Land Value Tax in the 21st Century

Georgism (breaking the power of last remnant of feudalism, the landlords) presents the most important point of contact and agreement between far left, far right, and centrist liberals throughout the world. Such agreement is key during transition to a new world economic system.


H.G. Wells, in The Shape of Things to Come, appears to have been correct (if off by a number of decades) when it comes to predicting Land Value Taxation becoming a fundamental cornerstone of a saner future world system. Whether the landlords are private or public in the form of a government, the unearned rents they collect will be redistributed to all living on the land. This allows most private corporations and individual capitalists to: 


1) Redirect increasing anger against them onto a relatively small number of individuals (buying time).


2) Buy off the poor without incurring too much personal cost (buying time).


3) Eliminate critical inefficiencies remaining from the dark ages and allocate capital more effectively in a world where capital accumulation has been slowing down/stagnating for decades (buying more time).


4) Push governments (that they always indirectly control when not being fused with them) of key great powers in the northern hemisphere to reinvent themselves. This allows the European continent to take the torch from United States in becoming a fortress of safety for capital via even better high tech welfare states (buying time once again by providing livable stipends to elderly and those displaced by machines).

Although it is popular to focus on either financial cartels or inefficiencies of the public sector these days, the sheer absurdity, inefficiency, and tyranny of landlords is often overlooked. It is too much part of background scenery. However, landlordism must be tackled first and directly since it is an older structural problem from a pre-capitalist world system. As we approach an end of a global debt supercycle (with governments of key military powers having to reconstruct social order to continue to function), landlordism should be emphasized as having been the primary cause of the crisis. This would create a convenient (and very necessary!) scapegoat and allow many corporations, oligarchs, unions, and governments to save face during transition to a new world system. Obviously it is one of many causes but singling it out has critically important benefits for humanity in terms of saving political energy expanded this century.


A few words about the global transition. It will either be orderly (Bretton Woods 2.0) or disorderly (trade disruptions and corresponding hunger related political violence primarily in the southern hemisphere). 


For it to be more orderly, the states will need resources. Resources will be scarce (factories shutting down, balance sheets of governments and corporations in disarray, etc). Tapping private landowners the world over and forcing them to pay rent will free up resources to minimize these conditions of chaos. Since new land can't be created readily, since it can't be hidden, and since private landlords control most of the surface of the earth, it will be easy to find what/who we need and redirect the rent these people normally collect towards infrastructure/welfare of a new world system. 


Although not all landlords have the same parasitic pull, the argument of "what about mom and pop landlords" is much like the 19th century argument about "mom and pop slave owners" who just had 1-3 slaves rather than the hundreds of the large plantations (large corporation equivalent of the day). Having said  that, the small landlords of course will not be physically touched and will become beneficiaries of the new system that they now help provide for. Some countries already implement a partial Land Value Tax system to great benefit. Taiwan is best example today. Future merger of China and Taiwan will hopefully "infect" a large planetary role model with a more futuristic tax code.

Problem of governments as landowners


Writing in 1976, Arthur Selwyn Miller in The Modern Corporate State, articulated the rise and decay of FDRist Social Democratic arrangement in United States from 1937 onwards. What started out as a roughly coequal coalition of large unions, large corporations, large universities, and large welfare government (with emphasis on job creating benefits of the military) has deteriorated. 40 years after the book was written, we are left with large military, large corporations (private governments), large universities subordinate to these private governments, and hollowed out central "public" government subordinate to these private governments. Combined with ever present institutionalized landlordism, this heady brew can only be described as neo-feudalism (especially with the 20th century decay/stagnation of newer dynamic progressive industrial capitalist system). 


Richard Nixon, the last strong relatively-autonomous American president, tried to prevent this and wanted to develop some executive government led (as first among equals) developmental authoritarianism. Franco's Spain in the 1950s springs to mind. Nixon was shown a lesson and now we have a major problem on our hands. How do we prevent the current, mostly privately led neo-feudal arrangement from transitioning to a mostly publicly led neo-feudal arrangement? How do we go forward towards new rather than backwards (only now with a glossier high tech patina).


