Enforced Victimization Culture

Rich Benjamin, an author and an Op-ed contributor to the New York Times recently wrote about what he refers to as the Gated Community Mentality. The trigger for this was the shooting death (I hope that we find out soon if it was a murder or not) of Trayvon Martin in Florida.

Mr. Benjamin, in researching for a recent book of his, which he (admirably) does not name and thus avoided pitching in his post, resided in numerous gated communities in the US. His intention was to get an idea of how a Black man, particularly one who did not actually own property in the community, is perceived in these neighborhoods.


Mr. Benjamin looks critically at the "bunker mentality of people who live in gated communities. I too am not particularly crazy about those types of neighborhoods, but Mr. Benjamin and I both seem to have different reasons for our dislike for them.


I will briefly quote his opinion first. Excerpts from his post are below. All italics and bolding are mine:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/opinion/the-gated-community-mentality.html

The perverse, pervasive real-estate speak I heard in these communities champions a bunker mentality. Residents often expressed a fear of crime that was exaggerated beyond the actual criminal threat, as documented by their police department’s statistics......

No matter the label, the product is the same: self-contained, conservative and overzealous in its demands for “safety.” Gated communities churn a vicious cycle by attracting like-minded residents who seek shelter from outsiders and whose physical seclusion then worsens paranoid groupthink against outsiders. These bunker communities remind me of those Matryoshka wooden dolls. A similar-object-within-a-similar-object serves as shelter; from community to subdivision to house, each unit relies on staggered forms of security and comfort, including town authorities, zoning practices, private security systems and personal firearms.
Residents’ palpable satisfaction with their communities’ virtue and their evident readiness to trumpet alarm at any given “threat” create a peculiar atmosphere — an unholy alliance of smugness and insecurity. In this us-versus-them mental landscape, them refers to new immigrants, blacks, young people, renters, non-property-owners and people perceived to be poor.
Another related trend contributed to this shooting: our increasingly privatized criminal justice system. The United States is becoming even more enamored with private ownership and decision making around policing, prisons and probation. Private companies champion private “security” services, alongside the private building and managing of prisons.

“Stand Your Ground” * or “Shoot First” [No such Laws exist] laws like Florida’s expand the so-called castle doctrine, which permits the use of deadly force for self-defense in one’s home, as long as the homeowner can prove deadly force was reasonable. Thirty-two states now permit expanded rights to self-defense.

In essence, laws nationwide sanction reckless vigilantism in the form of self-defense claims. A bunker mentality is codified by law.

*http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0700-0799/0776/Sections/0776.013.html

Despite his points, which I will address, the very beginning of Mr. Benjamin's post provides a telling glimpse of his concept of crime and of being a victim:

"AS a black man who has been mugged at gunpoint by a black teenager late at night, I am not naïve: I know firsthand the awkward conundrums surrounding race, fear and crime. Trayvon Martin’s killing at the hands of George Zimmerman baffles this nation. While the youth’s supporters declare in solidarity “We are all Trayvon,” the question is raised, to what extent is the United States also all George Zimmerman?

Under assault, I didn’t dream of harming my teenage assailant, let alone taking his life.
Mr. Zimmerman reacted very differently, taking out his handgun and shooting the youth in cold blood." (Of course we do not yet know if that is the case)

I hold that the foundation for Mr. Benjamin's take on gated communities can be seen in this opening remarks. The man, robbed at gunpoint, had apparently, long-before that incident, determined that he was going to enforce the status of helpless victim on himself. Think about it- a Robbery, one committed while possessing a weapon, an act that would be a crime of the First, or most serious of degrees in any state, something that would put someone in fear of his life or of substantial bodily injury, and Mr. Benjamin was determined to submit without a struggle. To stand against the violation of his health, safety, property, and right to go about unmolested was not even a blip on his mental radar. 

Every member of society has not only a right, but an obligation to defend himself to the utmost degree possible. If he had determined that he would not be able to defeat a firearm-wielding assailant and opted to play it cool for the moment, then that is one thing, but Mr. Benjamin makes it painfully clear that he would not even have considered doing his duty, even if he felt that his odds were good. In doing so, the victim willingly contributes the climate of  crime and fear. Not only his assailant, but others who exist in that grey area of those who may or may not become violent criminals, grow more and more emboldened each time they become aware of yet another sheep that willingly and submissively turned his neck towards the wolves's mouth.** By referring to his assailant as a "teenage assailant", he effectively twists the situation inside-out. I perceive that in doing so he remakes the assailant into a victim. "Poor kid, he never had a chance, that's why he is pointing a gun at me"(paraphrasing). How about this, "How dare this guy point a gun at me, who does he think he is?" 

The intellectual snobbery of such individuals not only  affects themselves, but also other bad guys, any future victims, and those who would defend themselves but become reluctant to do so because, hearing and reading about those like Mr. Benjamin, begin to doubt their responsibility or their right to take action. Mr. Benjamin, in shirking his duties to himself, the community, and society in general, is not content resting there. He wants to demonize those who would at least plan to stand up for their rights and thus shoulder their share of the burden.

While I do not like the idea of gated communities for most people, I do not have the same reasons, nor do I harbor the resentment as does he. I consider gated communities to be places for older or disabled people, or maybe single parents who would appreciate the comforting notion of being able to have their kids come back from school to a home that has been watched by someone. In short, they would work for those who would have more difficulty in protecting or defending themselves but want to be able to live in a manner relatively free of fear. 

I do, though, have a bit of a problem with the mindset of people who would otherwise be able to take measures to protect themselves but choose to live in secure communities. Many of them have such an aversion to violence of any sort that they would rather live behind guarded walls, let someone else fight (if necessary) for them, and leave people who cannot afford to leave high-crime areas to their own devices. The latter commonly live with excessive legal restrictions on what types of measures they would allowed to take to protect themselves. I consider it a safe bet that, contrary to what Mr. Benjamin asserts, that many people in gated communities do not approve of the private ownership of firearms. I hold that many people who choose to live behind walls suffer from what Samuel Huntington, author of  "The Clash of Civilizations" refers to as "the illusion of permanency" - the idea that they can always be able to maintain a certain way of life. These people tend to be among those who would be utterly lost if they were to become unable to employ the measures that protected them for so long.

Mr. Benjamin notes, without any specifics, the "exaggerated" fear of crime or the "actual criminal threat" of local police department statistics, which I am certain that he extensively researched. In doing so, he, in a casually dismissive fashion, writes off the fear of some people as being unfounded. If I am uncomfortable in confined spaces, is  it an exaggerated response for me to take the stairs as often as possible to avoid the elevator? It is really none of his business if he interprets local crime statistics in a manner differently than those who moved behind walls. It is also not the fault of a person that if, at this point in history, certain groups of people contribute an amount of violent criminals disproportionate to their actual numbers and that this fact results in others taking measures to live among those they perceive to be more like they are.

