I have read, with admiration, Tennekes letter on Hermetic Jargon, and it follows quite closely with some observations I had made, though states it far better than my own poor power to add or detract. It did, however, bring to this poor idiot's mind some febrile maunderings that wandered through unlit halls for a few moments, bouncing off dusty neural pathways, then tumbling to my feet, bruised and dusty from their long journey.
Tennekes, with his comparison of hermetic jargon to the tower of Babel, may have struck upon something curious, a meta-state of communication. As research grows more specialized, it also grows more separate. The mental act of 'reaching toward creation', or toward God,(to use the biblical term) requires that specialization, due to the sheer amount of knowledge that is required to understand the initial states of things from the present state. However, human nature throws up walls to communication, to protect their secrets, their research, and their understanding from others, to some extent, as well as to conceptualize and compartmentalize the ideas in ways that can be understood by others of the field. Specializations within the field do much the same, protecting their demesne with lines of language. Eventually the whole fractures under its own weight.
This was an interesting concept to me, and also lead into my fascination with history, language, and the nature of law. Contracts are designed in such a way that the terms of the contract are set 'in stone' without substantial alteration and renegotiation of the contract. The terms of the contract are written in such manner that all parties involved understand the nature of the terms, or are explained in ancillary documents that hold the common, or 'lay' explanation of the contract itself. In the case of the constitution, these would be the Federalist Papers.
Law, like science, has its own disciplines, its own trenched earthworks to try to keep the lay person at bay, its own language, its own concepts which, whilst easily understood, seem arcane to the layperson. The terms of replevin, fee-simple obligations, tortfeasance, lessors, and such seem like another world entirely. But each has concepts irrevocably imbued within them, and concepts that can usually be readily defined.
One of the curious studies my idiotic mind has wandered into is the drift of language within the legal profession itself. It's curious to me how the terms have evolved across the centuries, from the system under the Magna Carta and William and Mary of Orange, to the revolution, to today. We have evolved what is literally a monopoly over the law, with wandering priests (attorneys) trying to tell us what the law is, with unique terms and language to protect the higher orders, with its own internal hidden knowledge and a high fee for entry.
Was this always the way? I cannot say that it was. The founders intended that any person be able to both practice law, and to speak it, to interpret it, as it was written. The terms of the contract (for such the Constitution was, a contract between the people binding the states to a new federal government, setting down limits for that government, and establishing the powers thereof, and limits of the states under the government, the consideration involved being the preservation of rights preexisting the Constitution, in exchange for the powers to preserve those rights) were set down at the time in stone, with specific legal meanings, corresponding to the common knowledge of the meaning at the time, explained by those Federalist Papers and Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England.
Why does this tie in with Hermetic Jargon? What happens when one controls the learning of the terms at the time, and maintains a monopoly over not just the law, but the practice and interpretation of law? Can one not, at that moment, cause a drift in definition, deliberate or accidental according to the whims and biases of the interpreter, far, far away from the original intent, as well as the original definition?
The purpose of the Constitution was to set down a single rule of law for all to follow, no matter their situation, their placement in life, their classification or circumstances. The term attainder at the time referred to any law, or act, or ruling or regulation that removed specific properties, including the property of life... the property of liberty, the property of property itself, and the property interest within the ability to defend all of those. From those four touchstones all rights arise.
Attainder was the process by which these were stripped away, by judge or by legislative fiat. Those property rights were sacrosanct, to be only taken where necessity and the public good demanded it, and then only with fair, just compensation at current market value of the property if the Government had not been involved at all. The original attainder took something deceptive.. the right to have property at all, and this was extended to the children under the Corruption of Blood. Without the right to have property, the property in life and liberty no longer existed. The person ceased to be, and was considered blackened, tainted, or stained under the law, and outside of its protection.
The founders intended to end this, forever. Under the laws of England, if the powers had remained, their own lives would be forfeit for attacking the Sovereign. Their properties could be seized, their livestock and chattel seized, or destroyed, and their homes and families disposed of as the crown saw fit.
They proposed a system of just and equal laws, laws which affected everyone equally, without regard for color, for race, or any of the myriad other considerations which affect our law today... but the ideal drifted. The understanding changed, and the interpretation.
Read through the Federalist papers. This idiot did, and it took a great deal of time to begin to understand them. The concepts are simple, deceptively simple.
One law for all, all under the law, all bound equally thereby, all bound not to remove the rights of their neighbors, bound not to cause them harm. For the purpose of those rights, and the preservation thereof, they bound themselves, their neighbors, the people, their friends, and the government to the same iron rule. No targeted law, no legislation designed to harm or benefit any specific class, and forever made sacrosanct those rights.
