[sudo-discuss] [sudo-announce] forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings

Wed Nov 13 13:47:26 PST 2013

One other thing:

Using the District of Columbia as an historical example of "neutrality" is
severely problematic, considering the disenfranchisement of the people who
live within the district. Sure, I get the point of what is being said, I
just think it's irresponsible to use abstract examples like that, when the
lived reality of those examples has led to oppression.

Art McGee

On Wed, Nov 13, 2013 at 1:28 PM, Art McGee <amcgee at gmail.com> wrote:

> Greetings,
>
> I'm curious, but would not this post have been more appropriate for the
> sudo-discuss list? I assume you may not be aware of it.
>
> As for your specific point about the American Civil War being about
> states' rights, that just makes me say hummmm... :-\
>
> I'm going to do the Fanonian thing and not shout, since I'm too tired for
> that anymore, but I will just add that in the opinion of a lot of
> historians, some of them Anarchists, the "battle for power" between U.S.
> states and the Federal government is simply that, a battle for power, but
> it doesn't tell you anything about why the states want that power. It
> doesn't tell you anything about the motivating factors behind such a
> long-standing struggle, which, if you're unfamiliar with U.S. history,
> could lead you to the erroneous conclusion that it's a neutral "freedom"
> thing. It's not. I think you already know this, but your phrasing triggered
> my White Supremacy detector, so I had to respond. :-)
>
> Oh, and since I've now delurked and am posting on this discuss list, I'll
> just say that I live in Oakland but haven't as yet made it around to the
> sudo room in person (I'm hoping to change that in the upcoming year).
>
> Art McGee
>
> On Wed, Nov 13, 2013 at 11:50 AM, aestetix <aestetix at aestetix.com> wrote:
>
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>> I've been lurking for a while, but this caught my attention.
>> Especially given that I recently watched the musical 1776.
>>
>> IMHO, we're at a turning point in history. I spent part of this
>> morning watching the testimony on healthcare.gov, and seeing the
>> interplay of lawyers and technologists. We seem to be sandwiched
>> between two paradigms: the NSA/Omnicorp merger from Prism and other
>> Snowden leaks, and totally unrealistic valuations of companies like
>> Snapchat, which apparently just turned down a $3 billion cash
>> acquisition offer from Facebook. That spells out a damned if you do,
>> damned if you don't scenario.
>>
>> The one common theme we've seen through the history of the US is the
>> battle for power between State and Federal governments. This is what
>> the Civil War was *really* about, why laws like the Civil Rights Act
>> of 1965 are so important, and why the most recent government shut-down
>> happened. And inherent to this power battle, for which there is no
>> "better" side, is the will of the people. How do we overcome the
>> tragedy of the commons enough to build a system that generally, kind
>> of sort of works?
>>
>> It's hard to practice what one preaches if there's no cost. For
>> example, it's easy to use Google/etc, until the government subpoenas
>> your email and search history and uses that as evidence (hidden via
>> State Secrets) to throw you in jail. I speak on this with several
>> friends who are either in jail or dead because of bad laws, and many
>> more who have been harassed, detained, in most cases for doing nothing
>> more than dissenting.
>>
>> This is why I agree strongly with Eddan about the notion of
>> neutrality. I haven't kept up with sudo room as much lately, partly
>> because I don't have the time/energy to engage in some of the
>> transitions that were going on. I'm beginning to get to a point where
>> I can re-engage with people working on projects tackling these kinds
>> of issues. I suppose we shall see what happens.
>>
>> Back into the woodwork,
>> aestetix
>>
>> - ---
>>
>> I've often thought of Sudo Room a little bit like the District of
>> Columbia. and Rachel's subject for her email reminded me of that.
>>
>> It is often forgotten that there was a first constitution of the
>> United States after Independence before the one that people call the
>> Constitution. It was called the Confederacy of States. The nation's
>> capital was in Philadelphia and through a series of events ended up
>> moving to a newly formed neutral district - that we all know now as DC.
>>
>> It wasn't just a series of events, but a structural flaw in the
>> Confederacy that doomed itself. As James Madison wrote in Federalist
>> 43, "We have seen the inconvenience of this omission, and the
>> assumption of power into which Congress have been led by it. With
>> great propriety, therefore, has the new system supplied the defect.
>> The general precaution, that no new States shall be formed, without
>> the concurrence of the federal authority, and that of the States
>> concerned, is consonant to the principles which ought to govern such
>> transactions."
>>
>> As population grew and the country was further colonized by the
>> European settlers, the creation of new states turned into a disuniting
>> disaster. Different coalitions of states banded together to promote
>> their collective interest at the expense of others. Those states
>> excluded formed their own alliances and there were many cries of
>> treason thrown around back and forth. Each cluster thought of
>> themselves as the "us" and the others as the "them" until the "them"
>> became the "us" and the "us" was "them". And so on.
>>
>> So while New York, New Jersey, Virginia, Maryland - all wanted the new
>> federal seat of power in their states, a deal was struck to create a
>> district that didn't belong to any particular state. They all wanted
>> to have the center of the nation's power in their territories. And
>> this is how we got in Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution, the
>> provision saying:
>>
>> "To exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over such
>> district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of
>> particular States and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of
>> the government of the United States; and to exercise like authority
>> over all places purchased by the consent of the legislatures of the
>> States in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts,
>> magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings."
>>
>> I'm not sure we need forts and magazines and arsenals and such, but I
>> still think we need a neutral center so that no particular cluster
>> confuses themselves as being what constitutes Sudo Room. Only when the
>> country adopted a political structure that transformed the "us" and
>> "them" into we - did the agreement amongst them create stability and
>> mutual respect that made them united states.
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