, within the meaning of the term, not possible … in the ironic sense Bacon choose for the word
Paradis401: Should I try it while listening to Mahler?
SAcademy: No. Beethoven
SAcademy: OPr Wagner.
AGplusone: [I’d go with Wagner or Mahler]
Paradis401: Oh. Ok. I’ll do that.
SAcademy: Gotterdammerung.
AGplusone: right!
SAcademy: Did anyone know that I’m a Wagner fan?
Paradis401: The Song of the Earth according to the minstrel of the Spaceways.
AGplusone: everyone is a Wagner fan I thought, except he’s still ‘politically incorrect’ in Israel.
Paradis401: Oh Yes. You are Wagner’s heroine Ginny.
AGplusone: [but they still know his music anyway, just won’t play it publicly]
SAcademy: Sure. Brunnhilde.
SAcademy: Had the red hair anyway.
Paradis401: Didn’t Robert say that?
AGplusone: and the ‘magic helmet’?
SAcademy: No I had red hair before I met him.
SAcademy: No tarnhelm
AGplusone: shucks!
SAcademy: Sorry to bring personalities into this.
AGplusone: why?
AGplusone: they’re interesting
Paradis401: Why not? It’s fun!
AGplusone: with Le Fevre’s writings, are they published anywhere?
SAcademy: You’re not an anaarchist, Denis.
SAcademy: I think so. In LA. I think.
AGplusone: Neil would know?
Paradis401: I’m an antiquarian anarchist with cravings towards synthesis.
SAcademy: Yes. He will have them all.
SAcademy: I will see whether they’re still in print someday.
SAcademy: I think Brad would know also.
SAcademy: Do you get Prometheus?
SAcademy: They have given Robert about five of their top awards.
SAcademy: If I can find a copy around, I will send you one, David.
AGplusone: Okay: my daughter just called. Her class finally broke. Have to go get here, and bid you all adieu for tonight.
AGplusone: I’d appreciate it. Bye everyone ….
AGplusone: I’ll leave this running for backup David
KultsiKN: Bye, David — try to survive…
Paradis401: Bye AG.
SAcademy: Bye David.
AGplusone: I shall survive! bye
Paradis401: Who is They with the five awards for Robert, Ginny?
SAcademy: Libertarians.
Paradis401: Thanks.
SAcademy: Actually I thhnk they call themselves the Libertarian Futurist Party.
KultsiKN: Really organized? (if you can find that among the Libertarians)
SAcademy: Well, they’re libertarians. They don’t really believe in organization.
SAcademy: Neil Schulman just finished a new novel. I haven’t read it yet.
SAcademy: He wrote Rainbow Cadenza, and another one.
SAcademy: There’s a whole hive of them in L. A.
SAcademy: And many of them write, too. I am trying to think of the names which might be recognizeable.
DavidWrightSr: Laying aside the fact that you’d personally prefer no government, which of the forms that Robert described appeals to you the most?
Paradis401: Good question!
SAcademy: Maybe the one on Tertius.,
SAcademy: If there was one there.
DavidWrightSr: That’s about as close to no government that you could get 🙂
SAcademy: It wasn’t very visible.
KultsiKN: OTOH it was powerful
DavidWrightSr: As I recall only whatever rules the colony leader felt necessary
SAcademy: Was it? How?
KultsiKN: As David pointed out: despotism.
SAcademy: On Tertius??
DavidWrightSr: Not really, no indication that people had to pay attention to the rules 🙂
Paradis401: Lazarene Nepotism?
DavidWrightSr: I suspect that it was more a case of the people accepting the ‘constraints’ of the rules as usefule
DavidWrightSr: useful
KultsiKN: If they did not, the colony leader went out and kicked some ass.
Paradis401: And then?
KultsiKN: Well, they might kick back, but in the beginning it cannot be any other way: the leader must have absolute power and means to enforce it.
SAcademy: Then everyone did what suited them.
KultsiKN: Very close to lifeboat.
Paradis401: Well, I really liked that concept.
SAcademy: In a lifeboat, your life might depend on your doing what is needed, so it would be better to obey what the leader had to say.
KultsiKN: On a new planet the circumstances are likely to be a lot like that.