Crime was about harm. If harm was done, the neighbor had the right to defend against it by the appropriate force. If there were no recourse, and life were in danger, or believed to be, there could be no time to recourse to the law, and so a state of war existed. Once the state of war was ended, and there was time and place for recourse, that state of war ended.
It did not end, however, if the only available means for recourse was through the body of the one making the harm, for there could be no recourse if he were the means of appeal. No man can sit in judgment in his own case, and not be biased toward his own causes.
It leaves this idiot to ask... what recourse may we have against a monopoly on the Law itself, and the means to recourse? What is our recourse when the most interested parties control the gateway to the recourse? How does one obtain recourse when one does not know whom to address it against, or to?
Has hermetic jargon sealed away the Rule of Law from the hands of those that created it?
This idiot... wonders.
Read more!
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Friday, June 5, 2009
How did we get here? An idiot's take.
Our people, our nation have walked with open eyes, but quite blindly into the pit trap that is ahead of them. Shuffling forth like a crowd of grasping, hungry zombies after the nearby person atop the ice cream truck (with the music playing in the background for true horror), we've managed to destroy our freedoms, our liberties, and even our representation in our own government. So how did we get here? This article, and the next few articles will address this.
Suffice to say that we as a people got here with the best of intentions. "Good intentions", as said by Daniel Webster, "Will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters."
This is not, however, to accuse the putative 'masters' of being the only ones at fault. We tend to forget that we too have a place in the process, and our good intentions often feed into the grasping and manipulative hands of those who would harm us.
The keys are manifold, and often in our own hands. We see perceived injustice, and say 'there ought to be a law' while ignoring that there may well already be.
Here are the key events that got us here.
A good part of the start of this was at the very beginning of the nation, when the Articles of Confederation were dying a death of a thousand cuts from internal stresses and loose monetary policies. The Bank of England provided loans, and the people of the Several States used those loans to back currency, often at large inflationary rates, allowing foreclosures on the properties that ended up owned by the banks by their backers. Rebellion was occurring, no standing army existed, and liberty was as much a myth as any dragon or unicorn. The nation was protected solely by the might of individual arms, and the mustering of those arms took time.
The issue of slavery as well was on the minds of the population. While the founders wrestled with its thorny grasp, they recognized that men must be free. At the same time, they recognized the economic hardship that such a takings would cause in many parts of the nation, as well as recognizing that said nation was also going to be recalcitrant in giving up its property. They set a date for correcting the situation, a date of 1808. It was not addressed until sixty years later.
There were other forces at work as well. On July 14, 1803, the treaty authorizing the Louisiana Purchase reached Washington DC. Napoleon had ceded the lands involved for a cash sum of 15 million dollars, a bauble according to the value of the total land area, resources, and materials involved. This however had another effect, the effect of introducing new law through the Louisiana territory, the civil law under the Roman tradition. Regulations, definitions, and many other things began replacing the Common Law as early as 1838.
On November 6, 1860, a lawyer was elected president. His name was Abraham Lincoln. He selected members for his cabinet from among his political opponents, to get a number of opposing views. Their advice was often barbed with traps, particularly the advice of Stanton. The president often walked the tightrope between political destruction, and solvency. When the southern states pronounced their secession from the union, Stanton (the secretary of war) was counseling Lincoln that the union was inseparable without a dissolution, threatening the continuity of the United States as it was seen at the time. Without the Confederate states, the Federal Government lacked a simple majority, preventing any legislation from being passed, any work from being done, any declarations or resolutions from being accomplished. The Union was at a standstill.
Abraham Lincoln at this point declared an emergency, and declared Martial Law, under the assumption of emergency powers. The Supreme Court struck this down in Ex Parte Merryman, but it was ignored by Lincoln. Lincoln then by executive order passed legislation allowing the Congress to operate without a quorum, by suspension of the normal rules of operation, they could pass legislation 'without contention'.
In other words, if nobody was there to say no, then the writ was law. This situation still exists today, with the suspension of the rules, and passage without contention. It would appear that Lincoln was drafting legislation to return the U.S. to the constitutional situation while he was murdered, but this is beyond the scope of this document.
Numerous powers were attempted at this time, from the case of Texas v White, to the case of Cummings V. Missouri and Ex Parte Garland. The issue of firearms came up, and the north fought to maintain the individual right to keep and bear arms even for the 'insurrectionist' south.