Tapping and tackling only private landlordism will concentrate so many resources in the hands of the state that potential for mismanagement and confusion (see Soviet and modern Chinese examples) becomes all but a certainty. It will still be a better, saner, and more comfortable social order but one that would rapidly decay unless people in public governments are also viewed as much a (potentially parasitic) landlords as private landholders. This is especially important to keep in mind considering that most states in the world are effectively fused with large corporations to different degrees. Decreasing potential for corruption should be correlated to increasing complexity of civilization since preventing social unrest is difficult as is in such a densely populated world.

taxing land monopolies has no inefficiencies since supply of land is perfectly inelastic

The more proactively humane solution will only be in a legal rabidly institutionalized framework that ties the productive resource benefits derived from the land to each individual homo sapien living on the land directly. This means that governments can no longer serve as self aggrandizing “representatives” with final authority on how to allocate the stipends in the 21st century. This means structurally and legally binding governments, these entities with monopoly on violence in a given area, to only act as middlemen service providers and enforcers of justice. For instance, individuals in a private cooperatively owned and democratically managed private corporation in the future will pay legally mandated “rent” (whether money, electrical energy, resources, etc) to a public government land"lord" (people actually owning the land via planes, guns, and missiles) who will in turn be legally bound to transfer these resources to all people on the land. With cutting edge communication and transportation infrastructure, the line between decentralized and centralized governance will increasingly be blurred.

Sounds straightforward and surprisingly libertarian in the American sense? Yes, this brings us to a prior article on Left-Libertarianism in United States as a “glue” for the opposition. North America will be the hardest hit by the global transition since the people on that continent have utilized cutting edge technology to exhaust the current system first. This also means that most cutting edge and novel experiments in creating a new social order will happen there first. Land Value Tax provides a seemingly sensible yet ridiculously radical point of agreement towards a foundational platform of political coalitions of the future.

The planetary transition (whether orderly or disorderly) to a new international social order will span a number of decades and at first the leadership in constructing and developing it will pass to elites in the eastern hemisphere (Berlin-Moscow-Beijing-Tokyo-etc). However, once US begins to (hopefully) economically recover in the late 2020s and becomes role model for South America again (continent with the worst landlordism problem in the world), leadership should swing back to the land where both hope and world crisis began.

Russian Legislative Election 2011: End of an Era

A now familiar scene in Northern Hemisphere

Since it has served its purpose of stabilizing and consolidating the 20 year old country, Putinism is officially on the decline. Its future, if it is to survive, is either coalition governance with communists or radical transformation towards long term construction of a post-scarcity societal model.





The ruling rich man's party in the Kremlin has just gotten badly egged in the face by suffering a 25% drop in the Duma. It is the first reversal for regime's party since a number of prominent robber barons created it in 1999 to support their macho puppet at the time (when Putin was successfully used to divert nation's attention from collapsing economy towards a secessionist terrorist threat). The history of United Russia's seats in 450 person Duma in 1999: 73, in 2003: 225, in 2007: 315, in 2011: 238.

It was to be expected that people would not go for a lukewarm quasi FDRist reactionary policy of United Russia during a paradigm shifting global economic downturn (some members of Putin's party have pictures of FDR on their walls for inspiration). Although survival and additional expenditures on welfare and social safety nets were enough to avoid Greek style riots, they were not nearly enough to maintain (much less gain) popularity.

While it may appear paradoxical that citizens may punish a regime that kept them afloat as some economies have imploded throughout Europe, it is not surprising given human psychology. Whenever the elites actually empower the wage slaves by growing the economic pie, the people get empowered (duh) to demand more and more (see 1960s United States and numerous blue collar worker strikes in China today). If there are sudden reversals that clash with ego expectations, the amounts of hatred released can be dramatic (note Beijing's fear of annual growth dropping to under 7.5%).

Thus the popular shift to the promises of a high tech welfare state that the Communist Party of Russian federation (CPRF) offers. Zyuganov's Communists expanded their delegation's representation in the legislative by a respectable 61%. It is no longer a secret that CPRF stopped being just a platform for nostalgic elderly. The youth are joining the party in droves out of genuine conviction as well as a protest vote. "Business as usual" within CPRF is changing by the month.

It is to be noted that the 3 main opposition parties (including CPRF) are only allowed to exist by the Kremlin in order to have an effective feedback mechanism from the people that wasn't present until 1991. This allows the financial and industrial cartels that rule the country to be relatively flexible, avoid stagnation, and respond to wage slave needs in a relatively timely manner.

If the emerging Chinese princeling leadership (comfortable soft children of the old guard) ever democratize towards party pluralism, it may be along these lines. Similar system of feed back also exists in Syria where pro-Assad party allows some minor friendly parties to openly express popular discontent within structured channels. Multi-party (more than 2) rich man's democracy may even come to places like United States in the years to come as it appears that the power elites in Washington DC have lost the ability to measure and comprehend the sheer levels of peasant hatred against them. One can imagine a controlled monkey like Kucinich being allowed a small political block so frustrations can be channeled and systematically co-opted.

