[tcaudilllg]

Your opinion.

[RampantCoyote]

Nope. Not even close.

Politics have been increasingly shrill for the last six years here. But in the current political environment, the big political movement has actually been an uprising of the traditionally apolitical, the law-abiding middle-class who have come to realize over this same time frame (but mainly over the last four years) that those who have been playing nice and playing by the rules have been getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop by their elected officials on both sides of the political sphere.

But that realization hasn't changed their nature. They are still basically law-abiding, hard-working folks. And while the media has sensationalized their potential for violence, the vast majority of real violence or near-violence has actually come from those opposed to them.

I think the part that's really interesting - and a part that I am welcoming - is rather a potential re-alignment of the two-party battle lines that have been drawn over the last thirty or forty years, primarily over the fiscal axis. In that time, Republicans have typically stood for both social and fiscal conservatism, and Democrats have come to stand for liberalism along both of the axes. In practicality, the Republicans have failed pretty horribly on the fiscal front, and the Democratic party's tendency to push an ever more intrusive government to enforce social justice has bothered folks who's perspective of social liberty meant the government keeps its nose out of people's private lives.

So you have a lot of very disenfranchised folks who are socially center-to-liberal, and have a center-to-conservative view of fiscal matters and the role of government (the "Classical Liberals"). And you have some DEEPLY entrenched interests deeply vested in maintaining the status quo.

So if things keep going like they have been, we're likely to see a major realignment. It could be the creation of a major third party, forcing a realignment of the other two with the weakest of the three eventually dying out and fracturing. But more likely, it will be the two major political parties shifting around as they jockey for the center.

I see it getting ugly - the democratic process often is - but I don't see it erupting into real significant violence. Not like the 1960s, and definitely not like the 1860s.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[Rainer Deyke]

If the American people had the guts or even the inclination to stand up for their rights, the USA wouldn't have the political mess it currently has. The probability of an armed uprising with popular support is vanishingly small. Even an honest politician who fixes things from the inside seems more likely, and the system is set up to systematically prevent such a person from being elected.

[RampantCoyote]

Heh, quite possibly.

Here's a bit of amusement for how nasty politics have been in the past (I'm a fan of Reason):

Nasty Political Attack Ads, circa 1800

As to your point, though, I agree with Milton Friedman. The idea isn't to get the right person into office... the point is to make it so the system encourages the wrong person to do the right thing.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[tcaudilllg]

[Rainer Deyke]

Even if a perfect system was possible, you would still need the right people in power to actually implement it. The system certainly isn't going to overhaul itself.

[RampantCoyote]

Maybe that explains why I haven't been able to envision exactly what that kind of system would look like... ;) But then, my degree is in Computer Science, not Political Science. I write code to be efficient, but I think the lack of efficiency in government is a virtue that was by design by minds much more attuned to the problems than mine.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[Malignus]

There will be no civil war--the war was won years ago when Bush appointed John Roberts to the Supreme Court, setting the stage for Citizens United.

We have entered a new Gilded Age, except that the moneyed elites who manipulate our political system have gotten so good at it that the working class now lashes out against the only politicians actually trying to help them, like a bear caught in a trap blindly mauling the man who tries to release the mechanism. It's sort of pathetic, frankly.

[RampantCoyote]

I might take exception to a doctor who believes amputation to be the cure for a migraine headache, too, no matter how sincerely he believes he's helping.

I'm one of the folks you are probably describing. So I hope we can respectfully disagree. I've had a lot of Real Life hit me over the years which changed my views, to the point that I now consider government to be a "necessary evil" to be kept in check wherever possible, rather than the place to look to for solutions. It always seeks an excuse to expand its power, and never gives up that power without a (hopefully non-violent) fight.

What is disturbing to me is how many people seemed to share this attitude with me at one point, with the last administration's mad power-grab, yet changed their tune so quickly when someone else took (temporary!) possession of the oval office.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[Malignus]

Hey, sorry for the rant. I hope that didn't come across as disrespectful. I just get kind of fired up around politics. :)

As far as the need to limit government power, I halfway agree. Power takes many forms. To my mind, there are benevolent uses of government power, and there are malevolent uses of power. We definitely need to be concerned about one, less so the other.

