From the March 2004 Idaho Observer:

On the Other Side

by Hari Heath

OK, if you're not on an exclusive diet of news and information from the sugarcoated pabulum press, you may have noticed we're on the verge of societal collapse.

Problems

Government was once formed by the Constitution, but now it's unconstitutional in almost every area of its operation. And its operations extend to just about everything.

Our economy has been stolen by a cartel of bankers and congressmen whose lust for power has enslaved us and put us on the brink of global economic meltdown. A meltdown made easier because it's not gold or silver that would be melting, but rather paper, ink and computer data.

The resource base of the planet is losing ground to the demands of an ever more “civilized” global population. The toxic trail from our leap into the industrial age is now a noxious moat surrounding the castle of civilization. Miracles of modern chemistry have left a legacy of unbroken chains of carcinogens embedded in the post-industrial environment. Over 50 years of experimentation with nuclear power has left megatons of radioactive waste with a half-life of over 50,000 years. No scientific solution to this long-term problem appears to be on the horizon.

And the “developing” nations are embracing our careless indifference to a sustainable future with reckless abandon.

Nature itself seems to have had enough, as science predicts either a cataclysmic global warming or a coming ice age. And science suggests that such seeming opposites are not mutually exclusive.

Meanwhile, the government which claims to be protecting us from terrorists has become more terroristic than even the fascist regimes we defeated in the Second World War.

Lacking the lawful authority for most of the acts it commits, government and their private co-conspirators continually seek to make us believe we gave our consent to their unconstitutional conduct. The controlled corporate media are key to this illusion. If the make believe government can't make us believe in them anymore, their facade will fade away.

Individually, many of us are no longer believers in the religion of government, but due to the government's separation and suppression policies, we don't know how many of us there are. Eventually there will be a collective mass awakening to the fallacies of the federal fraud. In the meantime, we will keep trying to wake up anyone who will listen.

The upcoming Skull vs. Bones presidential debates will have much to say about the economy as an issue, but neither of the Bonesmen will dare touch the real substance of that issue -- there can be no economy when the only “money” available is unbacked fiat script and computer data entries issued into existence from the thin air of nearly empty bank vaults. The hologram economy will be bantered about by our two campaigning bonesmen as if it were reality.

It is miraculous that western banksters have managed to keep a lid on their scheme for decades without a major meltdown, but world conditions seem to indicate an imminent meltdown.

The global stage now has more players than just the European and American fiscal elite. Every nonwestern and “developing” nation now wants their slice of the pie. Unfettered greed will likely prevail over controlled economic expansion as the economic bubble slips from the grasp of its creators.

When the baseless economy reaches the end of its burning fuse, so too will the operations of the mega-government that has grown up around the unlimited power to appropriate more imaginary funds and “solve” any problem the administrators of government create.

And what about our nation's people? Successive waves of socialism and its accompanying regulations have subverted our “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” entrepreneurial American spirit. The former land of the free and the home of the brave is now the land of the entitled. Americans have sucked up to socialism, and in so doing, yielded their personal sovereignty to the shadowy forces of the usurper government. Most can no longer even conceive what it would be like to live in a free country.

We live in a delusion of freedom. We allow ourselves to be “permitted” to speak on the airwaves (FCC licensed activity); to worship in a tax exempt church (26 USC 501 (c)(3)); to acquire gun (BATF form 4473); to travel (vehicle and driver's license); and build a home (building permit, water, sewer and electrification permits, environmental and energy efficiency engineering assessments).

Then there's operating a business. “Free enterprise?” It's history. The regulatory compliance obligations of engaging in commerce are unfathomable to the free-thinking mind -- a mental capacity that is apparently no longer common in America.

And your rights? Most people who have graduated from a social engineering facility (public schools) don't know what they are, much less how to secure them. The Bill of Rights is another great subject of history.

Be it an economic meltdown of the fictional fiat economy, revolution against the usurpers treasonous tyrannical regime, environmental collapse, the unleashing of biological agents that have been engineered to thin down the herd, or some or all of the above, challenging times are ahead.

The other side

But enough of problems. What are we gonna do on the other side of the coming collapse? What would a positive, sustainable, accountable political society look like? And how can people who have been socially engineered from childhood to believe slavery is freedom, reform into a society that upholds freedom?

Can we move from the “freedumb” we now enjoy, to genuine freedom?

First of all, after the collapse, we will be reduced to what John Locke described in his Second Treatise on Government as a “state of nature.” It will be every man or woman for themselves, once big brother's handouts and security blanket goes away. Each of us will have and hold whatever we can, with whatever force we can muster to hold it. At the onset of the calamity, we will be reduced to hunting, gathering and plunder -- and not necessarily in that order.

We will be returned to our essential sovereignty, because the system to which we now surrender our sovereignty will no longer be there.

Or will it? “Fade away” may not be a realistic description of the creature called government thrashing about in its death throws. The force of such a behemoth crashing under its own weight might well be akin to a magnitude 9.2 earthquake on the social Richter scale.

Since we know not the hour, nor the nature of the events that are looming, it will be challenging to accurately prepare. With our current infrastructures and delivery systems fragilely inter-dependent upon each other, they are unlikely to survive.

Each of us will have to assume direct responsibility for life's needs or possibly perish. Direct responsibility may include forming alliances with fellow sovereigns living in the new state of nature. Locke has some insightful notions on the state of nature. His Second Treatise of Government, “An Essay Concerning the True Original, Extent, and End of Civil Government” is recommended reading for all of us who are about to be thrust into a new beginning.

Over time, the survivors will eventually seek what Locke described as a “political society” or “civil government.” We will want to establish a system of governance to secure our individual rights and property, provide for a limited government, prevent tyranny, conquest and slavery, and ensure the opportunity of sustainable human progress.