I will agree with Mr. Benjamin  that there are people who take things way too far. The mere sighting of a person who is of a different ethnic or religious group from the bulk of the demographic makeup of the neighborhood does not necessitate following him. I do not, though,  know nearly enough of the Martin death to give an opinion on what happened. I don't expect to be able to do so for some time. Whether or not  Mr. Zimmerman committed a criminal act should have no bearing on how others take action to protect themselves. Mr. Benjamin's mindset if one of forced victimization. Because he is not willing to do his job when attacked, you should not be able to do so either. We should just accept what is happening to us and report it to the cops if we are still alive once the bad guy has left. Mr. Benjamin, while correctly noting some concerns about hunkering down behind walls for safety, is dead wrong in considering people who prepare for and are willing to protect themselves and others to be vigilantes. A brief consultation of a dictionary would have helped Mr. Benjamin. People who refuse to meekly submit to violent crime are not vigilantes. 

Western Societies recognize that the individual must not only be willing to protect himself and the community, he must also be prepared for such action. Mr. Benjamin will have plenty of options if he goes about searching for a place to live that does not accept the mores of Western Civilization.***

**On acting like sheep:

http://www.mwkworks.com/onsheepwolvesandsheepdogs.html

*** On the rights and responsibilities of people in Western Societies:http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/01/18-year-old-mom-kills-armed-intruder.html

Iraqi-American Ca. Murder and My Suspicions

The terribly vicious bludgeoning murder of an Iraqi-American woman disgusts us all. The woman, Kassim Alhimidi, had lived in the US since the early 90's, having resided in a refugee camp in Saudi Arabia after Saddam Hussein's violent crackdown on Shiite Muslims following their brief and unsuccessful fight for independence after, you guessed it - the first Iraq war. She had met and married her husband there.

As has become common with US involvement in the Middle East, H.W. Bush, happy to pack up and leave after liberating Kuwait, withdrew our troops with no real concern for any minority groups that were likely to feel the wrath of Saddam as he both restored his tyrannical rule and healed his shattered ego by terrorizing people.

We did, though, provide some help with the no-fly zones to keep Saddam from doing much of the same to the Kurds and to stop some of the bleeding of the Iraqi Shiites. Kurdistan, carved up by the Turks, Iraq, and Iran many years ago, was more of a diplomatic problem for the US as we were worried about angering Turkey. If Kurdish fighters were to be fleeing across the border and possibly teaming up with Kurdish separatists in Turkey, the latter could be strengthened. As (pre-Erdogan) Turkey was the closest thing we had to an ally as far as Muslim nations go, we were not going to risk their ire.

As more details of the murder have been reported, I have begun to have suspicions. The note left at the scene stated “Go back to your country, you terrorist.”. OK, we all know that there are vicious non-Muslim criminals in the US, many of whom would be sufficiently hateful and cowardly to not only attack a Muslim simply due to his or her ethnic group and religion, but the wording of the letter not look like something that a white supremacist or other hate-mongering American would use.

To me, the wording has a made-up feel to it. Although I would not pretend to hold that neo-Nazis, etc. are the most eloquent of people, I have a hard time buying that such an individual would break into a home, murder an innocent woman, and tell her and the rest of her family to go home in that manner. The wording of the note just does not seem to fit. I will allow that it is possible that this was  hate-crime, or the work of a person intent on a robbery who thought that such a note would throw off the cops in their investigation, but it sounds too fake. If this was a hate-crime, I would have expected something written in more detail, referring to 911 or something along those lines.

More intriguing is the details that the victim's husband and cousin  reportedly provided:
All Italics and bolding are mine.

"Hamidi, 48, said he could not go on talking and explained that he was in a bad state before passing on the telephone to his wife’s cousin Hussein Alwadi.

“I saw her body in the dinning room a few minutes before the police arrived,” her cousin told Al Arabiya.

He said the murderer snuck into the house on Wednesday morning from the back garden.

“The garden has no fence so he was able to break the glass of the kitchen window right away and apparently he did so without making a noise.”

Hussein added that the attacker then reached for the window handle, opened it, and got inside.

“He did so after watching Shaima’s husband drive away with four of the children he was taking to school. Only Shaima and her eldest daughter Fatima stayed in the house. Fatima was asleep.”

The murderer, Hussein recounted, saw Shaima in the dinning room and attacked her with an iron rod or a spanner.

“He first hit her on her forehead then on her right ear. The third strike was on the back of her head. This was followed by five fast and consecutive strikes on her head and shoulders.”

Shaima, Hussein said, lost consciousness, upon which the attacker left the house.

“Because the attack was fast, the eldest daughter Fatima, who was asleep in the upper floor, did not hear a thing and only found out when she woke up and went downstairs to see her mother’s body drenched in blood.”

Hussein added that they immediately transferred Shaima to the hospital, where she died three days later after doctors failed to save her life and had to take her off life support."

http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/03/27/203513.html


When I was a K9 handler (Before I retired from law enforcement), I would get called to crime scenes on a regular basis. I would interview the victim(s) and first-responding police personnel prior to making any attempts to obtain the track (Human scent) of the actor. When the victim (When he was not a witness) began to tell me how it happened, or provided all sorts of details that would explain how the bad guy was able to commit the crime without being caught in the act, the person being interviewed, more than nine times out of ten, either committed the crime or knew who did. It is also pretty weird that the Cousin discovered the body.

Read the statement again and see if the details and Homicide Detective/Medical Examiner-type descriptions of the attack appear strange.

If this was a hate-crime, I hope that the actor is identified, arrested and nailed to the furthest extent that California Law allows. I detest bad guys, and would defend any innocent person with my life, no matter what the  race or religion of the victim. I have no doubt that the cops assigned to this case feel the same way.

No matter what I may write about the beliefs or teachings of any group, I and all right-thinking people refuse to forget that, ultimately, there are good people and there are bad people. I want the bad people removed from society, period.

If this turns out to be an Honor-Killing or something similar in which the family is involved, not only do I hope that the same happens to the actor(s), but that the press makes sure that the US and the rest of the world knows that, in this case, no hate crime occurred. 

Carson Daly's Joke About Gays Causes Uproar

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/carson-daly-gays-too-cowardly-to-have-stopped-jet-blue-pilot/

You can ignore the title of the link - Carson Daly does not appear to refer to gays as cowardly at all in the video (On link).

Mr. Daly had been commentating on the Jet Blue flight in which the Pilot needed to be restrained. Daly mentioned that reports noted that the flight had a disproportionate amount of men who were en route to a seminar or convention for security work. His point was that there were quite a few men on the plane for whom fighting, or more properly, being physically, emotionally, and psychologically prepared for serious scrapes, was a part of life and that this was a stroke of fortune.

He goes on to joke that, with his luck, if he faced a similar situation on a flight, his would have a bunch of gays who were on the way to a floral convention. He added a few jokes about what one could imagine that his co-travelers would say. Examples such as "No I can't I may break a nail" were given.

It was a joke. Daly never meant to harm or demean anyone. The mother of one of the flight 93 passengers (Flight 93 was the flight in which the passengers counterattacked the bad guys and sacrificed their lives) weighed in, stating  that her son, who she described as 6'4" and a rugby player, was reportedly one of the counterattacks. Of course she would be hurt over this remark.

