The Arguement

I'm really letting April down. I've been distracted since uni went back and being poor. I'm poor enough now to let people take photos of me licking their leprous feet for $1. There's no justice in the world. I know there's people with real issues out there but seriously I'm a girl with expensive tastes I don't like to have to think about money.
Enough of that though. There's one line, in one book that hits the nail on the head 'An armed man will never obey an unarmed man' said by Machiavelli in the perrenial amoral handbook 'The Prince' I also recommend 'The Little Prince' as a worthwhile read.
Arj Barker would say Machiavelli excepts the isness of the buisness. A lot of people hate Machiavelli, a lot of people hate their uncle playing low to the ground well placed shots in back yard cricket. Yet they both exist and frankly better the devil you know.
So anyway why is that line important? Environmentalism. I wrote about my favorite campsite a few posts back and some of you may have got the impression that I love nature. This is true, but unlike someone who believes in getting naked and mingling amongst the trees in the moonlight to abandon oneself to their feral nature and appreciate the ambiance of the environment because my parents were hippies or something, I approached environmentalism from a megalomaniacal angle out of a disturbed youth.
Basically when I see someone spit on the ground I don't think of it as everybodies ground but MY ground. For example close your eyes (and somehow manage to keep reading the instructions isn't it amazing how many times those instructions are written in print) so keep your eyes open for now and just think what I'm writing.
You bake a cake, a delicious cake you ice it and leave it on the cooling rack. Some snotball runs his finger through the icing. Your pissed off, your bigger than your snotball so you wack them with a wooden spoon and when they threaten to call the police you tell them that's fine, they'll send you to a foster home where your new parents will rape you and post pictures on the internet. Alternatively you get down on their level look them in the eye, explain what they've done wrong and sit them on the naughty step. They both work.
So now you're an all powerfull conquering warlord, you invade a cake, it's your cake you take it, but some snotball ran his fingers all through the icing, so you cut his ear off as a warning to future sabotoers (sabotage people) who will ruin things you intend to one day own.
So say the cake is Europe or the Middle East or the world, at some point in the future someone is going to claim rights to that land that is not who has rights to it now whether that be future generations or some world superpower or the Wiggles. They have the power to take that land from another in possession to it.
Like Australia dispossessed all the native inhabitants of the land and went one step further and declared they didn't even exist when clearly they were there. And we freely buy, trade and/or rent this stolen property enjoying full ownership under our legal system, never contemplating anyone would claim a brunswick or werribee dwelling as their birthright and knowig full well any trouble makers would be handily handled by the police.
We all enjoy this. So why can't someone really powerful just make the laws that only they have the power to enforce and others cant stop them?
Seriously if I was as big as I am now and a bunch of preppies formed a committee to say I had to pay a toll to walk on a footpath I would laugh at them and if they pressed the point tossed them aside like teddy bears.
That's the crux of what Machiavelli is saying. When he wrote amorally it wasn't with evil intent. It was amoral which means non-moral as in he wrote extensively on the mechanics of politics and in a time dominated by the church didn't presuppose what one should use political power for.
So the arguement would go something like this (and a belive throughout history it often has) some one sits in a chair and argues rationally, logically, conscicely and passionately about some cause, a moral injustice and positively suggests a remedy that may be counterproductive or merely inconveniant to his opponants position in the debate. He can draw on utilitarianism, economic schools and theories, exciting new Harvard research, new age philosophies. He can reiterate his arguements and provide precedent after precedent for his remedy.
The oppositions arguemen involves breaking his teeth until he can no longer talk. No logic no rational, no rightness or wrongness, he/she does so only in the knowledge that he/she can get away with it because ultimately it is his/her choice, they have afforded themselves a mandate that means they don't have to listen to anyone tell them what to do.
Compelling television I don't know depends who's debating and I guess that's all relative.
But seriously if I ruled the world I wouldn't tolerate PBS commentary on my policy because I wouldn't seek legitimacy through democratic election. I'd seek advice for sure, I'm no expert on fiscal policy, sustainable energy, health & infrastructure etc. I take this stance because I see the US spend several times more than probably 30 of the worlds poorest nations GNP just to get elected.
You can arm yourself pretty well with just a brain, anyone can, and if there's certain things you don't provide no leader can retain power for long, yet effective leaders can emerge in almost any system and be successful simply by understanding how to balance and sustain their power. Power just as a word sounds so totalitarian and testosterone charged that it immediately sounds bad.
I don't think it has too. Polittical parties in Australia fight out benign election campaigns on drab issues with unappealing personalities and far too much coverage in order to retain the power, not to oppress, maim, butcher but instead to decide how to spend the budget and which bigger fish to kiss arse to and the extent of that arse kissing (Do you stick out the tongue or just peck and hope minimal residue gets inhaled when your lips part again?)
Power's useful and nothing goes anywhere unless someone has it. The US mantle as world superpower isn't under threat by terrorism, in this day and age they should be afraid of competence.