SAcademy: But there are laws that don’t require such obedience. N o lives depend on obeying them.
KultsiKN: We have such laws. A competent colony leader don’t make such laws.
SAcademy: What restrains him? Or Her?
KultsiKN: His/her customers may not be sunday school kids.
SAcademy: Leaders can be very dense. Look at Mr. Bush!
KultsiKN: Sense among leaders is just as hypothetical as interstellar colonies 😀
Paradis401: Sorry, I’m busy trying to referee a bush war between the cats. You can say that again about the current Bush. Does his momma know he’s so dense?
SAcademy: And if this were a dictatorship, I could be hanbged for that.
Paradis401: Well, there’s not always any sense in genetics.
Paradis401: I mean heredity.
SAcademy: Do you really think I’m geriatric?
SAcademy: Sorry, I misread your sentence.
Paradis401: I’m taliking about Bush. I’m more geriatric than you are me dear.
KultsiKN: A family (RL) over here: the father is an OK guy, the mother’s so dense she couldn’t pee into a boot with instructions, the son’s like her.
Paradis401: Well Bush Jr. inherited two recessive dense genes from his folks.
KultsiKN: LOL
SAcademy: Wedo ave families like that Kultsi. The Jukes and Kallikaks.
SAcademy: I remember studying them in college.
SAcademy: If those were theirreal names.
Paradis401: Were they deeply inbred?
SAcademy: Don’t recall that. I think so.
DavidWrightSr: Robert used the ‘Kallikaks’ in Between Planets, If I recall correctly
SAcademy: Lived in the Kentucky hills.
Paradis401: Happens. Lazarus would have frowned here.
KultsiKN: Not the ones over here, as far as I know — actually the only really shtoopid people I know.
Paradis401: Got lots of those here in the boonies.
Paradis401: And now they’ll teepee my garden!
SAcademy: Peop[le like that need to be restrained by law or whatever. Preferably maybe death.
KultsiKN: Teepee like in … what?
SAcademy: I don’t understand
Paradis401: Toilet paper in all the trees and shrubs.
SAcademy: That was supposed to mean “I love you.” We got that once in Colorado.
Paradis401: They do a lot of that here. Their idea of fun on Saturday night.
KultsiKN: With lots of beer, I ‘spose?
DavidWrightSr: High school kids do a lot of it here. Not sure what it is supposed to mean these days. House down the street got it last weekend
Paradis401: Perhaps. But they really enjoy wrapping your trees with it. Really dumb!
SAcademy: That was Halloween though
Paradis401: Here it’s year-round. We had better things to do after a beer in my day.
SAcademy: On Halloween stunts like that are allowable.
KultsiKN: Me too, Denis. Many other stupid things.
Paradis401: I’ve been lucky… probably the only house in town that hasn’t been teepeed. Maybe they think I have a shotgun or an AK-47.
SAcademy: And don’t you?
KultsiKN: When, in fact you just have the old .45…
DavidWrightSr: What about the ‘Brass Cannon’?
Paradis401: No. I have not fired or had a gun since I was in the army. But I can really spit.
SAcademy: Still have the brass cannon.
fgherman has entered the room.
DavidWrightSr: Fabulous!
fgherman: Evening all
KultsiKN: Hi, Felicia!
DavidWrightSr: Hi Felicia
SAcademy: Hello, Felicia.
DavidWrightSr: Now we can really get the lowdown on governments. Is Joel going to be joining us?
fgherman: He’s going out to pick up supper
KultsiKN: Goodness! AK-47 is one fine weapon.
DavidWrightSr: No offense intended to you or to Joel.
fgherman: I think we have the Chinese version of the AK-47
DavidWrightSr: Sorry I couldn’t get Thursday’s log uploaded. Tripod has been giving me trouble all day.
Paradis401: Won’t have guns around my house,,, but as I said… I can spit real good.
KultsiKN: Our army uses our own version of it. It’s good, accurate, seldom jams, easy to fix…
DavidWrightSr: The preferred gun of General Lee in ‘Guns of the South’
Paradis401: Oh. I do have two real good bows. Donno if I can still string em though.
DavidWrightSr: until he realized what kind of people were providing him with them.
DavidWrightSr: Felicia. are you familiar with out topic for tonight?