With the understandable emotions that a possible hijacked flight brings, we can, as armchair quarterbacks, say that Mr. Daly should not have made the comment. He did in fact apologize later on.

Having said that, I strongly believe that what we are witnessing is much more than a lot of people who are hurt and offended by the remark that was meant as a joke. This is another example of the widespread censorship that in forced upon anything that goes against the Leftist doctrine of Political Correctness. This doctrine found its home in Leninist Russia/Soviet Union. The idea was to put a stop to any speech or activity that did not toe the line drawn by the Party.

Mr. Daly clearly was not indicating that no gay man (or Woman, straight or gay) could be of any help when it is time for a fight. If someone were to be asked what Mr. Daly could have meant by his joke, he may offer the following scenario:

If the flight (Or any other otherwise isolated group) was made of three general groups of people; heterosexual men, gays, and women, what third would supply the the bulk of those who would defend the whole group against a threat?

No answer is needed, but it is not politically correct to give the obvious answer in a public setting.

Yes, we all know that there have been many examples of women and gay men who have performed bravely and proficiently in battle or other types of fights (Let's avoid Alexander the Great for now as the evidence is heavily against the claim that he was a homosexual). The fact that these people have proven that they are not helpless does not do anything to even suggest that those from these two groups, as a whole, tend to provide near the amount of people that you would want on your side in a fight as does that of heterosexual men.

I hope that no one would contest that there are more effeminate, non-violent, and non-aggressive men among gays than there are among non-gays. Feminists love to paint heterosexual men as violent and dangerous, but refuse to admit that, just sometimes, this tendency/predisposition can be of benefit. This is an easy thing to deny or ignore in a society that is generally safe and free of crime. When the tables are turned, though, it is the men that are expected to do the fighting and we can be certain that non-gays comprise, if not an overwhelming amount of the fighters, a clear majority of the same. I can assure you that, in countries plagued by violence and other strife, women do not go about pretending that they are equal to men in general fighting abilities. If I was getting beaten up or chased by several bad guys, and was made aware (Say, via radio or cellphone) that a group of gays, a group of women, and a group of non-gay men were all on the way to help me, which one do you think I would hope arrived first? Leftist love to refer to humans as just another species of animal. Well, as a species we belong to the Class Mammalia. In that group, males comprise almost the entire body of the most aggressive members.

In the workplace, we are supposed to be afraid to say that men are generally (Almost always) born to be more capable to, for example, serve as an infantry soldier in the armed forces than are women*. To even mention it in passing is to draw, if you are lucky, cold stares and shoulders. If gays tend to have more effeminate men in their ranks than do heterosexuals, it follows that there will be a lower percentage of gays who will be effective fighters than there will be among non-gays. Simply put, more gay men will act/function like women in the event of a vicious fight than will non-gay men. Their hearts may be in it, but it takes more than heart (Although heart is a big part) to fight.

Angry people, I know that this offends many, but I am not here to avoid hurting feelings. Men are physically stronger, have more aggression, are more likely to engage in physical altercations, become proficient in the use of weapons, and train as boxers or in other fighting styles. I have seen one High School female wrestler, one. She was quite good. Does that prove anything? If one High School with a wrestling team with one or no girls had a meet against a similar-sized team with, say, five girls, the Politically Correct thing is to pretend that we don't know which team has an apparent advantage, even though we of course know that the all/almost all-guy team has a good probability of beating at least four of the five girls in the individual matches.

To my knowledge, there never have been:
Female MLB, NFL, NHL, NBA, etc. players.

There of course have been gays that have been in these organizations. I will freely admit that many gay men are very capable athletes and fighters. But, again since there is a disproportionate amount of men among gays that act and think in manner similar to women, that group will provide a a smaller percentage of effective fighters than will non-gay men.

To hold anything to the contrary to what I have written is to have to assert that, out of all of the warriors/soldiers/fighters through the millennia, the reason that almost no women were included as fighters was that the men just wanted all the fun for themselves and have excuses to subjugate their women.
Standing up for our civilization is not possible unless we insists on being able to speak, not only freely, but factually.

Let's not pretend that, in the event of a fight, I would start by asking who is gay and who is not. That would never happen and implying so is dishonest.

*A post that I did in 2011 on Australia's opening of all military specialties, including infantry, to females:

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2011/09/australia-lifts-ban-on-women-soldiers.html

Agenda 21 ICLEI - Creation and Purpose

The Agenda 21 threat is difficult to perceive by an individual since, it comes at us in so many forms, many of which are disarmingly labeled with stated purposes of "sustainable development", environmental protection,  and preservation of land. This post will deal with the ICLEI (International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives), which is a movement that seeks to bring the US and others nations of the world under the mantle of the Leftist/Environmentalist plan for the elimination of the free individual, private property rights, and  national sovereignty. The means that it employed to encourage (And possibly cajole) state, county, and municipal governments to deal directly with the UN and other extra-national bodies to bring their districts into line with the Global agenda. Of course our Constitution annoying limits such negotiating to the Federal Government, but why let that stand in the way? County and Municipal governments are especially vulnerable. This is not due to the people wanting to go in this direction , but because a good portion of them, busy with their lives, assume that those who run for town councils and the like are, if not for their interests, at least not enthusiastically in opposition to their interests. 

This leaves a chink in the armor in which Leftists or radical environmentalists, simply presenting themselves as candidates of normal political parties, secure mayoral/town council positions from which they can begin creating ordinances and policies that severely restrict property owners, burden the same with regulations that result in excessive operational costs, and generally create climates in which small and middle-scale farms and other properties/businesses are no longer tenable. The result is a sell-off to corporate farms and other large business entities to avoid bankruptcy, foreclosure, or crushing fines. Those who stay in rural areas will devolve into employees on the once-free farms and other businesses; those who leave will move to the cities. 

Note that ICLEI bigwig Mr.Jeb Brughmann (In the quotes below) describes creating high densities in the cities. People who live in cities are easier to control and will naturally gravitate towards governments that provide the most at the lowest or no cost and thus create increasingly-dependant people. Although I will freely admit that, due to the end of textile and other factory-type businesses in urban areas, we have a tremendous amount of unused and relatively cheap properties that have great potential for development. The problem is that those who advance Agenda 21 have decided that they will implement a vast array of measures that will gradually force people to move to these zones. 

Their idea is that, well, those areas are all ruined already. So, instead of creating parkland (As you will see in Mr. Brughmann's comments), urban development will consist of building housing, presumably high-rise apartments, to house the newly resettled. This will achieve many goals, including bringing rural and suburban populations to a bare minimum, reducing the electoral strength of those regions, and increasing the same in urban areas. So my grandchildren will not be able to listen to the chorus of Spring Peepers or the symphony of songbirds in the Spring, or gaze upon the Autumn leaves while they wait for the school bus unless I move the family to the rural zones to be - not a farmer, but a farmhand.