Having said that, CPRF remains the most autonomous oppositional entity with greatest potential for unpredictable action especially if its aging leadership is suddenly replaced internally. Kremlin's strategists may find it necessary to dramatically increase or restructure their psychological, informational, and financial warfare and co-option approach towards CPRF. The leading theorist of Russian managed democracy and "brains behind the throne" Vladislav Surkov, already helped create a fake opposition center-left party Just Russia to try to drain votes from CPRF. The other fake opposition party Liberal Democrats (LDPR) does a marvelous job sucking in the less pleasant crypto-fascist and militarist elements of society (think a special party to catch and compartmentalize the Michele Bachman and Rudy Gulliani lovers).

Surkov's goal is to have one "steering" party rule for 30-50 years the way Sweden and Japan were in the second half of the 20th century. The tiny parties may even be allowed to become substantially more independent (if they continue to take small amount of seats that is..). This would allow implementation of 5,10,20, and 30 year economic plans. Unfortunately, some current long term plans are paper shuffling jokes (building financial center to rival London) rather than being tangible herd improving ones. An example of the latter is the Northern River Reversal water project which would really glue Central Asian and possibly Persian elites to Kremlin's leadership and provide enough regional jobs to neutralize the fires of Islamic radicalism being currently fanned by Anglo geopolitical strategists.

It will be interesting to see:

1) How Putin modifies his position before the presidential election in response to this pie on the face
2) If Medvedev will even stick around
3) Which one of the 3 smaller party gremlins the papa gremlin will choose to cooperate with the most.

There have already been signals that the militarist LDPR may be the ally of choice as Putin returns to foreign affairs duties next year. That is since there is the matter of taking advantage of shrinking perimeter of American empire and consolidating regional economic blocks (Eurasian NAFTA-esque entities) to help make Kremlin friendly corporations even more profit. When it comes to choosing allies for domestic policy however, things will get a lot more complicated as Internet literate population has sensed blood in the water after dealing Kremlin a broken nose.

Continuing decline of American influence may briefly boost the Kremlin for a short time. Ultimately however it would further and even more thoroughly discredit current form of Putinism which is basically intensely trying to copy what American empire did right in the 1950s-1970s period (vibrant soft power, incredibly cold and restrained diplomacy, attracting foreign investment, social democratic architecture, allowing sufficient democratic input to bypass oligarchs, becoming example for elites in poorer parts of the world, building cutting edge energy infrastructure, etc). CPRF as ruling coalition partner may be the only realistic choice for United Russia in the next few years as American neoliberal model continues to nosedive (occupy the Kremlin anyone?).

As much as some Western dissidents would like to see the desires of their own ruling imperialist Kleptocrats tempered by those in Beijing and Moscow, it is not the sort of strategy where the little people ultimately win. Imperialism from DC being replaced by economic imperialism from Berlin, Moscow, or Beijing is not what humanity needs to preserve social stability in the 21st century.

As of today, 4 political units stand out in terms of having the preconditions to provide leadership for the whole world. They are Germany and Japan (once they figure out a way to constructively end foreign occupations of their soil) and China and Russia. Japanese elites have the most high tech and egalitarian "human farm" to work with, China has the raw economies of scale to construct for large swaths of the world, Germany of course can lead in supranational integration, while Russia may be the first to demonstrate combination of democratic functioning and popular blatantly communist aspirations that are being rekindled daily. Those robber barons still buying London property (and thus political protection) understand this.

P.S. Once again, regional militarism born out of imperial power vacuum is to be avoided at all costs.

Ideology Causes Societal Stagnation

When the ruling 20% of the population (NTs/NFs) overwhelmingly relies on heuristics and ideological shortcuts, the resulting storm of cognitive laziness rots society from the top down. Progress in the 21st Century will require development of a guiding yet non-ideological framework




Before diving into construction possibilities of such a framework, a few words about why this blog is titled The Pragmatist. The name was selected to be in stark opposition to the widely hated The Economist ("free" trade/ neoliberal claptrap/ capitalist propaganda arm of the British intelligence). The Economist has done more harm via cognitive pollution of world's elites than most state propaganda arms can ever aspire to. Countless countries were left in ruins by the sort of rigid one dimensional Trotskyist-esque globalization peddling that a pretentious rag like The Economist provides.

A silver lining to this was that The Economist's underlining assumption (that a certain type of development is the best) has stagnated jolly old England via its rulers. This is similar to the way the Chinese empire was stagnated by rigid adherence to traditionalist Confucian train of thought in the 19th century. If Chinese elites of old had a similar magazine, say The Confucianist, it would undoubtedly deal with alternative modes of development with the same contempt and dismissive patronizing attitude. Just like their Chinese brethren before the Opium Wars, Anglo elites of today consider the rest of the world to be barbarian even if these barbarians are developing more advanced technology and infrastructure. They may not be into the beauty of calligraphy but the various non-development obsessions (and thus unbecoming of ruling elites) are eerily similar.