Paradis401: General Lee had an AK-47?
fgherman: Not really
DavidWrightSr: In ‘Guns of the South’ by Turtledove
Paradis401: Thanks.
KultsiKN: Alternate history?
DavidWrightSr: Bunch of South African white supremicists went back in time to change the outcome of the war between the states
fgherman: I love alternate history
DavidWrightSr: Me too
Paradis401: I love any kind of History.
KultsiKN: How’s Joel’s book coming along, Felicia?
fgherman: Be doing better if his computer had been working
fgherman: Just got back from the shop last night
KultsiKN: MS hiccup?
fgherman: hardware problems, hopefully corrected
KultsiKN: Happens. Usually at the most inconvenient times.
fgherman: Too true
DavidWrightSr: Hope he had good backup
fgherman: Incredibly redundant back-up
KultsiKN: Good.
KultsiKN: Too often it’s a corrupted disk and a corrupted backup.
fgherman: Just a corrupted writer
Paradis401: That’s why I back up all my files to CD.
KultsiKN: Mirror RAID is the cheapest nowadays.
fgherman: We just set up a RAID system
KultsiKN: with disks starting at 20G the CD’s just can’t cope.
DavidWrightSr: Any more comments on topic?
KultsiKN: About government?
fgherman: Hey, big government is back
DavidWrightSr: In particular, the various forms that Robert wrote about.
DavidWrightSr: and why?
Paradis401: I wonder if Athene wasn’t a big part of the government on Tertius.
KultsiKN: I feel that the uppermost government in those books was self-government.
AGplusone: how ’bout: Government is a figment of our imagination, designed to entertain and amuse us, at every evening in Tunnel in the Sky ….?
KultsiKN: WB, David.
Paradis401: Came back through the Tunnel AG?
AGplusone: And that when the rubber has to met the road, responsible leaders take over, act as dictators, and then retire like Cincinatus. Thanks.
AGplusone: meet
AGplusone: And that the problems of government arise when people forget that’s it’s supposed to be an amusement, not an addiction.
KultsiKN: Isn’t that how it should happen?
AGplusone: Look to the juveniles, I always say.
Paradis401: How about the government of the Martians in Red Planet and Stranger?
KultsiKN: That’s what I meant some lines previous.
AGplusone: And that government leaders get in trouble when they forget to enlist the help of their followers … but instead are out there fighting with the chads themselves.
SAcademy: Now that was an anarchy.
Paradis401: Yup!
AGplusone: Chad was Jock’s little brother, or was that a crony?
AGplusone: Bruce …
AGplusone: And to complete my analogy, Dub-yah is getting into trouble by trying to fix this thing hisself
KultsiKN: 😀
AGplusone: as if it’s a political campaign.
Paradis401: Numnuts despotic nepotism?
SAcademy: He needs to get rid of his national security adviser.
AGplusone: Condelessa … what else is new?
fgherman: He needs to get rid of his Secretary of State
Paradis401: Yaymen to that.
AGplusone: Except the scary thought is he’s doing what they wish because he can’t think of anything better.
KultsiKN: The next step: he needs to get rid of.
Paradis401: Does that man remember where they put his silverware?
fgherman: He needs to hire Guiliani
AGplusone: “Dazed and confused” Five of his daddy’s cronies elected him … and we’re going to have to suffer.
Paradis401: That might help.
fgherman: I’m not sure there’s anyone around who could do better under the circumstances
SAcademy: Does that mean that everyone here is of a single mind?
fgherman: And remember, I despise the man
AGplusone: that’s a real scary thought, Felicia
fgherman: Tell me about it
Paradis401: It’s frightnight!
KultsiKN: The problem is: you (as the Us of A) have no definite enemy.
fgherman: He’s having greatness thrust upon him; I hope he lives up to it.
AGplusone: or the entire culture is the enemy, take your pick …
SAcademy: Right, Kultsi!
AGplusone: and, if so, there’s only one humane solution to that.
SAcademy: What will happen if the Florida election is turned upside down?
AGplusone: Unless we want to plow their fields under and sow salt
fgherman: So, how about that social contract?
AGplusone: I dunno … alterate theories of history are fun to consider but only if there’s a point.