People who live in cities face ever-increasing degrees of governmental control. Ridiculously- restrictive smoking bans, demonizing of table salt (NYC), and terrifyingly restrictive firearms laws (Washington DC, Chicago, NYC) are the norm in urban areas, and I see no reason why this trend will not continue as more and more people are ushered into the cities. 

As the photo below indicates, the counties that voted for the Democratic candidate in the 2004 Presidential election (The 2000 election was virtually identical and it is fair to say that 2008 was close too) were almost totally confined to urban areas. Taking steps to move as many people as possible to cities is a good bet to increase the urban electorate and thus provide a permanent base of voters who will consistently overwhelm national elections with Leftist candidates. This will also apply to seats in the Capital Building; Congressional districts will of course be redrawn to reflect the locations in which the most people live, and Senatorial seats in more states will simply go to whomever the new all-powerful urban electorate votes in. As an example, Pennsylvania and Ohio, both very rural states already politically driven in a big way by Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Cleveland, etc., will in all probability be completely swamped after the changes occur. Note in previous posts that I have asserted that the Left has done everything that it can to keep multiple generations of the US population, especially that of urban areas, in states of  permanent bondage, helplessness, and reliance on governmental assistance. 

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/images/rcp%20electoral/2004_results_by_county..gif

As noted at top, the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives is a means for the step-by-step implementation of Agenda 21 and global or pan-regional "Governance"*. I will  provide some quotes from an interview with Mr. Jeb Brughmann, a big shaker and mover (And apparent co-creator of ) with the ICLEI.

If you don't believe that Agenda 21 exists, read on....

http://sovereignty.net/p/sd/How%20ICLEI%20was%20created.pdf (Source of the interview quoted below)

http://jebbrugmann.com/ (Mr. Brughmann's site)

All italics and bolding are mine. I also inserted a few remarks:

"You may remember cities declaring themselves as sanctuaries for refugees
from El Salvador and Guatemala, (Remember how the Leftists got a free ride in the late 80's - early 90's  by the media despite their atrocities?) esting from South Africa, establishing sister-city relations with the Soviet Union and this movement built and demonstrated the capacity of local governments to have an impact in international affairs so when the Cold War came to an end, we, in the movement decided that we had to identify the next phase of activities for local government involvement and it was clear at that time that we should focus on the global environment."

Commenting on being contacted by the UN and being offered a part in the new movement after his work was noticed-

"We were surprised, because we were aware that we were having an impact but we never
thought of a direct relationship between local government and the UN which is an
organization of countries. I got involved with local government in the early 1980s as part
of this broader peace and human rights movement. I was actually the Director of the City
of Cambridge, Massachusetts Peace Commission, (Just what is/was that?) a very unusual city agency. It was through that Commission that we were able to build this international network. But now the ICLEI is a worldwide organization. We have 250 city members from about 60 countries. They represent about 150 million people. What we have discovered is that through the concrete practical actions of the cities at the local level, we can have a real measurable impact on global environmental trends.


What we have found since Rio, the Earth Summit, is that so many of the agenda items in Agenda21 actually cannot ever be implemented without local governments and communities taking action. So that is what we are about today making sure this agreement among nations actually will get implemented after all the rhetoric is spent.

We get engaged in the design of that policy. As the
United Nations is right now negotiating an international treaty of dealing with the climatechange problem, the cities are at the table. In the U.S., 45 cities have joined an international "Cities for Climate Protection Campaign." Their commitment as participants in that campaign is to develop a local action plan to reduce their greenhouse gas
emissions. The U.S. EPA is giving full support to this activity financially. In fact, the cities are reporting to the EPA on their emissions reduction so the U.S. government can
go to the international arena and claim that the U.S. is complying with its treaty
commitments. So we are now at the starting point of engaging in a process with the
United Nations and governments in actually designing the policies that we can implement
locally in order to achieve global environmental accords. We will be doing the same with climate, Agenda 21, and we have endorsed a major international campaign called "Local Agenda 21" whereby now more than 2000 cities in more than 60 countries around the world are developing Agenda 21s for their cities with concrete targets, with concrete budgets on how they are going to implement these things and this is a movement that is now beginning in the U.S. Out of the 4000 or so cities and towns in the United States,
there are now only 19 formally in this Local Agenda 21 activities.

Environmentalists have always thought that saving the planet is about creating new parks...Most people don’t get to go to these parks....The city, because of its concentration, allows us to economically invest in the infrastructure we need in order to protect the environment as well as social services. It is by creating high density that we can finance public transportation systems (Removing our ability to move ourselves from place to place), recycling systems, all of these things so we want to reap the opportunity of the city to protect the environment.

We got involved during the process of the negotiation of
Agenda 21s sustainable development action plan. Our job since the Summit has been to make sure that local development is aware of its responsibilities in implementing that plan and that it has the resources and the support to do it. What does it mean? Local governments need to create a mechanism in which
they work with the business community, the non-profit organizations, the civic sector to
develop strategies to implement the different chapters of Agenda 21 -- dealing with issues like protection of the atmosphere, water resources, biological diversity, changingconsumption patterns, sustainable agriculture all of these areas mentioned in Agenda 21.

So what do we have to work with at the local level? First we have local law and regulation. Municipalities manage the infrastructure or invest in the infrastructure which is needed to deal with pollution control. Municipalities often times have a great influence over the public educational system amid spend a lot of money


We’re trying to overcome this by taking a partnership strategy to implementation in many cities, particularly those that are doing this local Agenda 21 process in the U.S. What they do is create multi-sectoral councils, or organizations, where local government representatives, business, the church community, the union community, the non-profit community meet together, flesh out a common strategy in areas where they can agree with one another, and make joint agreements to implement that strategy

And, this year were [sic] launching a new program. It’s called Cities 21. We will be inviting our members from around the world to measure the change in their performance in key areas: energy,waste management, water resources management, from 1990 to 2000. But economic growth is accelerating tremendously. Since1992, 450 million new people have been born on this planet. So, as we speak, 10,000 new people will come into this planet. Population growth, economic growth, are accelerating to the point where the earth is noticing and were stressing the limits of the balance in our eco-system.

It wasn’t until the Cold War came to an end, that the 1987 World Commission on Environment andDevelopment put forward a third doctrine called Sustainable Development which is about balancing social equity, the long-time socialist concern; economic vitality, the capitalist concern; amid [sic?]the new concern that neither paid any attention to - environmental sustainability. We have a new concept for how to develop; now were just beginning to learn how to put it into practice."

Referring to the Soviet Union and its treatment of the environment.(below) Those who recall the Leftist/neo-pagan kid's propaganda show Captain Planet and the Planeteers may remember how the Planeteer girl from the Soviet Union was a model for sound environmental practices and the US Planeteer boy always needed to be reminded of things like his responsibility to limit the amount of children he should have as an adult. This was of course sickening as, even not counting Chernobyl, the Soviet Union's environmental record was far worse (And I am being generous) than that of the US:

http://countrystudies.us/russia/25.htm

"They had strong environmental laws, but because there is no distinction between business and government, those laws were never
implemented. "


People who desire to maintain our national sovereignty, property, rights inherent to Western Societies, and the choice of where we live need to become involved at their local level first. Find out if your local government(s) are involved with the ICLEI. If they are, research as much of Agenda 21, sustainable development, etc, as you can. Talk about these with your friends and associates and let your local politicians know that you do not approve of the direction in which they are taking us. Let them know that we will not simply acquiesce to their Agenda.(Pun intended)
More links will be at the bottom.

