My wireless router is a perfect example of what's wrong with society: Many people are bullied into conforming with and paying for a product or service only because it's convenient for others.

My roommate would have a brain meltdown if they were required to configure their own IP address for the home network. I, on the other hand, have no problem changing my IP address in /etc/hosts and with ifconfig. In order to ensure easy home networking, however, the wireless router is set up to use DHCP. On my wired router, with dhcp enabled, connections would still work if I eschewed dhclient and assigned the addresses manually. With the wireless router, however, unless DHCP has been used the wireless router refuses to allow network access even with the MAC address in the routers ACL.

There's the premise which sets the stage. People who don't want to learn find conveniences which allow them to remain happily ignorant. While I have no problem with that it does cause a problem for me if I need to saddle my systems with dhcp in order to allow for their shortcomings.

DHCP may not sound like much but the premise is easily extrapolated from there. Eventually government entities are asked to fund systems which are convenient for the influential segment of their district. Even those of us who don't need or want the convenience service are required to pay for it. Often the service of convenience becomes more financially attainable than the system of education and self-reliance. Prohibitive controls may even be placed on self-reliance to bully people into using the systems of convenience.

Eventually all of society is pushed into mediocrity for the benefit of the three or four entities which own controlling patents on the systems of convenience.

Maybe I'll install bootp or pump and see if that will work. I really don't like dhcp anymore.

I woke up this morning and thought "Thank you God for another birth to another day to be alive."

The I checked my e-mail, and Slashdot, and took a shower. I stood outside for 15 minutes waiting for my carpool ride to work. I am a synthetic chemist. I'd like to be a medicinal chemist but my current employer doesn't work in the medicinal field. I was a medicinal chemist at the last employer and was quite happy with the job. The people at the last employer were part of a clique which spanned their collective graduate study groups and post-docs. Better than 3/4 of them had worked together prior to working there. I was the outsider and eventually it became painfully obvious so I left. Now I no longer work in medicinal chemistry but I still work in synthetic chemistry. I make stuff for people. At one time I cared what stuff I made for which people. I've since realized that it doesn't matter what stuff I make or which people it goes to. Inevitably it's just stuff that the people will use to create pretty marketing brochures for investors, contributors, and creditors. There's no big impact in helping society. There's only making stuff for people in order to receive a paltry paycheck with too much taken out in taxes. The nature of the stuff and the identity of the people don't matter. The only thing that really matters is an upper management that doesn't hear what I say until three weeks after I've said it. Once I'm three weeks over budget and behind schedule then what I said becomes what they say. They can pat each other on the back for saying what needs to be said to finish the project and I can be over budget and behind schedule. Did I say that three weeks ago? Could it have prevented me from being over budget and behind schedule? It's like the stuff and the people. It doesn't really matter. What matters is the paltry paycheck with too much taken out in taxes which keeps me warm and dry at night and allows me to eat so that I have the energy to step outside and wait for the carpool in the morning.

Maybe tomorrow I'll do the same thing.

Every night I go to sleep and think "Tonight I will die."
Every morning I wake up and think "Thank you Lord for a new birth and a new day"

Life's pretty bleak.

Laws are rules and regulations imposed on behavior in order to ensure compliance with the will of the governing body. While a strict definition of socialism implies that the implementation of any law moves the government into the realm of socialism it can be accepted that a minimal set of laws is required in a republic in order to prevent destructive chaos.

In the United States of America the legal system has grown out of proportion with the definition of a republic. The laws are many and varied and typically do not conform with the broadest definitions of the powers given to a republic. Why is it that in a nation that purports to be the pinnacle of free society that the legal system has been abused to become a tool more closely resembling the powers of a communist or socialist government?

There are two main reasons that can be cited for this transformation from a free republic to a domineering socialist state.

The first is the payment of elected officials. Elected officials, once paid by the government, are no longer officials working solely in the interest of the people or even the state. These elected officials have made the political arena their livelihood. Once their existence and propagation of their families becomes dependent upon their vocation as an elected official their own personal interests begin to weigh more and more heavily into their decisions in elected office. Their own personal associations--personal, business, social, and religious--begin to take shape and blend with the power that they exercise from elected seat. Since they are members of the subsect of society which will create and implement new laws their position grants them a certain amount of leveraged power. Other people--honest, dishonest, or neutral--will seek to infiltrate their trust and use them for ulterior motives. Elected officials are human and are susceptible to deception, fraud, graft and greed. If the choice comes between the passage of a law inconsistent with the powers given to a republic and the continued propagation of their family or the discarding of a law and the loss of special interest benefits associated with it there is little question which direction they will cast their vote. Dissidents would argue that elected officials need to be paid or else there would be no one running for office. This is precisely the point of a republic--to keep government small and to prevent government from interfering with the daily lives of the population.