SAcademy: Which one, Des Cartes?
fgherman: Hey the Carthaginians didn’t bother the Romans after that
Paradis401: Miami will move to Cuba?
AGplusone: Sumbuddy is going to have to have greatness thrust upon them
SAcademy: You can’t mean Castro!
AGplusone: he deserves them and vis-a-versa
Paradis401: No. I was just kidding. What about the Florida election?
fgherman: It’s seems to me from the reading that Robert Heinlein was a big believer in the social contract
fgherman: brb
AGplusone: I think we have a social contract, one that demands to be followed, and it sez: Congress declares wars
SAcademy: The results of the Florida presidential election will be made public on Monday
SAcademy: Right, David!
KultsiKN: About time
AGplusone: what: they have the real results compiled by whom?
Paradis401: And then?
AGplusone: nuthin’ changes … we go on
SAcademy: I don’t know who did it. The results will be out Monday.
fgherman: They did vote to give the president leeway to conduct this action
DavidWrightSr: And then. nothing. It means absolutely nothing. Bush is the president and will be until either next election or the one after that.
Paradis401: Sad. And scary too.
AGplusone: when?
AGplusone: in ’72?
KultsiKN: A declaration of war would be alright — but upon whom?
fgherman: Right after the WTC & pentagon attacks
AGplusone: de facto government of Afganistan would do for starters
SAcademy: That is what I’ve been saying, Kultsi.
KultsiKN: Agree.
AGplusone: they passed a resolution?
fgherman: yes
AGplusone: saying what?
fgherman: I don’t remember exactly, I’ll go look it up.
AGplusone: that doesn’t comply with the 72 law
SAcademy: Is that the War Powers Act?
AGplusone: that requires a report in 60 days and either a Declaration of War, or Congress decision to allow the President another 60 days, or withdrawal.
AGplusone: yes
SAcademy: I don’t know the provisions of that Act.
Paradis401: Instead of MUSH we get mush-mouthing.
DavidWrightSr: In order not to limit our eventual targets, a declaration of war would have to be pretty general, wouldn’t it?
DavidWrightSr: or make a new one each time we target someone else?
SAcademy: How can a president, or even Congress delcare war against a government that doesn’t exist?
SAcademy: Call it Bin Laden.
Paradis401: Unfortunately, like drugs, the terrorist have infiltrated everywhere.
DavidWrightSr: I understand we did it against the Barbary Pirates who were not a government
AGplusone: 50 U.S.C.§ 1541et seq if you must read it
AGplusone: Actually, we’ve declared war only five times in our history
AGplusone: despite sending troops in over 120 times
AGplusone: that was one of the reasons they passed the War Powers Act in 1972
KultsiKN: David, your font…
SAcademy: High time, too!
AGplusone: Congress can do whatever it wishes. I declare this a WAR is all they must say.
AGplusone: that better Kultsi?
KultsiKN: much
SAcademy: Yes!!!
KultsiKN: I think what’s established this far:
AGplusone: Call bin Laden the de facto government of Afghanistan, call it a war against the Taliban, Al Qaida, or whomever you wish. It’s a war because Congress sez so … lookie there, see the soldiers march off, darling …
KultsiKN: 1) Osama bin Laden is behind the WTC attack
SAcademy: You know that for sure, Kultsi?
SAcademy: We need proof.
KultsiKN: Hasn’t he admitted to that?
AGplusone: If he didn’t admit to it on TV after the attacks Ginny, he deserves to get what he gets based on his stupidity
SAcademy: Not that I know of.
AGplusone: What he said was good enough for me
DavidWrightSr: As I understand it, he virtually admitted to it on one of his tapes.
DavidWrightSr: Although, he is denying it now.
AGplusone: and that’s good enough … I’m not trying a case, I’m conducting (or urging the conducting of) a war
AGplusone: doesn’t require full constitutional due process …
SAcademy: Not only that, but we paid for it all through oil purchases
AGplusone: an equivocal admission is enough for me …
KultsiKN: 2) Taleban has stated to be fully in support of bin Laden
AGplusone: sounds like the Axis to me
Paradis401: It’s just back to the days of Vietnam. Pretend action while soldiers die.