* On "Governance"

http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/proposed-un-environmental-constitution-for-the-world-would-establish-an-incredibly-repressive-system-of-global-governance

"In documents such as these, drafters have learned to never use the term "global government" because it sets off alarm bells for people. So they often use the more politically-correct term of "governance". On page 36, we are told that proper governance includes the creation of governing institutions on various levels "from the local to the global"....

"Governance is the process of decision-making and the process by which decisions are implemented (or not implemented). It also can be defined as the rational organization of society in order to achieve the objectives emerging from its common concerns emerging from material, economic, historical and cultural foundations and needs. Governance includes the creation and the functioning of institutions and of norms at various levels from the local to the global."

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/02/obamas-rural-council-and-un-agenda-21.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/agenda-21-more-details-and-original.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/02/farming-families-targeted-by-dept-of.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/recent-agenda-21-developments.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/marxists-hijack-democracy-pretend-that.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/obama-to-control-distribution-of-goods.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/cloward-piven-founder-gleefully.html

Egyptian Cleric Dispels Doubt About Slavery in Islam

http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/03/former-dean-of-islamic-law-at-saudi-university-misunderstands-islam-says-islamic-law-permits-possess.html

Just in case anyone is confused about the status of slavery in Islam, a former Dean of Islamic Law has stepped up to make sure that we know that slavery is perfectly acceptable in Islam.

The video should be watched. It is unbelievable how the man kindly smiles while explaining that not only is slavery OK in Islam, the enslaved actually have quite a few freedoms (Except the right to own oneself).

The arguments sound like those of Southern plantation owners in the US 160 years back. Why do we rightly condemn that view while ignoring that it is going on right now?

Leftists and Atheists will be quick to add that the Bible does not prohibit slavery and cite the New Testament as proof, but a person with a fifth-grade reading level would be able to discern appreciable differences. When slaves or slavery is treated in the NT, it is in a manner that acknowledges that slavery exists. It does not, as does the Koran or the Haddiths, provide examples of great slave owners to be emulated (All that Mohamed did should be emulated in Islam), what one can do with slaves (There is a lot of that in Islamic teaching, or specify who can be a slave (A whole lot of that too is in Islamic teaching).

From Jihad Watch - link is at top:

"But while the freeing of a slave or two here and there is encouraged, the institution itself is never questioned. The Qur’an even gives a man permission to have sexual relations with his slave girls as well as with his wives: “The believers must (eventually) win through, those who humble themselves in their prayers; who avoid vain talk; who are active in deeds of charity; who abstain from sex, except with those joined to them in the marriage bond, or (the captives) whom their right hands possess, for (in their case) they are free from blame…” (23:1-6). A Muslim is not to have sexual relations with a woman who is married to someone else – except a slave girl: “And all married women (are forbidden unto you) save those (captives) whom your right hands possess. It is a decree of Allah for you” (4:24).

Slavery is still practiced more or less openly today in Sudan and Mauritania, and there is evidence that slavery still continues beneath the surface in some majority-Muslim countries as well -- notably Saudi Arabia, the home of Dr. Saud Al-Fanisan, which only abolished slavery in 1962, Yemen and Oman, both of which ended legal slavery in 1970, and Niger, which didn’t abolish slavery until 2004. In Niger, the ban is widely ignored, and according to a Nigerian study, as many as one million people remain in bondage there."

Note that "whom their right hand possesses" means those who have been taken in warfare/conquest.

Unlike Christianity and Judaism, Islam has not and actually cannot prohibit slavery. Islam has no room for any changes or fuller/better understandings of human rights or religion. What Mohammed did was the best example possible - any deviation or change to that is an affront to Allah.

Syrian Alawite Women and Children Now Fair Game

With Middle Eastern Christians backed into a pitifully small corner, and the Obama Administration dead set on removing one of the last States in the region that is not Islamist, the women and children of Alawites in Syria are now considered legitimate targets in the new Rules of Engagement as defined by Syrian Cleric Sheik Muhammad Badi' Moussa:

http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/3376.htm

The interviewer asks if it OK for the Free Syrian Army (The Syrian rebels) to kill Alawite women and children. Mr. Moussa answers "Yes". He continues with describing requests for clarifications that have purportedly been sent to other clerics concerning how to deal with the Alawites. Syria's ruling family is Alawite and it has been long suspected that, in addition to Christians, they too will be the recipient of Islamic Tolerance once the regime falls.

He adds a number of accusations that Alawites have been raping Muslim women. Although I have not researched this claim, I  find it unlikely as they have been believed to be preparing for the end of the regime and any protection that it offered. Going out of their way to earn even more enmity of Muslims would not be a good strategy. Moussa also claims that Alawite snipers have been targeting Muslim women and children. He then states that Muslim women have been kidnapped and held in Alawite suburbs. These claims sound similar to the psychological term of projection that is liberally employed by Egyptian Muslims; they accuse the Copts of doing to Muslim women exactly what Muslim men are actually doing to those of the Copts.

Mercifully, Mr. Moussa notes that the Free Syrian Army must issue warnings prior to actually raiding the Alawite neighborhoods and commencing with the killings of the women and children.

Many Muslims do not consider Alawites to be true Muslims. They are believed to be one of the offshoots of Shiite Islam. They are secretive and stay within their clans. They have incorporated practices not followed by other Muslims, including reported forms of worship similar to those of Christians -  Communion, a Trinitarian belief, celebration of Christian Holy days, etc. This is quite possible since, in the early days of Islam,  many Christians took to assuming a Muslim identity to avoid crushing taxation and other benefits of Islamic Tolerance. As the years and generations passed, these people began to identify less with Christianity and more with the Islam that permeated their world while the old practices remained.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alawi

Cinncinatus on Reducing Foreign Aid

It is no secret that, in order to redirect the mob from their four years of recession trouble, the establishment has taken to blaming Government employees at all levels for the nation's economic problems. From my experience,  the most zealous supporters of Chris Christie of NJ, etc., who extol the virtues of going after public-sector workers' salaries and pensions, tend come from the groups of people who made the most money during the Halycon days of the 90s and early 2000s. Those who complain the most tend to be the ones who would never have taken a government job in the first place because it did not pay enough, but now that there is a recession, the same are all-too-willing to be worked up into a frenzy by elected officials who know that "divide and conquer" is the easiest way to take the heat off of themselves. Get the people at each other's throats and you have quelled the anger for a while.

When I was working three jobs (Our salaries are low to start) in the early 90s and driving beat-ups cars that I prayed would not break down due to the costs of replacement parts (I did much of the work myself), many people we knew were driving new (Often company) cars and had all kinds of money to spend. I never felt any jealousy for them and only asked that they extend the same courtesy to us now. Who knows? If we get hit with any appreciable inflation, my pension will not be worth much anyway.