The second reason is based upon the growth of the United States government outside the realm of a true republic. The United States government has become a money making institution. With the passage of the Gold Standard act in 1900 and its subsequent amendments, coupled with the liens taken out by the government to fund the wars in 1917 and 1940, coupled with the loans taken out and grants donated to large businesses to stave off economic collapse in 1929, and enhanced by the money making scheme of social security and its descendants, the government has no longer become an institution for the advancement of American culture. Rather the government has become an institution for the creation and maintenance of a class of people imbued with wealth. It is certain that the end goal was to imbue all Americans with this wealth but the fact is that not everyone can be wealthy. In a real world where some people have wealth and some people don't the government functions as little more than an artificial vessel for the distribution of that wealth. As in any system of contributed funding those closest to the central cache of resources are given the first right to the largest portions. Additionally, in a system where the major banks and lienholders for the government are given the power to control the terms of repayment through interest rates it is only a logical step to proceed to a system where the debt will never truly be paid off. Rather the system of debt is allowed to continue in the interest of continued artificial support of the entities to whom the debt is owed at the expense of those who are born, in subsequent generations, into the cycle of debt.

In terms of the laws of the United States of America this means, among others, one very important thing: that laws in the United States are selectively enforced to create both scapegoats and poster children. Poster children are necessary to maintain morale, support, and trust in a government which deserves none of these things. The government has already broken all semblance of trust by stepping outside the realm of the allotted powers of a republic. Poster children, people who champion large causes, do little more than keep the majority of the people preoccupied with the illusion that they're making advances for the greater good. The people are kept busy fighting for one cause or the next and very few devote any intellectual faculty to uncovering the greater offenses being committed by unscrupulous politicians for their own personal gain or the collective gain of their associates. Scapegoats are necessary to keep the people in check. As long as the public is amazed with the public display of a scapegoat on a regular basis they will continue to devote their attention to the poster children and will never have the courage to question the government even if they ever make the connections to realize the level of deception to which they are being subjected.

Selective enforcement and abuse is what any communist, socialist, or fascist state specializes in. A true republic needs no scapegoats or poster children. A true republic needs nothing more than the very basic set of laws. A true republic is what the United States of America lost when the government took advantage of its right given in Article I, Section 8, clause 2: "To borrow money on the credit of the United States of America."

Truth be told, if you could borrow money on someone else's credit, take the largest cut, and pass the debt on to them without any fear of lynching, wouldn't you? As long as the people are preoccupied with scapegoats, poster children, media celebrities, and the next politician to run for office they'll probably never find out who initially sold them into debt. Even if they do find out you could be kickin' it in the Caribbean long before they even start to look.

This is the real world.

Most of us have said it in the pledge of allegiance,"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all."

To the republic. What is a republic? A republic is a governing system which seeks to limit itself from the economic, social, and religious aspects of the nation as a whole. A republic does this for good reason. Amendment X to the Constitution of the United States of America, part of the original Bill of Rights, was the most concise attempt to ensure that we would always have a republic.

First we need to become familiar with what other forms of government exist aside from a republic and how they differ from a republic. A communist state is a republic that seeks to integrate itself into the economic aspect of the nation. A communist state does not concern itself with social or religious aspects of the nation. A socialist state is a communist state that seeks to integrate itself with the social aspects of the nation. In the course of humanity it has been all but impossible to separate religious aspects of a nation from the social aspects of a nation due to the intense integration of religious ceremonies and holidays into the social behavior of the constituents. A fascist state is any state that purports to be anything other than what it is for the purpose of placating the people.

Here in the United States of America we are purported to have a republic. It's in the pledge of allegiance and in the Constitution. How can we have a republic when the government routinely passes legislation which regulates the economy and the social behavior of the people? A republic seeks to avoid interacting with the economy or the social aspect of the nation. A government which, for whatever reason be it greed or goodwill, involves itself in regulation of the economic sector of a nation is communist.

The role of democracy has little to do with any of this. Democracy is a method for making a decision and little more. It is perfectly possible to democratically elect people of a communist or even socialist mentality.

The fact that the majority of Americans vehemently deny electing communist or socialist officials only says one thing--they've really elected fascists.