Why would this stagnation of the English speaking world be a blessing in disguise? For starters, from a global perspective, the socioeconomic decline of United States and United Kingdom will do as much to discredit capitalism as the decline of Soviet Union did to discredit communism. Thus we will finally exit the era of great ideological jihads that marked much of the 20th century. This will seem incredibly unfair to many in the Western world who will think the decline occurred because some idealized branch of capitalism in their heads was not adhered to enough. They have their counterparts in the former Soviet space. For majority of humanity at large however, it will mean mental liberation from rigid "isms". Failure of US will trigger bitter factional struggles in the cities of Berlin, Paris, Moscow, Tokyo, New Delhi and Beijing. It will mimic similar struggles after Soviet collapse and the tidal wave of social change will be tremendous.

In fact, because both superpowers were so intertwined with the ideological systems they mouthed, the discrediting of capitalism will usher in greater change than discrediting of Soviet communism. There will be nothing to fall back on in the minds of both ruling elites and everyday thinking peoples of the world. Chinese and Russian leaderships of today are pragmatic and heterodox yet they still have FDR's social democratic industrial capitalism embedded in the back of their consciousness. China will not be able to fill the void left by US in the minds of world's elites the way US filled the void of SU.

[Note: Democracy will not be similarly discredited since the financial/corporate oligarchies in UK and US provide far less democratic input than the oligarchies of continental Europe. US doesn't have the very basic minimum democratic principle of proportional representation allowing more than two parties. UK's horrid non-inclusive first-past-the-post system makes a mockery of allowing political competition. Lack of democratic input will be singled out by future researchers as the main structural reason why the Anglo kleptocracies reached the levels of irreversible stagnation that they had.]

Well that was more than a few words but The Economist is the devil, it needed to be said. The point is that human intelligentsia wont be free to develop the rest of the herd with ideological "isms" lurking to unconsciously frame all perception. It appears that left brainers are more prone to adapting "ism" systems. That is unfortunate since they tend to be overly represented at the top of various ruling hierarchies.

The more one "educates" oneself about his or her ideology the more neural connections are created within the brain, making it easier to retrieve data. Since left brainers have more sequential processing than right brainers, their brains get the most easily reshaped by system based socioeconomic thought. In other words they build a sort of a neural muscle that aids in spouting one dimensional propaganda. Similar to an athlete just working out one muscle group while letting the rest of the body atrophy. Often having such a brain circuit devoted to a an "ism" feels empowering since:

1) Most of the population (80% who aren't NT/NF) haven't delved into internalizing a system to such an extent. They think anybody with an elaborate enough system must be an expert
2) Half of the intelligentsia (NFPs/NTPs) are right brain dominant and sample data from across a variety of systems and experiences. Their style of conversation relies on drawing horizontally from a wide range of fields. To a left brainer system peddler it would appear that they are dodging the conversation.

In any event, a person deep into system based ideological thinking is prone to debate mode of conversation rather than mutually beneficial discussion where tangible learning can occur. A sort of an interpersonal cold war mentally becomes ever present. An "us versus them" dynamic develops within the intelligentsia. We saw where that leads entire societies.

Previously I touched upon the criteria by which future leaderships will be judged:

1) preservation/expansion of human autonomy
2) speed in construction of energy plants needed for continental infrastructure projects in irrigation, transport, farming, etc.

Providing more infrastructure can never truly become an ideology any more than providing more water and food can be an ideology. If you talk to anybody whose cognitive processes are deeply caged by an "ism", it is highly unlikely that they'll mention the result of less shelter, food, water, energy as the benefit of their ideology. And of course minority death cults can be readily recognized and dismissed out of hand (this unfortunately includes some "post-industrialist" factions of the green movement). Thus we have infrastructure as our first guiding point that is flexible enough depending on the needs of a particular region/climate.

What the ideologues of course differ on is how to get to more infrastructure for humanity. We can't simply use the process of elimination of what's easier in terms of how to proceed. This may open the door to tyrannical political suggestions. Yet how do we make the above mentioned preservation/expansion of human autonomy a guiding point without it becoming a rigid "ism"?

This is a complex topic that I'll attempt to tackle in the next article. Obviously provision of shelter/food/energy and giving more cutting edge democratic proportional representation builds autonomy of the individual. Yet we can't just say "our guiding point should be infrastructure and we should build more infrastructure and build it quicker in a way that keeps expanding the autonomy of all individuals (second guiding point)". Although it may appear as if there are no trade offs with our guiding points, many political factions can easily spot trade offs that can occur (sacrificing humans in name of infrastructure construction or sacrificing infrastructure construction in the name of humans).

Therefore, the relationship between the guiding points needs to be very carefully developed to preemptively deflect accusations from ideologues of various stripes (namely libertarians and those who want to emulate Chinese dictatorship).