On a more cynical note, I also found that those who have been the most vocal about public employees salaries and pensions were mostly the same ones who, after 911, could not say "Thank You" often enough for what we did (I recently retired from Law enforcement and was, among other things, a K9 handler, Police Bomb Technician, etc.). Although I was appreciative for these sentiments, I would note that no thanks were needed since, as far as I was concerned, I was compensated fairly well for and liked what I did. (It is ironic how we went from being thanked to being targets of their frustration) I tend to hold that the military guys, being deployed in far more dangerous places for long periods of time and those who do the jobs for free, like volunteer firefighters, deserve thanks more than do full-time workers.

Cinncinatus is a new contributor. The following is his second post. At the bottom is a link to a site where you will see how overwhelming our foreign aid burden is and many of the problems that are associated with it.

Cincinnatus 

Commentary to Senator Akaka open letter in the Federal Times dated 18 March 2012 

http://www.federaltimes.com/article/20120318/ADOP06/203180305

If Senator Daniel K. Akaka (Hawaii) was serious in the following article he would have identified where the cuts should come from to pay for the 10 months of unemployment coverage. There are a great deal of programs that the federal government has taken on over the last century which under our constitution are the responsibility of the States and not the Federal Government. This is where we need to cut to spare the hard working federal employees. I have never met a progressive/liberal that has ever wanted the federal government to comply with the Constitution when it relates to the governmental social engineering programs, but yet they would have no hesitation to cut and, in some case, eliminate those programs that are mandated by our Constitution to be performed by the Federal Government.

Taxes that are used to fund those functions that are enumerated by our constitution on the federal government are fees for services rendered (i.e. enforcement of US Law, National Defense, etc.) to the citizens. Taxes that are used to redistribute the fruits of one's labors are simply another form of slavery. Throughout human history the more economic resources that government takes away from its citizens that earn it the less liberty all citizens have and the more imposing and demanding government becomes.

I will suggest an area that Senator Akaka could consider cutting (some would say totally eliminate) to protect the hard working middle class Federal worker (as well as the tax payers); that is US Foreign aid. 

The following link details where the foreign aid from the Federal Government is going to: 

http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/politics/us-foreign-aid.htm

Note from Pleiststarchos - I knew that our foreign aid was bad, but I had no idea how bad it really was until I looked at the numbers. Those who advocate isolationism cannot be totally off the mark - the money we throw around could go a long way to fixing Social Security, energy independence, infrastructure repairs, health care for the poor, you name it. When our debt reaches the tipping point, even these massive amounts of cash may not be of help anyway.

"Ethicists" Calls for Massive Controls on Humans

http://www.smatthewliao.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/HEandClimateChange.pdf

I tend to prefer to put the links for anything I quote in plain view so that anyone who stares at my posts in disbelief can go right to the source. This will enable the reader to do two things; know that I do not dream these things up, and decide for himself if the writers of the quoted source are being sincere in their wild proposals or if they are just being modern Jonathan Swift-types of satirists and I simply missed the sarcasm.

The subject of this post is a a paper written by three individuals from New York University and is dated from February of this year. It states that it is to appear in Ethics, Policy and the Environment. The writers start out with a brief thesis that of course assumes that Anthropogenic climate change (Global Warming for lay persons like you and I) is a done deal and beyond question as a concept. The paper takes some interesting but terribly frightening paths. I will quote directly from the paper in order that the reader will not assume that I am taking any liberties with my interpretations.

All italics are mine.

II. Human Engineering Solutions to Climate Change

Pharmacological meat intolerance

Since a large proportion of these cows and other grazing animals are meant for

consumption, reducing the consumption of these kinds of meat (for brevity, call them

‘red meat’) could have significant environmental benefits (Eshel and Martin 2006).

Human engineering could help here. Eating something that

makes us feel nauseous can trigger long-lasting food aversion. While eating red meat

with added emetic (a substance that induces vomiting) could be used as an aversion

conditioning, anyone not strongly committed to giving up red meat is unlikely to be

attracted to this option. A more realistic option might be to induce mild intolerance (akin,

e.g., to milk intolerance) to these kinds of meat. While meat intolerance is normally

uncommon (Aparicio et al. 2005), in principle, it could be induced by stimulating the

immune system against common bovine proteins. The immune system would then

become primed to react to such proteins, and henceforth eating ‘eco-unfriendly’ food

would induce unpleasant experiences. Even if the effects do not last a lifetime, the

learning effect is likely to persist for a long time. A potentially safe and practical way of

delivering such intolerance may be to produce ‘meat’ patches – akin to nicotine patches.

We can produce patches for those animals that contribute the most to greenhouse gas

emissions and encourage people to use such patches.

Making humans smaller [The idea of the writers is that smaller people create less carbon emissions]
 While genetic modifications to control height are likely to be quite complex and beyond our current capacities, it nevertheless seems possible now to use PGD to select shorter children. This would not involve intervening to change the genetic material of embryos, or employing
any clinical methods not currently used. It would simply involve rethinking the criteria for selecting which embryos to implant. Another method of affecting height is to use hormone treatment either to affect somatotropin levels or to trigger the closing of the epiphyseal plate earlier than normal (this sometimes occurs accidentally through vitamin A overdoses (Rothenberg et al. 2007)). Hormone treatments are used for growth reduction in excessively tall children (Bramswig et al. 1988; Grüters et al. 1989). Currently, somatostatin (an inhibitor of growth hormone) is being studied as a safer alternative (Hindmarsh et al. 1995). Finally, a more speculative and controversial way of reducing adult height is to
reduce birth weight. There is a correlation between birth weight and adult height
(Sorensen et al. 1999), according to which birth weight at the lower edge of the normal
distribution tends to result in the adult’s being ≈5 cm shorter. Birth height has an even
stronger effect for adult height. If one is born at the lower edge of the normal distribution
of height, this tends to produce ≈15 cm shorter adult height. Gene imprinting has been
found to affect birth size, as a result of evolutionary competition between paternally and
maternally imprinted genes (Burt and Trivers 2006). Drugs or nutrients that either reduce
the expression of paternally imprinted genes, or increase the expression of maternally
imprinted genes, could potentially regulate birth size.

Lowering birth-rates through cognitive enhancement

In 2008, John Guillebaud, an emeritus professor of family planning and reproductive

health at University College London, and Dr Pip Hayes, a general practitioner from

Exeter, pointed out that ‘each UK birth will be responsible for 160 times more
greenhouse gas emissions … than a new birth in Ethiopia’ ((Guillebaud and Hayes 2008):

576). As a way to mitigate climate change, they proposed that Britons should consider

having no more than two children per family.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

By all means, read the paper and Google the names and title. If someone can find that this paper was intended as satire, please let me know. I would at least be a tiny bit relieved to find out that this was intended to be a 2012 version of "A Modest Proposal".