AGplusone: That’s why I want a declaration of war, so the President can have ‘greatness thrust’ upon him if he continues this … and you know exactly where it’s going to be thrust
KultsiKN: 3) Afghanistan is one helluva hard nut to crack
SAcademy: Is this insurrection or sedition?
AGplusone: ‘ … it’s a hard knock life for us … ‘ all wars are hard nuts to crack.
AGplusone: no wars are won on the cheap
AGplusone: except Grenadas
Paradis401: It’s anger here, methinks. Justifiably so.
KultsiKN: Many have tried, none has succeeded.
AGplusone: Russia thought they’d crack the Mannerheim Line cheaply, din’ they, K?
KultsiKN: Touché
KultsiKN: ’twasn’t the line, ’twas the guys.
AGplusone: so instead of a ‘new kind of war’ that Shrub can ignore when it suits him, I was Congress to declare a War and tell him that’s his job, not finagling tax breaks for his cronies
KultsiKN: I agree David. It would be better that way.
AGplusone: Lyndon Johnson screwed up Vietnam by spending most of his time trying to advance The Great Society … can’t we learn from that?
AGplusone: focus …
Paradis401: Obviously Bush can’t see it. Too many trees?
AGplusone: sure
AGplusone: and not a clue how to lead
Paradis401: God help us!
KultsiKN: A declaration of war would give the acts of the US another kind of legality.
AGplusone: but he’s a nice smarmy sort who looks good on camera
AGplusone: exactly, K
KultsiKN: Now, it’s like poking a finger into a dark hole… do I need to spec more…
AGplusone: and what, exactly, do we gain from not declaring war?
AGplusone: “we” not Bush
Paradis401: Nothing. We lose a lot.
KultsiKN: Illwill.
AGplusone: Ill will from whom?
KultsiKN: The Rest of the World
AGplusone: do we lose it, or gain it, from not declaring war?
Paradis401: We gain contempt by inactivity.
AGplusone: I think so … paper tigers galore …
KultsiKN: Sorry, David; read you wrong. If you do not declare war, you lose.
Paradis401: I agree with Kultsi.
AGplusone: we lose what … good will or ill will?
KultsiKN: Good will
AGplusone: we lose good will the longer Bush procrastinates
AGplusone: okay, I agree
AGplusone: the rest of the world is wondering what I’m wondering “What in the hell is he doing?
AGplusone: and why?”
KultsiKN: Yup.
Paradis401: As the oriental would say… we lose/have lost Face.
KultsiKN: In fact, that’s not only in the Orient.
Paradis401: True.
AGplusone: Well, you can’t fool all of the people some of the time if you’re simple and straight-forward …
AGplusone: and ask for a Declaration of War.
AGplusone: Maybe the truth of the matter is it wasn’t in his plans for a war to be thrust upon him and he’s awaiting instructions from his minders.
SAcademy: How many more days dies he have to ask?
AGplusone: September 11 plus 60 days
SAcademy: It’s almost two onths now.
SAcademy: Tomorrow in fact.
AGplusone: very close indeed
DavidWrightSr: Wouldn’t that be 60 days from our first attacks on them?
AGplusone: if there was a resoltion as Felicia suggests, perhaps sixty days from it, or sixty days from what
David suggests
SAcademy: Don’t know.
AGplusone: but SOON
SAcademy: Tomoorw is 60 days.
Paradis401: Mid-next week?
AGplusone: write your congressmen folks
AGplusone: and senators
SAcademy: What can they do to Bush?
SAcademy: Remove him?
KultsiKN: BTW: if there is a declaration of war, I’d expect some difficulties in continuing communication like this.
AGplusone: exactly
AGplusone: I doubt it
Paradis401: That worked real well with Clinton.
AGplusone: well, you simply don’t impeach a president for a blow job Denis
Paradis401: I would.
Paradis401: For being stupid.
AGplusone: well, not enough people agree …
SAcademy: It’s simply a law, not the Constitution.
AGplusone: and all presidents are stupid … they ran didn’t they?
DavidWrightSr: You are not going to get any impeachment from this congress David. Not with the approval rating he has now.
SAcademy: It’s dwindling.
AGplusone: But give him time … the only reason people ‘approve’ of him now is they’re trying to support the national interest in defense of this attack.