The malevolent powers that Bush unleashed (presidential signing statements, extraordinary rendition, seizing the power to unilaterally strip people of constitutional rights by declaring them "enemy combatants," permitting torture, and so on) Obama has been regrettably inconsistent about reversing. To my mind, those are legitimate grounds for anger and concern about government tyranny.

But there are benevolent government powers, too. Like, for instance, ensuring that the oil industry doesn't destroy the world's oceans. Or ensuring that the sick aren't denied the treatments necessary to keep them from dying.

What I don't understand is that these, the benevolent uses of power, are the ones the Tea Party keeps railing against in the language of tyranny. I mean, come on. Extraordinary rendition? Yeah, that's scary shit. That trips the tyranny-o-meter. Keeping your grandmother from being denied coverage for her cancer treatment? Yeah, sorry, not tyranny.

[Rainer Deyke]

In an ideal system, the people control the government and the government controls the corporations. In the current system, the corporations control the government and the government controls the people. Since the government is not an independent actor in either case, I don't think it makes much sense to talk about how much power the government has. The government is merely the vehicle through which power is exercised. It has no will of its own.

I'm not even sure if I agree that politicians should have less power. If they weren't at the mercy of the corporations who fund them and the broken system through which they operate, maybe they would actually do something useful once in a while. Then again, maybe not. They would still be politicians.

I completely agree about benevolent versus benevolent power.

[tcaudilllg]

It should be easy to pass laws, but very difficult to repeal them. Now it's very difficult to either pass laws or repeal them, and as we saw with the health care debate opportunities for reform are largely contingent on factors (such as public revulsion over corruption and misgovernment) that have nothing to do with the reforms themselves.

I would make exceptions for civil rights laws, which may be passed to disguise prejudice. But the U.S. constitution in its current form does not work. Far too inefficient.

RC I'd like to hear about these first-hand accounts of the federal government getting in the way.

Overall I'm just disappointed by what is happening. We got to a serious low point on the corruption scale -- the congress today is probably the least corrupt it has ever been -- and yet we're poised to reverse that progress and elect probably five or six hardcore corrupt politicians (nay, common thugs) in two days.

I know Reid's not a particularly charismatic guy, and neither is Pelosi... but of the people gunning for their jobs one has BPD and the other is a regular JR Ewing. Electing them... sets the whole premise of republican government on its head.

[RampantCoyote]

I personally believe that the bulk of the anger and political din coming out these days is because the perspectives of both sides are being presented as over-the-top cartoonish sound bites. You get painted as either a naive hipster neo-marxist who would love the government to force the world at gunpoint to pay for your lifestyle that you did not earn, or you are an ignorant redneck corporate tool who clings bitterly to his guns and religion.

I imagine that stereotype does exist on either side, but it relatively rare. But as I've discovered from my blog - offering a reasonable opinion doesn't generate NEARLY as much traffic as a major rant. And so the media would really rather show the extremes to fire people up and get attention.

So if I might offer my perspective, and I'll let you judge whether or not it's reasonable.

First off, as far as "benevolent power" - I don't believe power is either benevolent or malevolent, it's all in how it's used. And from your perspective. The truth of the matter is that EVERY choice has a cost. Often unforeseen. Those who benefit from the use of that power in their favor may see it as benevolent, but others may see it quite differently.

A major example: Nanny-state laws. Like, say, videogames. There's one coming up before the supreme court from California soon. We just had one in Utah that passed the state House of Representatives almost unanimously before it ran out of time to be handled by the state Senate. (Saved by the bell...)

On the surface, they are full of all kinds of benevolent-sounding ideas. Think about the children! It's for the children! This law is to PROTECT children! Therefore, by a minor destruction of the rules of logic that the average person ignores, if you are against this law then you are AGAINST protecting the children, you don't care about the children, and you want to see children get hurt.

But the potential consequences of these laws are pretty damned malevolent in the eyes of game developers, game players, game stores, and even parents (and since I'm a developer who sells games on my site, and an avid gamer who has two daughters who game, I'm in quadruple jeopardy).

#1 - According to the Utah law which nearly passed, if - as a parent - I judge my teenaged daughter to be mature enough to play a rated "M" game, like Persona, I could be thrown in jail for up to 30 days, and fined.