Ways to Screen Political Candidates

The goal of acquiring better politicians and eliminating influence of money in government points to an exam based selection system as the means




How to better achieve the age old goal of having political candidates that are right for the job? The job of course being to visibly and tangibly advance social welfare and involves:

a- decreasing price (in caloric energy spent) while increasing quality/quantity of food, electrical output, transport, shelter, education  
b- decreasing necessity for backbreaking work and subsistence living  
c- increasing safety from violence and coercion and advancing interethnic harmony
d- preserving and even expanding human autonomy during the process of all of the above

Yes, very difficult and definitely not the type of job that morons, pandering charismatic narcissists, rich man's stooges, and quick fix/gimmick driven individuals should engage in. Unfortunately, very often these days these 4 types are blended into one toxic package. To know what we want from candidates is to conceptualize a way to screen them. The public desires 3 basic simultaneous things from a person seeking power:

1) sufficiently competent to run and evolve technologically complex and very populous (over 10 million people) social units
2) sufficiently independent of oligarchic corporate influence
3) sufficiently legitimate in eyes of the public without it minimizing 1) and 2) (successfully approved by some sort of democratic input)

It is becoming very clear that neither public or private financing of candidates is achieving these. Rather than engaging in a futile task of tweaking an easily abused system (more public financing, ban on ads, regulating funds, etc), it is possible to cut off degradation and corruption of the candidate pool at the root. What needs to be made structurally obsolete is a need for money in politics in the first place. This in turn eliminates the need for advanced election marketing propaganda, fund raising pandering, and for extremely self absorbed individuals that possess a solid acting/lying/showmanship ability.

Screening method 1: Technical Exam

As previously mentioned, since economics is an engineering challenge, it is imperative to dramatically increase the quantity of candidates with scientific, civil engineering, and technical backgrounds. This calls for a comprehensive examination that candidates have to pass. Unlike the 1920s progressive era desire to screen voters via literacy tests and such, screening of ambitious power hungry candidates will find a lot more support. Relatively unbiased apolitical technical exams can rapidly be formulated and mandated for those who are to appear on the ballot the same way signature collection is.

The difficulty of the examination process can depend on the level of responsibility the candidate will possess. Perhaps the highest offices in the land may mandate taking a general exam, then secondary more closely watched exam for top 10% of scorers, and finally a final filtering test for 10% top scorers of surviving group. The last individuals left standing (say 10 people) can then be put under rigorous investigation of their personal and psychological backgrounds and be made to engage in debates before the public finally votes for who they want.

"But who controls the process!!?? Who makes the exams!!!??? Wouldn't rich people just have super specialized prep schools to create super engineers that always pass!!?? We're back to where we started!!!"

Sigh. The rich ivy leaguers are nowhere near as advantaged under the examination system since they would not get the automatic social networking and money raising boost. The materials to pass would be much more diffused and available in society (unlike the ivy social networking advantage many politicians have that prevents average people from even trying to run for office). This means that more people can try their luck at higher office. Additionally, due to the color blind nature of the meritocratic candidate selection process, the chances are a lot better for a highly qualified individual to make it into the final candidate pool (who would otherwise not get there due to voter bias against race, gender, ethnic group, age, class, etc).

We must keep in mind that the goals of candidate competence and independence from corporate control determine the means of candidate selection. If for example, one looks at a hypothetical proposal where some sort of social networking-video presentation candidate selection method is implemented, it becomes clear that once again the visually presentable and narcissistic are at an advantage. Visual selection of candidates via videos of speeches filters out the potentially far more competent individuals who may be camera shy, not be sufficiently attractive, not possess superb verbal eloquence, and so on. As of today, politics is dominated by extroverted semi psychopathic backstabbing individuals who are very eloquent and presentable. This corporate type led our society to disastrous consequences on a planetary scale. Reducing reliance on video presentation and increasing other ways of evaluation is key.

The exam itself would consist of sections such as systems thinking, civil engineering, organizational architecture, basic materials science, energy science, history, systems analysis, organizational psychology, infrastructure design, etc. If children of rich people do have some advantage of specialized prep schools, so be it, they'll be better occupied than snorting coke and becoming lawyers.

Screening method 2: Psychiatric Exam

This would test candidates for psychopathy using cutting edge medical and psychological means. This is a very serious if not the most critical issue for leadership filtering in terms of preventing damage to society. Further information concerning the societal justification can be found here.