The passage of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth amendments with interim (appointed) state governments complicated the mix. (Again beyond the scope of this document).
During this time an experiment with a national reserve bank ended, with another run on the bank. The experiment was repeated after the passage of an income tax amendment, and the passage of the Federal Reserve Act, in 1913. At this point, so long as the reserve bank did not have a run on too many banks at once, the system was seemingly secure. A financial boom time followed, the 'Roaring twenties' fed as well by the industrial complex of the First World War. Borrowing to invest had become common, and a fatal flaw. On Black Friday, the nation's fortunes plummeted. Loose monetary policy and lack of oversight of the Federal Reserve and lenders had caused an inflationary bubble, which popped and caused massive unemployment.
Due to this unemployment, the 'Bonus Army' came to Washington D.C. in order to attempt to gain an advance from their promised bonus bonds, due to the financial hardship. This left President Wilson in a bind, knowing the treasury did not have enough funds to pay the full amount of the bonds, and that the Federal Reserve refused to allow the bonds to be paid, he felt he had to refuse. Against orders, and ignoring repeated orders, the Army marched across the Potomac and chased the Bonus Army from the grounds of Washington D.C. (to this day rumors of atrocity abound, it's impossible to say what really happened, the official account was a child dead by tear gas, and several saber wounds in various people). Around the same time, numerous news and media agencies were bought up, forming a new 'associated press' that only had its independence in name.
This paved the way for Franklin Delano Roosevelt to gain the White House. In 1933, there was a national emergency declared by Congress, and the powers latent since Lincoln were activated once again, and have never to this date been deactivated, as the Congress in their panic allowed that only the president could declare an end to the emergency.
The president then declared a paper currency, dictated the seizure of all gold coins, bullion, and silver to back the currency and to be delivered to the Federal Reserve. The Internal Revenue Service was given extraordinary powers to seize property.
Desegregation in 1957, and use of the army in Little Rock did little to quell the powers of government.
We fast-forward a few years, to the Vietnam war, and a media more capable of using photography and film to influence the public. The power of the media and television, illustrations carefully chosen created a swell of anger in the people at home, against our soldiers and our government. The cold war begins, various presidents pass executive orders allowing the seizure of any property, including labor, and redistribution as the nation requires. The Watergate tapes, the scandals of multiple presidencies, a soaring national debt funded by the same bankers as back in the beginning, distracting the people through the media further, busily giving them people to focus on and hate, overemphasizing the problems of racial inequality, and legislation introduced to maintain it, claiming to be operating to remove it...
Are we really so much better off today?
Or are we all slaves already... this idiot wonders.
It would seem to me that government ownership and debt have made us entirely under their power, and as we must request permission to travel, permission to farm, permission for industry, permission for manufacture, permission to use our own lands and our own vehicles, permission to own our vehicles, our weapons, and even to have children and be married.. that we are fully owned by the government.
And this idiot wishes he were too stupid to be terrified of what that means.
Read more!
Suffice to say that we as a people got here with the best of intentions. "Good intentions", as said by Daniel Webster, "Will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters."
This is not, however, to accuse the putative 'masters' of being the only ones at fault. We tend to forget that we too have a place in the process, and our good intentions often feed into the grasping and manipulative hands of those who would harm us.
The keys are manifold, and often in our own hands. We see perceived injustice, and say 'there ought to be a law' while ignoring that there may well already be.
Here are the key events that got us here.
A good part of the start of this was at the very beginning of the nation, when the Articles of Confederation were dying a death of a thousand cuts from internal stresses and loose monetary policies. The Bank of England provided loans, and the people of the Several States used those loans to back currency, often at large inflationary rates, allowing foreclosures on the properties that ended up owned by the banks by their backers. Rebellion was occurring, no standing army existed, and liberty was as much a myth as any dragon or unicorn. The nation was protected solely by the might of individual arms, and the mustering of those arms took time.
The issue of slavery as well was on the minds of the population. While the founders wrestled with its thorny grasp, they recognized that men must be free. At the same time, they recognized the economic hardship that such a takings would cause in many parts of the nation, as well as recognizing that said nation was also going to be recalcitrant in giving up its property. They set a date for correcting the situation, a date of 1808. It was not addressed until sixty years later.
There were other forces at work as well. On July 14, 1803, the treaty authorizing the Louisiana Purchase reached Washington DC. Napoleon had ceded the lands involved for a cash sum of 15 million dollars, a bauble according to the value of the total land area, resources, and materials involved. This however had another effect, the effect of introducing new law through the Louisiana territory, the civil law under the Roman tradition. Regulations, definitions, and many other things began replacing the Common Law as early as 1838.