AGplusone: If he continues to piddle around …
DavidWrightSr: What more, besides a declaration of war, would you want him to do?
AGplusone: act like a fucking leader, for goodness sakes, instead of a puppet
Paradis401: I think this nation is still in shock. Wonder when they’ll come out of it.
SAcademy: Who is running the country?
AGplusone: we have, or we don’t have, a serious threat against our security
DavidWrightSr: And do what?
AGplusone: either he does something serious about it, instead of paying lip service to the threat …
DavidWrightSr: What?
SAcademy: Does all this surprise you, Kultsi?
AGplusone: or he should resign. Ask for a declaration of War. Ask for a million volunteers. Mobilize. Fight and end the WAR.
KultsiKN: Not really
SAcademy: I thought it might. It’s free speech.
Paradis401: I agree with AG’s last comment.
AGplusone: Then he can get back to being politically correct and paying back his daddy’s cronies for influencing his election.
KultsiKN: Ginny, don’t you think we have it as well?
SAcademy: Of course you do.
DavidWrightSr: I don’t agree. What would we do with a million volunteers?
SAcademy: Keep them from staarving. ddavitt has entered the room.
DavidWrightSr: Or are you expecting to invade Iraq, Iran, and everybody else? ddavitt: Hi everyone
AGplusone: Oh, we could train about forty divisions of infantry, land them in Haiffa, and look around to see what needs to be sat on ….
KultsiKN: Hello, Jane! ddavitt: Finally got the kids to bed…
SAcademy: Hello, Jane. ddavitt: David should be landing in San Jose soon David
AGplusone: exactly … why do it again and again and again … you want war on the cheap, Dave?
Paradis401: Hey Jane. We have war on the bench here. ddavitt: It sounds fierce! What have you been discussing?
KultsiKN: War
Paradis401: I’m ready to cry or enlist. ddavitt: Not government?
KultsiKN: errrh… government
AGplusone: Well, in the final estimate, that’s what we have governments for … all the rest is amusement that you discuss over the fire in Tunnel in the Sky, each evening. ddavitt: Can you have a war without one?
AGplusone: not very well
AGplusone: At least one side has to have one
DavidWrightSr: No I don’t but I don’t think that it would work the way you think it would. Right now we nominally have most of the Muslim world more or less on our side. Get them all mad and there are a billion of them.
AGplusone: So …
DavidWrightSr: I don’t want a billion terrorists out there. Just a few hundred or thousands are enought
SAcademy: Does everyone think we should post this discussion?
Paradis401: Perhaps not.
DavidWrightSr: Why not. as you said ‘free speech’
AGplusone: I’m not after their “hearts and minds”
David. I think the appropriate part that I want causes them to follow you wherever you want.
KultsiKN: No. Much too sensitive.
AGplusone: I don’t care.
KultsiKN: There Be Realities.
DavidWrightSr: Don’t count on it.
Paradis401: Ok. Why not post it. Freedom of speech. I’m not scared of mamma Bush.
AGplusone: Neither am I
AGplusone: nor of Osuma bin Maniac
Paradis401: I think we have a majority if favor of posting here.
AGplusone: The problem we have is: either this is a war, and to be conducted as one, and won; or this is a scam. I don’t think three planes flying into the towers and the pentagon was a scam.
Paradis401: Ginny. Advice please?
AGplusone: But I think our President needs some guidence from the trenches, not from the ivory towers.
AGplusone: Nor from the PTB
SAcademy: I feel that many of us have been somewhat indiscreet, and if this IS warm we coould wind up in jail
AGplusone: not it’s not
DavidWrightSr: David I agree it was no scam. I just don’t think that what you are suggesting would do any good in the long run.
AGplusone: well, as I said, it’s a problem that we either face now, or face again and again and again …
AGplusone: I’d rather solve it now
SAcademy: Agree.
AGplusone: They can either join in and be Adenhauers or they can get out of the way …
KultsiKN: I with AG — this terrorism thing has been going on for far too long.
DavidWrightSr: I agree, but massive invasion of the middle east through to middle asia is going to solve it.
DavidWrightSr: is — is not
AGplusone: but I think the only solution that is a solution is land, seize the ground, and administer the occupation exactly as was done 1945- ???? until they don’t have any more terrorist weeds in their garden.