A hypothetical argument against this can be made from certain possibility that as the ability to pass the technical exam increases, the ability to pass the psychiatric one decreases. This may be true to a degree considering schizoidia leaning introverted individuals with low empathy may excel more at engineering and systems analysis the colder their temperaments are. What has to be kept in mind is that a degree of physiologically determined empathy and emotional intelligence is not in conflict with competence but is a significant characteristic of it (especially for a political leader). To see some discussion on taking emotionality into consideration when determining policy in a group context (or even formulating a candidate exam), see here.

The reader can be assured that humanity can overcome the problem of balancing the need to screen out genuine psychopaths (who are not likely to be synonymous with advanced technical/analytic ability to begin with according to Lobaczewski) from the candidate pool while allowing very cold but harmless people to participate in evolution of social policy.

Final thoughts:

It is worth noting that technical and psychological exams can be applied to all levels of public recruitment even if the leadership is still selected completely democratically. A council of engineers instead of council of economists by the side of the mayor, governor, or president would go a long way. Some countries have already engaged in trying to screen out psychopaths during hiring of new police officers. This can be expanded easily to entry level positions within all public hierarchies. If we are to have proper reindustrialization of the Western world, the public cadres must be up to the level of the task.

Constructing Efficient Socieconomic Systems

Part 1: A second look at non-technological top down approaches we're already familiar with

The last article touched upon a simple overarching goal that seems to have been lost in the discourse about the public sector. That is, constantly using cutting edge engineering and technological knowhow to create a bigger energy bang for your energy buck when delivering goods and services via public means. When one makes the effort to replace a plow with a tractor one has greatly cut spending in terms of energy/resources over the long run.

Many governments in the world are the plow/ horse and buggy equivalents. Throwing more money for a better plow isn't going to cut it in the 21st century. Public tools at humanity's disposal must be restructured to meet the demands ahead, these demands being mass scale production of fission and fusion reactors to power up southern hemisphere and reindustrialization of the Western world.

Future public sectors will be judged in how they balance:

1) preservation/expansion of human autonomy

and

2) speed in construction of energy plants needed for continental infrastructure projects in irrigation, transport, farming, etc.

The idea will be to create virtuous cycles where the public tools and infrastructural products of said tools reinforce each other in a rapid movement forward.

No, this is not a call to emulate China (as some in the West are beginning to do) or argument for some sort of a scientific dictatorship (although after the current ghastly rule by bankers and lawyers a congress/parliament of scientists would be a liberating breath of fresh air). Efficiency should not be a dirty word. The word was certainly dragged through the mud by free market economists (the energy logistics behind outsourcing being so inefficient as to make Soviet central planners blush) but we can reclaim it.

Many people are currently focused on bottom up structural reform within their communities and micro governance in general. That is all good but before we move on to that lets remember that there are always 3 other basic ways to get things moving on a macro level. Additionally, whether reform is from above or below, the extent to which it is possible depends on a certain level of technological development and proper implementation of communication devices, transport, etc.

Common top down types of restructuring to bring about efficiency on a macro scale:

A) Breaking up larger political structures geographically to infuse the newly independent parts with new life and autonomy. Example: dissolution of Austria-Hungarian Empire and USSR. After the fragments became independent they learned how to function and are now joining up again in new economic/political blocks on their own free will. Think of it as a bloated monopoly or an unwieldy AOL/Time Warner merger coming apart. When the different parts don't compliment each other well (if they are kept together by historical force or if the ethnic groups don't mix well), then major public sector efficiency gains can be made locally through splitting up the country. Some even argue that countries should have population caps (ranging from 10-50 million people) as small countries provide best examples of governmental streamlining.

If large entities like India, China, or United States (it can easily be 5-7 smaller federal unions) are split up, the fragments can reorganize and then merge again in a fashion that is more productive for all. This is not realistic brainstorming in most cases but lets continue to illustrate types of macro reform that may be attempted in unforeseen regions in the future.

It may presently be absurd to join the already huge and ungovernable Mexico and USA together with Canada to form a North American Union. However, if Mexico splits, if USA splits, and then if Canada splits, after 10-15 years of independence the newly streamlined governments of fragments can rearrange into a North American Union that is dramatically more productive. This of course is recommended for those bloated beasts that can split without bloodshed (once again you know who you are... Indian subcontinent).

B) Joining industrial enterprises together to create economies of scale.
One may think that A) contradicts itself. Why would countries join together again (even partially) after political decentralization and independence? Once again, efficiency is the reason. Think of a hypothetical federal union that has 3 major states: Mexas, Malifornia, and Mew Mork. The country has one large industrial monopoly (Mockheed Lartin) that makes advanced passenger planes. The factories to assemble the airplane parts are scattered throughout the union, research facilities concentrated in one part, vertically integrated mines in another and so on. If this imaginary country splits up, the new governments may become a lot more efficient, responsive/closer to the people, freer, have greater energy and ability to do things faster, etc. However, the new sovereigns of Mexas, Malifornia, and Mew Mork may suffer greatly if Mockheed Martin is similarly split up into three pieces. That is because synergy between the parts of the industrial giant has been lost. The new countries will be left with pieces of a giant and will not be able to barter planes for other things that they need (or even provide planes for themselves in the short term as cheaply as before). The slow down of real physical economy would then negate benefits from acceleration of the political process.