A check with Slate, which runs pretty strongly on the Liberal side, does not appear to treat this as an absolute joke:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2012/03/14/human_engineering_for_climate_change_and_trolling_.html

Earlier this week, co-author Liao spoke with the Atlantic’s Ross Andersen about the paper. In what Andersen described as a “wild interview,” Liao elaborated on some of the ideas considered in “Human Engineering and Climate Change.” For instance, Andersen said that he found the idea of enhancing altruism and empathy perhaps the most alarming part, arguing that it might be “more problematic to do biological tinkering to produce a belief, rather than simply engineering humans so that they are better equipped to implement their beliefs.”

The discussion prompted a torrent of response online, with many considering the ideas dangerous and troubling. Environmentalist Bill McKibben tweeted that these were the “[w]orst climate change solutions of all time.” Others accused the authors of promoting eugenics or being “environmentalist Nazis.” Climate change skeptics were particularly perturbed.

The Guardian’s Leo Hickman reached out to the co-authors to get their reaction to the kerfuffle. Their responses are fascinating. They reiterate that they are not necessarily arguing in favor of these modifications—just consideration—and Oxford's Sandberg admits that during the writing process, "I felt I was to some extent trolling." He also notes, “In philosophy we take ideas and test them to destruction. This means that we often bring up concepts or lines of thought we do not personally believe in and then argue them as strongly as possible to see where they go and what we can learn.”

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Left has targeted a number of aspects of Western Societies for removal. Livestock is a big one. Leftists have been railing against the 'cattle culture" (I assume that Bison*, Hogs, Sheep, etc., are just as bad to them) since the early 90's. The most bizarre proposal about making smaller people is probably the one that the writers took the least seriously. The last quoted subject about the reduction of births per family is fairly telling - note that it makes it clear that the child born in a Western Society such as Britain is destined to contributed 160 times more in the way of carbon emissions during his lifetime than a child in an undeveloped world. Of course I don't run in to people who advocate Leftist/people control concepts who are actually planning to move to an undeveloped nation and raise their children there.

*Has anyone asked an environmentalist have the world got by before we killed off so many of the native Bison in North America?  Although I personally hold that we missed out on a chance to developed a Bison-based as opposed to a cattle-based livestock economy (A good topic for a future post), that point is moot for the subject of global warming. We all know about the millions of Bison and herds that were said to stretch for upwards of 50 miles, but the link below has one estimate of 75,000,000 Bison running around the continent before Europeans showed up. If cattle are such a problem, how were that many Bison not a problem? Even if the lower given estimate of 30,000,000 is used, that still is easily a full third of the total of cattle in the US today.

http://www.ias.unt.edu/llela/bison.htm

Best Friends not Authorized for Britain's Children

Well, the Left is rarely at a loss for vicious ideas-

Teachers in Britain have taken to using their positions of moral and ethical authority to tell their students to refrain from having best friends. Now when a child in Britain says "I'm not your best friend", it cannot be considered an insult but a mark of adherence to the values and dictates of the State.

"I have noticed that teachers tell children they shouldn't have a best friend and that everyone should play together.

"They are doing it because they want to save the child the pain of splitting up from their best friend. But it is natural for some children to want a best friend. If they break up, they have to feel the pain because they're learning to deal with it."

Russell Hobby, of the National Association of Head Teachers, confirmed some schools were adopting best-friend bans."

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article4203460.ece

Note that a representative of the teachers group is aware of this movement. I do not know if Mr. Hobby would object to use of the word "ban" to describe this scheme, but there seems to be little doubt that faculty will not be restrained from enforcing the measure.

Aside from the fact that we see another example of the state deciding that they have to protect everyone from everything*, I see a more insidious intent behind this. Leftists need to remove from people any amount of individual thought and seek to bring their consciousness into step with that of the group. In Leftist thought, what the body of people (Really the ones that get together and make the decision for all) thinks, or is told to think, is not to be resisted. A child that has a buddy with whom he or she can confide and find common interests is hard to break spiritually, emotionally and intellectually.

Looking at this from another angle, children or now being forced to become liars. How many children will fall in line with this decree? Those who do not will have no choice but to hide the fact that they actually do have a best friend. What are the procedures that faculty are to follow if they receive a report, or catch wind , of a couple of scofflaw students that are defying school policy? I can picture the child shifting uneasily in a chair as he or she awaits being called into the Principle's Office to answer questions. Imagine the line of questioning - "Karen, I know that you say that you and Susan are not best friends, but Susan says that you two are. Is she telling us the truth?"

I also have to wonder if the teachers plan on enhancing the authority of student hall monitors and turning them into Thought Police, charged with ratting out other students for violating the best friends ban in addition to the more routine tasks of ensuring that no one runs in the hallway.

This comes across as a typical move of a dysfunctional State. While Britain hides its head in the sand to avoid having to address its horrific crime**, increasing Islamization of the nation, and a real loss of a sense of national identity, the nation dreams up another way to control the children instead.


*The school system could be a bit more concerned at what may happen to the seven year-old kid eight years from now than it is for the ultimately minor setback of being dumped as a best friend in second grade.
http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/gang-rape-of-15-year-old-british-girl.html



**http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2011/11/muslim-rape-gangs-in-btritain.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/01/archbiship-of-canterbury-faults-british.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/london-calling-or-is-it-londonistan.html

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/02/httpwww_22.html

Piven - "Democrats, Socialists, and Communists...We Are All Together"

Frances Fox-Piven, one of the founders of the Cloward-Piven Strategy*, has elaborated on the Grand Alliance of the Left and its projected direction for this Spring and beyond. Note that the inclusion of the word "Democrats"** should not be taken to mean what you think. As noted in an earlier post (Link below), the Left not only has a pretty good hold of the reigns of the US Democratic Party, it has worked overtime to redefine the very meaning of the word "Democracy" to refer to the redistribution of property and a regressive (They like to call it progressive) return to a primitive state of financial equality.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/democrats-socialists-and-communists-we-are-all-together-piven-draws-chilling-connections/

"There is room for all of us. Religious leftists, people who think peace is the answer, those who think that wholesome food is what we really need, ecologists and old-fashioned Democrats, Democratic Socialists, Socialists and Communists.”

We can work together because we have a really huge task before us, transforming America and the World.” 


The preceding comments were made at the Left Forum 2012. This group is an assemblage of Leftists (Mostly Academic) of all types. There declared mission is to draw up uniform methods of introducing Leftist thought into our educational system (Well, they can claim success there), and to promote the Leftist agenda to transform the US into a state that is organized along lines more palatable to them.


http://www.leftforum.org/


I will refrain from going into detail on Ms. Piven's ideas or the concept of  pretending that Democracy has anything to do with redistributing wealth. The two posts listed below will provide a reasonable familiarization.
I would strongly recommend reading the posts. Ms. Piven's predictions of the Occupy Movement's goals for this year are indeed very dark.

http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/cloward-piven-founder-gleefully.html


http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/marxists-hijack-democracy-pretend-that.html.