KultsiKN: I suspect most Muslims do not agree with it either.
SAcademy: Certainly not the Indonesians!
AGplusone: If it’s done in the middle East, do you think the Indonesians are going to miss the words on the wall?
KultsiKN: Or Malesians or the ones in S’pore — it interferes with making a buck.
DavidWrightSr: That’s what I said. They don’t agree with, but if the bulk of muslims really do perceive this as a war against Moslem, they will
SAcademy has left the room.
AGplusone: It’s not a war against Muslims in the sense that it wasn’t a war against Germans and Japanese … if that heartens you.
KultsiKN: So, it needs to be a war against terrorism, and stated as such.
AGplusone: But it is a war against terrorism in exactly the same way it was a war against the Nazis and the Code of Bushido
DavidWrightSr: You and I know its not, but if *they* really perceive it is then that will change
AGplusone: and if all the lawyers in Congress can’t come up with the appropriate language I think a man in the street might give them a hand.
SAcademy has entered the room.
AGplusone: or maybe a bright twelve year old
joelrmpls has entered the room.
SAcademy: Bumped. First time in a long time!
AGplusone: Welcome to “Operation Haiffa” Joel
fgherman: Howdy Joel
SAcademy: Hi, Joel
KultsiKN: Hello, Joel!
AGplusone: Felicia give you a log to read?
AGplusone: I say again, David: “I don’t want their hearts and minds” We wasted two wars doing that. I want that other part, and their hearts and minds will follow.
fgherman: er, no
ddavitt: Think I’ll go and unwind with a vodka; catch you all later.
AGplusone: We wasted the best efforts of two generations ….
fgherman: Good night
ddavitt has left the room.
DavidWrightSr has left the room.
AGplusone: Goodnight Jane
Paradis401: Back to the question of posting. I think Ginny has a point in being cautious. Some vulnerability here for some of us here. Me. I don’t care.
AGplusone: I don’t either
AGplusone: I’ve said what I’ve said publicly on posts
fgherman: My views are known
AGplusone: makes no difference to me
Paradis401: Did we scare anybody off?
KultsiKN: Can’t hurt me
fgherman: (and to the left of Joel’s)
AGplusone: I dunno …
AGplusone: I think maybe we bored Jane
fgherman: Canadians…
Paradis401: No, I think we may have scared her. I lived through the War Powers Act in Canada.
AGplusone: I think Dave just got bumped
DavidWrightSr has entered the room.
DavidWrightSr: Are you still here?
AGplusone: speak of devil … yes, I’m still here
fgherman: yes
Joelrmpls: Hell, Jerry Pournelle’s views on some matters are to the left of mine.
AGplusone: “Sing Heavenly Muse ….”
fgherman: now *that’s* a scary thought
Joelrmpls: But, then again, he used to be a communist . . .
Paradis401: Isn’t Jerry an old Navy man?
SAcademy: I think “Arma virumque cano” is more appropriate.
Joelrmpls: Army
AGplusone: well, Genghis Khan’s views are somewhat to the left of some of yours … Jarhead, I thought
AGplusone: Me, I’m a bona fide certified liberal, ask anyone!
Paradis401: Thanks. Cave canis? Ginny.
Joelrmpls: Nope; USArmy artillery.
SAcademy: No, Jerry was Army
fgherman: You’ve just been accused of being a conservative, Joel
AGplusone: okay
Joelrmpls: In some ways, I am.
Joelrmpls: I think of myself as a Jackson Democrat, though.
DavidWrightSr has left the room.
SAcademy: It’s cave canem.
Joelrmpls: Scoop Jackson, not Jesse.
Paradis401: Not if you only have one.
AGplusone: “I sing of men and arms …. ”
fgherman: You sure it’s not Andrew?
SAcademy: Right, David.
AGplusone: or, to retell my joke “A man went out with a gun and a dog.”
DavidWrightSr has entered the room.
Paradis401: Now you sound like Lazarus.
DavidWrightSr: Wow. Something strange going on. I’m getting bumped all over the place
AGplusone: It’s Bush ….
AGplusone: trying to stop this!!!
DavidWrightSr: David can you send me log to fill what I lost
AGplusone: Absolutely.