This is not to say that all industrial monopolies with a global reach are synergetic. Lockheed Martin for instance purposefully decentralizes its operations through all 50 states to influence congressmen which creates ridiculous cost overruns and logistical inefficiencies. But if one looks at how European Union and USA emerged, there were major industrial enterprises driving the integration. When it comes to infrastructure builders and providers for products like MagLev trains, tunnels, and canals it's obvious that some organisms need to stay together and expand for cheaper utilization of materials and assembly lines. Industrial giants benefit from size and are the only way to advance real physical economy and wealth of the world.

Therefore, if we continue discussion of what may be best for North America, the optimal restructuring may be: the 3 great countries on the continent splitting into a bunch of smaller sovereign political units (while preserving their industrial links) THEN coming together again as a North American EU confederate  equivalent and THEN creating singular continental industrial monopolies to take advantage of economies of scale. This way North American Union can fully utilize its resources to stamp out planes, trains, fission reactors in large cheap quantities to compete with similar continent wide industrial giants elsewhere. These continental giants would dwarf Gazprom and most likely be born from bilateral/multilateral agreements between sovereign governments (rather than any private interests). At this scale, such continental industries are necessarily public property as a mater of simple energy economics and common sense. On a longer timeline, this process would eventually lead to UN being partially or fully in charge of a planetary electrical grid, irrigation construction, and other things of sufficiently international scale.

C) Finally another structural reform is elimination of local governments. In parts of northeastern USA, the oldest parts of the country, there is an absolutely absurd, archaic, and insanely inefficient overlap of tiny local governments. An area and population that would simply and cheaply be covered by a county government in the Midwest would have an ancient village government, a town government, and various neighboring microgovernments all fighting tooth and nail with each other as if it was some Middle Age feudal principality.

Often, a good way to cut spending is to simply wipe out local governments and replace them with one bigger horizontal government with a flat managerial structure that can provide goods and services cheaply by utilizing its larger negotiating power. Unlike A) which wipes out an umbrella gov, C) creates a new umbrella gov for localities while eliminating those under it. Feudal political middlemen on the village level may sound like they are close to the people but when it comes to adding to resource costs and societal progress they stand in the way like some strange Western tribal elders. Here is an example of a fiasco that can occur.

This will be all for now, I'll return to question of efficiency and its interplay with human autonomy in later parts as well as discuss micro bottom up approaches.

5 Ideas for today: Modular rural home, blimp bus, gloryrights, public nuclear plant, surveillance of police

1) Blimp Bus:

The advantage of the B Bus is that it travels in an efficient straight line from point A to point B. It doesn't waste energy on friction with the ground or time from waiting in traffic. The ride is relatively more silent than a standard bus. It's also smooth as you wont be feeling jolts and bumps from road contact. The B Bus is safe as it travels just a few stories away from the ground and has its inner gas compartments compartmentalized for extra safety. It wont roll over or be hit by anything. The surface of the B Bus is coated in solar panels for extra energy and it can even partially store lightning strikes for additional power. The view of course is superior to one from land travel. The costs of B Buses drop with mass production and automation (it's easier to not have a driver on B Bus than a standard bus). At first of course, these would be used for traditionally long bus journeys to areas where MagLevs and other trains don't go.



2) High Tech Modular House for Rural Areas:

Levittown showed how military style techniques can be applied to affordable housing. A 21st century modular home is cheap to manufacture, replace, and recycle. Kitchens, bedrooms, living rooms, etc are mass produced in a factory and then driven or airlifted by an industrial blimp to their destination. Poorer families can acquire a house in one extra large module. Modules are built "off the grid ready" with solar panels and clean water from air systems. A buyer modifies a module before buying the way one does a Dell computer and its parts. Since the price of a laptop went from thousands of dollars to 35 dollars (India also produced the world's cheapest car as well), mass production stands to do the same for housing. Entertainment and furniture systems can be added, subtracted, or reconfigured within individual modules. When one's kitchen becomes obsolete, the whole thing can be sold like a used car and replaced while keeping the rest of the house. This housing is not made of wood. People buy mass produced cars, yachts, and computers and there is no reason to not do the same for homes. It's about time to apply space tech for hyper efficient land living.