On November 6, 1860, a lawyer was elected president. His name was Abraham Lincoln. He selected members for his cabinet from among his political opponents, to get a number of opposing views. Their advice was often barbed with traps, particularly the advice of Stanton. The president often walked the tightrope between political destruction, and solvency. When the southern states pronounced their secession from the union, Stanton (the secretary of war) was counseling Lincoln that the union was inseparable without a dissolution, threatening the continuity of the United States as it was seen at the time. Without the Confederate states, the Federal Government lacked a simple majority, preventing any legislation from being passed, any work from being done, any declarations or resolutions from being accomplished. The Union was at a standstill.
Abraham Lincoln at this point declared an emergency, and declared Martial Law, under the assumption of emergency powers. The Supreme Court struck this down in Ex Parte Merryman, but it was ignored by Lincoln. Lincoln then by executive order passed legislation allowing the Congress to operate without a quorum, by suspension of the normal rules of operation, they could pass legislation 'without contention'.
In other words, if nobody was there to say no, then the writ was law. This situation still exists today, with the suspension of the rules, and passage without contention. It would appear that Lincoln was drafting legislation to return the U.S. to the constitutional situation while he was murdered, but this is beyond the scope of this document.
Numerous powers were attempted at this time, from the case of Texas v White, to the case of Cummings V. Missouri and Ex Parte Garland. The issue of firearms came up, and the north fought to maintain the individual right to keep and bear arms even for the 'insurrectionist' south.
The passage of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth amendments with interim (appointed) state governments complicated the mix. (Again beyond the scope of this document).
During this time an experiment with a national reserve bank ended, with another run on the bank. The experiment was repeated after the passage of an income tax amendment, and the passage of the Federal Reserve Act, in 1913. At this point, so long as the reserve bank did not have a run on too many banks at once, the system was seemingly secure. A financial boom time followed, the 'Roaring twenties' fed as well by the industrial complex of the First World War. Borrowing to invest had become common, and a fatal flaw. On Black Friday, the nation's fortunes plummeted. Loose monetary policy and lack of oversight of the Federal Reserve and lenders had caused an inflationary bubble, which popped and caused massive unemployment.
Due to this unemployment, the 'Bonus Army' came to Washington D.C. in order to attempt to gain an advance from their promised bonus bonds, due to the financial hardship. This left President Wilson in a bind, knowing the treasury did not have enough funds to pay the full amount of the bonds, and that the Federal Reserve refused to allow the bonds to be paid, he felt he had to refuse. Against orders, and ignoring repeated orders, the Army marched across the Potomac and chased the Bonus Army from the grounds of Washington D.C. (to this day rumors of atrocity abound, it's impossible to say what really happened, the official account was a child dead by tear gas, and several saber wounds in various people). Around the same time, numerous news and media agencies were bought up, forming a new 'associated press' that only had its independence in name.
This paved the way for Franklin Delano Roosevelt to gain the White House. In 1933, there was a national emergency declared by Congress, and the powers latent since Lincoln were activated once again, and have never to this date been deactivated, as the Congress in their panic allowed that only the president could declare an end to the emergency.
The president then declared a paper currency, dictated the seizure of all gold coins, bullion, and silver to back the currency and to be delivered to the Federal Reserve. The Internal Revenue Service was given extraordinary powers to seize property.
Desegregation in 1957, and use of the army in Little Rock did little to quell the powers of government.
We fast-forward a few years, to the Vietnam war, and a media more capable of using photography and film to influence the public. The power of the media and television, illustrations carefully chosen created a swell of anger in the people at home, against our soldiers and our government. The cold war begins, various presidents pass executive orders allowing the seizure of any property, including labor, and redistribution as the nation requires. The Watergate tapes, the scandals of multiple presidencies, a soaring national debt funded by the same bankers as back in the beginning, distracting the people through the media further, busily giving them people to focus on and hate, overemphasizing the problems of racial inequality, and legislation introduced to maintain it, claiming to be operating to remove it...
Are we really so much better off today?
Or are we all slaves already... this idiot wonders.
It would seem to me that government ownership and debt have made us entirely under their power, and as we must request permission to travel, permission to farm, permission for industry, permission for manufacture, permission to use our own lands and our own vehicles, permission to own our vehicles, our weapons, and even to have children and be married.. that we are fully owned by the government.
And this idiot wishes he were too stupid to be terrified of what that means.
Read more!
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