KultsiKN: DW, I have the complete log, as does AG…
Paradis401: It’s Big Mamma.
AGplusone: Big Nanny
DavidWrightSr: He wouldn’t have bumped me. I’ve been defending him:-)
DavidWrightSr: Or is that just typical government efficiency?
AGplusone: but he can’t tell the difference between
Davids
Paradis401: I for one, forgive you David W.
DavidWrightSr: Thanks
AGplusone:
Paradis401: 😀
AGplusone: 😉
SAcademy: Those don’t show ona log.
AGplusone: I was, as all can see, heavily influenced by Warner Brothers cartoons
DavidWrightSr: Of course having the complete log won’t do any good if I can’t get them uploaded
fgherman: a very venerable influence
DavidWrightSr: They do show, but only as ; an ) and so on
Paradis401: They so nubile… like the shrubs!
DavidWrightSr: If I had the time, I could replace the characters with .gif files, but time is of a shortage around here
AGplusone: ah, yes … well, next meeting is going to be “Pretty Boys in Heinlein” ….
fgherman: I don’t know of a place where time is of a longage
KultsiKN: TEFL
DavidWrightSr: sehr wahr.
AGplusone: and Denis is going to help me co-host, but I’ll make a leadoff tomorrow …
fgherman: Like Oscar “Scar” Gordon?
AGplusone: Like him, and a few others
Paradis401: You’ll like the next topic… felicia.
SAcademy: Nite all. Have to run.
fgherman: Goodnight Ginny
DavidWrightSr: Nite Ginny.
Paradis401: Bye Ginny.
AGplusone: sorta twist on the Heinlein uberWoooMan
KultsiKN: Nite, Ginny
SAcademy has left the room.
AGplusone: Night Ginny
fgherman: I’m only hot for a man’s mind, ask Joel
AGplusone: Well, you don’t know me!
Paradis401: Make that Pretty Men David.
fgherman: Big IQs make me swoon
AGplusone: eh … ‘pretty boys’ vs. ‘pretty men’ … watzdadif?
Paradis401: Felicia?
fgherman: Yes?
AGplusone: I better stay at least 1,000 miles away then … my IQ is nearly as big as my ego
fgherman: I’ve been married to Joel for 23 years
AGplusone: lucky guy
fgherman: He is
Paradis401: Yes!
AGplusone: fortunately I have an evil overlord spousal unit
AGplusone: for the past 37
fgherman: Darth Wife?
AGplusone: sorta
DavidWrightSr: It’s 10 past the hour. Any more thoughts on Robert’s governments?
AGplusone: they’re fun!
KultsiKN: Was sitting beside my ex last night
fgherman: His governments seem to work
KultsiKN: listening to the concert our daughter and the group were giving
AGplusone: to provoke thought
fgherman: Which seems overly optimistic
AGplusone: Thank you all for suffering through my current hobby horse …. 😉
Paradis401: Well we tried. Good discussion!
KultsiKN: He did have a point over the RL govenrments.
AGplusone: I felt it fun
KultsiKN: He got to invent them 😉
AGplusone: and I’ll see you all on the cartoon hour in two weeks …
Paradis401: Amen to that!
AGplusone: reading Le Carré’s latest this week
AGplusone: La Carré’s?
KultsiKN: F or M?
Paradis401: M… Le
AGplusone: male … the Sumthin’ or other Gardner
fgherman: night all
fgherman has left the room.
AGplusone: nite all
DavidWrightSr: Nite David
KultsiKN: Nite!
Paradis401: Night all. Thanks.
DavidWrightSr: Kultsi send me your copy of the log too please, in case david forgets.
KultsiKN: K!
Paradis401 has left the room.
DavidWrightSr: Not that I think he will, just want to be sure.
DavidWrightSr: Log officially closed at 8:15 P.M. EST
AGplusone: got it … sent
DavidWrightSr: Sorry I thought you had already left.
AGplusone: not yet, but ….. G’nite from New York,
David
DavidWrightSr: I’m gone Folks.
AGplusone has left the room.
DavidWrightSr: night Kultsi, Joel
KultsiKN: I think you have it all, Dave?
DavidWrightSr: I’m going tohave to fill in the part when I got bumped.
Final End Of Discussion Log