#2 - Some of these laws have required that games get rated by a government-approved ratings board (which by default would mean the ESRB). Unfortunately, this would destroy indie gaming, as most of us can't afford to get an ESRB rating for every game we choose to distribute to the public.

#3 - For websites which sell games online, it's very hard to prove identity, and selling any game deemed "inappropriate" for a minor to a minor could result in stiff fines and possible jail sentences. What's "inappropriate?" Well, that might not be determined until after a lengthy and expensive legal battle.

#4 - And - duh - think of the chilling effect across the entire industry. You want to address a serious, grown-up subject? That includes a risk of fines, jail time, lawsuits, and costly legal battles. Forget it. It's much safer to make games about meaningless jewels and blocks, or unicorns and bunny rabbits.

So basically, the end of indie gaming, the end of digital distribution, and a chilling effect that tightly curtails the number (and quality) of games that appealing to adults. All to "protect the children" from a boogeyman that's largely been invented by people who have never played a video game in their lives.

That's the cost of the "benevolent power."

All of these things have costs.

And politicians really don't like talking about these costs.

That's why Social Security is an epic disaster right now, and so many politicians are hoping the economy will turn around soon enough and hard enough to hide that fact again long enough that the NEXT generation has to find the solution to an even bigger disaster. They turned it into a giant piggybank for funding their spending at effectively zero interest. Like any Ponzi scheme, it works great as long as the income keeps growing to match the payouts. But, as Bernie Madoff found a couple years ago, there's an inevitable end to that plan, and it never ends pretty, and a lot of people are gonna get screwed.

It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when and how bad. It's started to show this year - they've had to deal with payouts exceeding income, especially with all these baby boomers beginning to retire. The government knows they can't simply say, "Woops, sorry, we f***ed up" to the entire nation, so they are frantically scrambling for a solution... or a way to hide the problem another twenty years.

And these are the same guys who are seizing control of MORE and MORE aspects of the economy?

Sorry. You know, you can argue about the "evil" corporations all day long. But at the end of the day - unless they've managed to land a sweetheart crony capitalism deal with their favorite purchased politician - those companies have to ASK for my money. They have to try and earn it from me. And if they screw me over? (And they have!) I take my money elsewhere. Enough people do that, and they fail.

But the government? No, they have the authority to put a gun to my head and send me to jail if I do NOT give them money. They can take it from me without asking. What do I do, take my citizenship elsewhere? Possible, but a far, far more daunting task.

And really, where would I go? For all its faults, for all my tea-party style ranting about the government overstepping its bounds and driving up the national debt to unsustainable levels, this is where my heart is, and I believe it's a wonderfully free nation and that the American Dream is still very much alive (if a little battered).

And I think as long as we can have civil discourse with each other WITHOUT having everything filtered through the lens of media and political agendas, we can make it work. Maybe not according to our own visions of perfection, but we can find enough common ground to make it work.

No civil war necessary, thank you very much.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[RampantCoyote]

Anyway, here are some examples (though they are at the state / local level more than federal):

Why Can't Chuck Get His Business Off the Ground?

I was writing more, but it's really late and I didn't feel alert enough to write 'em. As far as first-hand accounts... I have a few (none horribly grievous, but all symptomatic).

Incidentally, Harry Reid, Glen Beck, and I all share the same religion. And they are both highly active within it, to my understanding. Unbelievable, huh? There really is an enormous common ground there. The problem is not one of having different goals, but rather strong differences of opinion on how those are best achieved.
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Tales of the Rampant Coyote - Old-School Game Developer talks Indie Games, RPGs, and the Games Biz

[Rainer Deyke]

I'd like to see fewer laws (which are restrictive by nature) and more government programs (which are helpful by nature, department of homeland security notwithstanding). Of course there are good laws and bad/wasteful programs, but in general, problems are better solved through proactive action than by restrictions. For example, I'd rather see the health care problem solved by offering a government-run service that competes side by side with the existing industry, than by attempting to regulate the existing industry. That way people who like the present system can stick with it, and those who hate the current system don't have to be satisfied with compromise measures.

The government is, in theory at least, the collective power of the people. There is something fundamentally dysfunctional when the collective power of the people is primarily used to restrict the individual freedoms of the people.