Wolves and Sheep

Recently congress was considering two bills intended to stop online intellectual property theft. The question is whether we want the government to regulate the internet, and to what extent.

Not surprisingly, creators of intellectual property tend to favor this legislation,  while website owners and the general populace tend to oppose it. As of now, the web siters and the general public are prevailing, and congress, for the time being, has backed off. But the battle is far from finished.

The creative community, including hollywood, the music industry, and the publishing industry will regroup and return, like the confederate army at Gettysburg.

It is however comforting to be demonstrably reminded that even in America mass protestation can influence the government, and more comforting still to note that mass protestation still occurs in this country.

Thomas Jefferson said : "If the people become inattentive to the affairs of government, the magistrates and the legislators will divide society into two classes, wolves, and sheep".

Having long since so divided ourselves,  (corporations and the people), we may at least derive solace that we the people, in theory, have the power, through our attentiveness to government, to lift up we the sheep, or to at least keep the wolves at bay, somewhat.

But the wolves are never kept at bay for long. their ravenous appetite for wealth and power are sometimes sated, but only temporarily.

On New Year's Eve President Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act, which is an annual presidential ritual. But the newest version contains ominous, wolfish provisions.

The U.S. military, it seems, now has the power to apprehend terrorists on American soil. All well and good, assuming that terrorists are willing to openly identify themselves. Do we want the government or the military to identify terrorists a priori ?

The murder of Abraham Lincoln was the worst possible blow to the defeated confederacy. John Wilkes Booth, in his misguided belief that he would be hailed as a hero for slaying a tyrant, failed also to understand that Lincoln would be replaced by a president (Andrew Johnson) from Tennessee who was determined, along with a vengeful congress, to punish the south.

The U.S. army occupied the south for twelve long years, finally removing in 1877 as part of an agreement that settled the disputed presidential election of 1876, and included the law that the military would never again be used as a domestic police force.

Now we have evidently undone the idea that the military must not police the American people.

Beware, fellow sheep: the wolves are never far away.

Please scroll sown for the other articles in this issue of The Truthless Reconciler! Thanks!