MORE FROM THE "HEATHEN COMMIE" (OR, IF JOE BAGEANT RULED THE WORLD)

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Note: More from the "Heathen Commmie (as Joe B. refers to himself)," and I'm not finding much to disagree with. (I find myself in the midst of a possible political conversion--as a libertarian and recovering fiscal conservative, I may emerge at the opposite end of the political spectrum. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A born-again ???) /LL (/grin/)

BY: Joe Bageant

From here on out the U.S. exists for the sole purpose of making you the people's life as healthy and meaningless-toil free as possible, with as much true leisure as can be accomplished, so that you may have time to grow, and think and come to know what sages know before their time is over. The government exists solely to ensure that you can be as straight, queer, or transgender or as deviant as you so choose, so long as no one is harmed. And to be as idle as you choose, yet be guaranteed the minimum entitlement of all human beings, food, shelter and civil liberty. To be as much or as little as you choose to be, and to be educated enough to make that choice.

I hereby announce that this government exists so as to preserve the earth, not so it can serve us longer, but so that we may serve the earth longer, better and with complete humility for the only mother we ever had or will have. Let us now wage peace against every war making entity on the planet.

Tomorrow morning at 8 AM I will cancel the space program and its interstellar wastefulness and reassign those resources to the hungriest people not just here in America, but across the world. I herein declare the American era of material prosperity officially closed for business, which I admit is no great accomplishment, given that it is already over and dead. Thus I order the hair and the nails to cease growing. Likewise the American lifestyle is also canceled.

All citizen debts are canceled and banks as we know them are abolished. Money is abolished, to be replaced with a system of social credits based upon planetary sustainability, meaningful and useful human productivity and an economy of human labor and art. I order the elites who have held captive the people's medium of exchange, then rented it back to them creating a nation of debt slaves, immediately to prison without any trials by the judicial commissariat who have always served their interests. Any true wealth that exists, other than the gifts of nature, we alone have produced by our labors. Thus we have the right to redistribute it so as to serve the greatest number, not the elites. Consequently, there will be a redistribution of all genuine wealth, not fiat currency wealth but true wealth, such as access to health care, access to education, access to clean air and the right to the love of a fully paid stay-at-home mother. All nannies are hereby fired, with full unemployment compensation to begin immediately.

From now on the national policy is "pay as we go." We choose to live within the society and economy we actually produce and create, not one based upon borrowed billions from other nations, most of which was likewise extorted from the production of their citizens. Nor will we avail ourselves to the profit of empire through thuggish conquest of the indigenous desert peoples, jungle peoples, and savannah land peoples of the planet. And lastly, the nation's capital will be moved to Beckley, West Virginia, to mountaintop removal coal country, where every congressman and senator will be required to work ten hours a week as a mucker separating rock from coal. Or, if age or health prevent any congressman or senator form doing so, then to work as a telemarketer. In either case, they shall enjoy the same wages, standard of air, water and health care as citizens presently residing there enjoy. Food stamps and commodity cheese will be issued monthly.

Now go out there and relax and enjoy life. Rediscover and redefine art and labor, meaningful work and play. To that end, I have declared marijuana legal.

In art and labor,
Joe

[emphasis added]
[images added]

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Still to come: Ode to Joe Bageant (/Big Grin/)
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