Ostracism Reconsidered - Founding Fathers Should Have Included it

Ostracism has come to have connotations that are purely social in nature. Its actual practice, origin, and ideas behind it are truly fascinating and telling for our times. In the ancient Athenian Democracy, this was a procedure by which individuals who either posed, or were suspected of possibly becoming, a threat to the state could be temporarily exiled from the city.

In the Fourth Century BC, Athens had ended a Tyranny. Like the subject of this post (And also like the Roman Term "Dictator"), it also originally had different meaning:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrant

"Tyrant (Greek τύραννος, tyrannos) was originally one who illegally seized and controlled a governmental power in a polis. Tyrants were a group of individuals who took over many Greek poleis during the uprising of the middle classes in the sixth and seventh centuries BC, ousting the aristocratic governments."

Today we view a Tyrant as someone who rules cruelly in addition to arbitrarily. Although some Greek Tyrants were in fact cruel in nature and practice, others were not. Nevertheless, the Athenians recognized that their city-state had to have some law and order and a means to prevent another individual from seizing power.

Cleisthenes is generally credited with initiating several reforms at the close of the Sixth Century BC that resulted in the creation of Athenian Democracy. His solution to the threat of another Tyranny was Ostracism; a procedure by which the citizens* of the state could vote to have a person removed from the city for a period of ten years. The Ostracized individual was not truly exiled (Actual exile was a different procedure) as he had every right to return at the end of the ten years, his property was not forfeited, and no other penalties were imposed. Although the state could and did on occasion vote to allow someone back early, if he tried to return on his own, he faced the death penalty.

On an annual basis, the citizens were asked if they had any intention of Ostracizing one of their own. If not, then the issue was laid to rest until the following year. If there was a a vote in favor of it, a two-month period was required prior to actual procedure, both to guard against any angry knee-jerk reactions of the body politic and to allow for discussion on the possible need for such a decision. Names were not presented as a sort of candidate(s). The intention was to remove from political influence anyone who seemed to be courting the favor of too much of the citizenry, was deemed too charismatic and thus likely to attempt a takeover, or had been believed or rumored to be plotting in such a manner. An example of the latter would be if one was believed to have accepted bribes from the Persian King or one of his Satraps.

With papyrus, the normal medium for writing being a valuable product, shards of broken pottery (Ostraka), which were plentiful, were used. Each voter would write the name of the person that he felt should be sent away for a while on the shard. We appear to have two versions of what constituted a quorum, or sufficient number of votes, for an ostracism; one held that six thousand votes for that particular individual was needed, another seems to be  that as long as there were six thousand total votes cast, the one with the majority of shards containing the inscription of his name had to go.

There was no appeal and he had ten days to settle his affairs and leave the city. Since the Ostracised could still earn an income from his property, this method of temporarily removing a potential threat to the state was, although effective, far from harsh. It was also not done every year - I can only come up with thirteen known individuals who were in fact Ostracized. In fact, if we consider that Athens had at times around 50,000 citizens, the removal of 13 or so guys over a period of 90 years does not sound so bad to me.

The Greeks were known for being honorable guys and, like others of Indo-European cultures, willing to let even the regular guy have his say. As I have noted in previous posts, higher-ranking members could not only speak their peace to leaders and Kings but would even would speak quite boldly to them - witness the dialogues between Alexander the Great and his soldiers and army officers. Also pertinent is the soldier in Clovis' army who had no fear in expressing his disagreement when the Frankish King was going to take a larger share of spoils from a battle than the rest of the soldiers. Clovis, bound by protocol, was forced to let this go and was not able to exact any retribution until he (Dishonorably) killed the soldier later on under the pretense of having found his weapons dirty during an inspection.

The story of Aristedes' Ostracism illustrates the fairness inherent among the Greeks. Although some historians dismiss the following account (They like to, with a wave of the hand, casually ignore a lot of good stuff), many see no reason to hold that it did not happen.

During the period of the voting for Ostracism for Aristides (c. 485BC), he was approached by an illiterate citizen who, not knowing what Aristides looked like, asked him to write a name on his pottery shard for him. Upon asking what name the man wanted, he was told "Aristides". Naturally, Aristides asked why he wanted that guy (Aristides) gone. The common-sense illiterate Greek responded that he was sick and tired of hearing Aristides always being referred to as "the Just". Aristides, without revealing himself, dutifully inscribed his name and, although we don't know if the one vote made a difference, he was in fact Ostracised.

The idea behind this account was that even a lowly, illiterate citizen could recognize that constantly adding such designations to a person's name was a bad precedent and made him stand out a little too much among other Athenians.

Although I am not a math guy, I figured that, over a ninety-year period, Athens Ostracised a mere 0.14 of its citizens per year. If we in the US, with our 313,000,000-plus people, were to go with that modest amount, we could send two people a year away without going over the Athenian average. I welcome corrections from  people who are good at math.

Where to start? Well, since this nation was founded on the principles of freedom, private property, the absence of oppressive taxation, etc., I would hold that the best candidates for productive Ostracisms would be those who are the chief advocates of Marxist doctrines or those who do their darnedest to stir up one "class" of Americans against the other. Note that for personal/private property (including money) in particular, our Founding Fathers, those who actually created our system of government, were heavily influenced by John Locke, who was emphatic that one of the main reasons for government in the first place was to protect people's property. The concept of utilizing governmental power to take away and redistribute property is a modern aberration of the concept of government.

Although we are in fact not a Democracy but a Constitutional Representative Republic (Marxists like to pretend that we have a Democracy and then pretend that Democracy is about "spreading around the wealth*), we do have what I would call Democratic elements in our political system. Universal suffrage, the concept of extending the franchise to anyone who reaches a certain age (A horrifyingly low one on our case) regardless of payment (Or lack thereof) of property or income taxes, proof that one is not receiving government assistance or proof of military service, or any other reasonable requirements that would at least indicate that one has a true stake in the good of the nation, does in fact leave us open to all sorts of Demagoguery. The subjection and virtual restriction of large portions of our electorate to generations of dependency on Welfare, the continued importation of vast numbers of unskilled immigrants (Many of which are illegal, but who cares about that?) while severely restricting the same from developed nations, and the destruction of our educational system, have come together to create a massive base of voters who are easily misled and used as a permanent bloc of votes that can be pointed like a dagger at the throat of our prospect of continued prosperity.

The Founding Fathers, while their work is repeatedly attacked by the Left, did in fact do a great job (Thank Heaven for that) of setting up barriers to Tyranny. I do, though,  hold that they did drop the ball in one case - they left out any means by which the people could remove potential Tyrants or Demagogues, even if for a temporary period. In fairness, they probably did not have a crystal ball to see what we have facing us today.
If we did in fact have such machinery in place, not only would we be able to encourage staunch Marxists/Classists to go to nations that actually are Marxist, those who wanted to stay would be far less likely to blatantly brainwash our youth for fear of being tossed.Consequently, we have to work all the harder for out rights, our way of life, and the legacy that was bequeathed to us.

*The subject of who actually was a citizen (And could vote) in Athens and the redefining of Democracy to mean spreading around the wealth can be seen in this post:
http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/2012/03/marxists-hijack-democracy-pretend-that.html