John Locke and Frederic Bastiat have expressed well the fundamentals of life, liberty, property and the necessary limitations to prevent government encroachment thereon. Perhaps the best place to start is the origins of the American experiment and build again on its foundation. That experiment was started over 200 years ago when America was very different socially, geographically and technologically. And as all experience hath shown, some important changes are needed to keep the monster of government within the chains of the Constitution.

It would be pure fantasy to presume that after whatever calamity befalls us, the survivors from a formerly 280 million plus national population, who now know only freedumb, would assemble as our nation's founders did in a national convention and draft a new document to successfully secure the blessings of liberty for their posterity.

The best place to rebuild a government to serve free people is at the county level. So let's begin there. And by reviewing the mistakes of the American experiment in self-government, learn the lessons and avoid repeating the failures.

The drafters of our original Constitution left many unclarified presumptions in the document. The Bill of Rights was an attempt to clarify some of them. What may have seemed obvious to them then, and therefore needing no clarification, has since been misconstrued, largely helped along by evolving meanings of words.

We must remember that no one had previously attempted what the Founders accomplished and their passions and memories were fresh from the war, making it possible. We no longer have such passion -- or memory.

The following are a few of my suggestions for improving the experiment:

We have been swamped in a morass of administrative government. The solution is simple and pre-existing. Article I, Section 1 of the Constitution vests all legislative power in the Congress. There is no provision for administrative promulgation of regulations. If only Congress made the laws, there would be less of them.

Similarly, Presidential Proclamations, Executive Orders and Directives may be OK if their effect is only to control the executive branch. But they're not authorized by the Constitution. When they have legal force against the people or other branches of government, they become legislation.

The judiciary is meant to be interpreters and keepers of the laws laid down by Congress. Legislation by judicial doctrines not based upon clear interpretation of existing law are not part of the judicial power.

Some clarification of these much-abused practices is in order. A new Constitution needs to define the constitutional duties of the executive, administrative and judicial branches to preclude them from exercising law-making power. Given the excesses of our current government, the present language is apparently not strong enough. Something to the effect of “all legislative power shall be vested in a Congress and no other component of government shall exercise any law or rule making power which shall have force or effect beyond the internal control and operation of its respective branch.”

Congress would be OK if it stuck to the powers enumerated to it. If they did, U.S. Code would be a single volume. But the people have been prevented from exercising any remedy that would enforce the Constitution. Without enforcement, the monster of government knows no bounds. Effective recall elections and an honest and open court system to challenge legislation could keep legislators in line with the mandates of their office.

Our founders had little legislative experience when they formed the Constitution. The practice of attaching riders and unrelated amendments to federal legislation was not even thought of then. But many states have included single subject legislation provisions to prevent such clustered law-making. Idaho's example reads “Every act shall embrace but one subject and matters properly connected therewith, which subject shall be expressed in the title; but if any subject shall be embraced in an act which shall not be expressed in the title, such act shall be void only as to so much thereof as shall not be embraced in the title.”(Article III, Section 16)

Another necessary component of legislation, not currently in any constitutional provision, would be the requirement for every bill to be on a subject authorized by the Constitution and to state which provision it relies upon for its authority. This would limit the amount of legislative intrusions into our lives and provide a clear basis of the legislative intent during any legal challenges to the laws passed.

The one part of the federal Constitution that needs to go is Article I, Section 8, subsection (2), granting Congress the power “to borrow money on the credit of the United States.”

Thomas Jefferson explained: ”I wish it were possible to obtain a single amendment to our Constitution. I would be willing to depend on that alone for the reduction of the administration of our government; I mean an additional article taking from the Federal Government the power of borrowing.” ~Thomas Jefferson to John Taylor, 1798

Nothing could be more diabolical than the folks at Diebold and other culprits in the black box vote stealing scam. The electronic age has now commandeered the electoral process with its vote counting machines and touch screen voting. As this trend continues, we will have no more choice in our political affairs. The only workable solution is to require hand marked, hand counted ballots and keep them around after the election so they can be recounted in the event of any controversy. It may take longer to find out the results, but a constitutional provision to that effect would put the election thieves out of business.

Accountability in government? There is none and so we succumb. Various judicial accountability reform movements are based on the idea of bringing the unconstitutional or corrupt actions of judges before special grand juries for review. The idea could be expanded in a new Constitution to have a special citizen's grand jury to review the conduct of all public servants.

Our nation's founders had the experience of fiat paper money and its inherent runaway inflation fresh in their minds when they drafted the Constitution. They thought granting the power to “coin money” would be sufficient instruction on how to have a sound economy. It apparently wasn't. And now we have enjoyed our freedumb for so long that most people have no concept of real money any more.

The Coinage Act of 1792 took the nation's money supply seriously. The prescribed penalty was hanging for any mint employee who failed to maintain the purity and weight standards of the coinage or was caught stealing. Now we have given the control of the money supply to a private banking cartel which debases the baseless currency regularly through its private tax called inflation.

Some constitutional reclarification on the nature of money is in order. But the Constitution is not the only thing that needs improving. Americans have gotten something for nothing for so long that they feel entitled to it. An economy based on substance is stable and reliable and doesn't steal wealth from its users. But it also can't create abundance from nothing.

Perhaps, as the hologram economy evaporates before their eyes, Americans will again come to appreciate the value of coins as the only real money.

These are a few ideas on building a sustainable future, “on the other side.” If you have any ideas to secure the blessings of liberty and form a more perfect union on the other side of the coming collapse, send them to The Idaho Observer. They may be included in a future article.

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On The Other Side Government:

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the rule of law.

~Edward Abbey