3) Gloryrights instead of Copyrights:

Napoleon said that men will give up their lives for a piece of colored ribbon (medals and such). In both ancient and modern civilizations, people were often awarded with triumphs and honors to great effect. It is now apparent that copyrights often stifle technological and scientific progress by killing the traditional open exchange among scientists. Why should a scientist share his research with his peers if it is more profitable to join a corporation where this information will be secretively used to bolster the employer's profit margins?

A gloryright system gives the often introverted geeky scientists and inventors what they crave most, access to international attention (and thus feeling of empowerment) and correspondence with equals. Say a person invents such and such and is given Silver Gloryright. SG automatically allows the person who received it to appear and be interviewed on various popular programs, participate in high level panel discussions, get interviewed by famous personalities, meet high level people, etc. Sure they may miss out on being able to sell their invention to their employer but some material reward is likely to find this person within Gloryright system anyway. A Gold Gloryright brings additional perks. Here is an excellent book on how modern patents and copyrights are hurting local communities and traditional research.

4) Big cities controlling their own power supply and certain factories:

A city over a million people is a powerful unit. Its government should own a power plant and a few factories that produce needed drugs (not just generic, see gloryrights above) and other goods for the citizenry. The government of NYC, an entity more populous than Sweden, is entitled to its own small nuclear fission plant, factories that make clothing for employees and the needy, vertical farming constructs, etc. This dramatically reduces logistical chains and cuts out political middlemen, enhances the power base of the city government vis a vis the state/province, and allows self sufficiency in case things go wrong in other regions of the country. Libertarians and socialists alike will appreciate decentralization through empowering smaller political units with their own factories. A large city is also in a very good position to bargain and negotiate better for what it needs in terms of raw materials.


5) Ritualistic surveillance of the public by individual citizens:

This can be turned on all the time or get activated when a crime or legal encounter is happening. Imagine if a person's car got stopped by a police officer. Immediately the person activates micro cameras and audio listening devices in his clothing and car. These devices record, encrypt, and stream the entire encounter to the person's personal computer, his lawyer, and other places throughout the world (like youtube which then sends out alert to people who like to watch that type of stuff in real time for signs of abuse). Such a system will reduce crime and force politeness and civilization on both the users and those they encounter (whether private or public employees). If citizens are going to be watched by corporate and government entities, then they must watch them back twice as hard while sharing anything interesting in a decentralized publicly available format.

New Constitutional Convention for United States (ConCon)

Practical Plan to Really Restore United States Economy (by late 2020s): 

Part 1: Road to Constitutional Convention and a proper message to unite factions of the tea party with urban progressives in an alliance of convenience



Situation in United States has deteriorated to a point where we are not looking at a gradual and peaceful slide into Brazil level international status (with similar domestic social conditions) anymore but at a Soviet style nasty imperial disintegration when the next inevitable financial shock occurs.

We've heard many exciting proposals recently such as "abolish the fed", "end corporations as legal entities", "default on the debt", "wipe out the financial parasites and rebuild FDR style", etc. Structurally however, none of those can be accomplished due to oligarchy's aging personal lawyer/butler (supreme court/congress) and their guard dog (the president) being on a tight leash. Needed changes cannot come from the federal center of force unless the situation dangerously deteriorates. It'd be too late then.

As such, a moderately radical (compared to fascist, bolshevik, and secessionist proposals we'll be hearing after the upcoming second dip of the depression) but doable and pragmatic plan needs to begin to be implemented immediately if United States hopes to start a long multi-decade road to recovery. This plan has been distilled from previous long articles such as the ones dealing with unpayable national debt, pinpointing need to prevent braindrain, problems of a sold out senior citizen home that is US congress, and nurturing some industries to compete with China's mercantilist practices.

The plan has to be appealing to a vast majority of the US public across the political spectrum (fringes included) which means utilization of emotional triggers that people had ingrained into their consciousness since childhood. Believe it or not but a 21 year old progressive from Boston and a 70 year old rural man from Alabama both share nearly identical life long propaganda indoctrination by the ruling oligarchy. The trick for realization of a movement towards recovery is mobilization of a broad coalition to displace the ruling regime by flipping regime's own propaganda against them. 

Only a plan that:

a) plays to rural genuinely constitutionalist factions within the tea party movement (those not misdirected or bought off by corporate infiltration of the movement's phony "national leadership")
and  
b) unites them with younger urban unemployed/underemployed via a common, very consistent, and rather simple message

can achieve a breakthrough. Uniting some tea partiers and disenchanted progressives in temporary marriage of convenience against a common foe will be the hardest part. However when anger is up and emotions are running high, such unthinkable political bedfellows become possible if extroverted emotional waves join at a proper time. It has happened numerous times before in other societies.

[Message building]

1) Call for a Constitutional Convention  (34 states needed to have one and 38 needed to ratify)

Now that the federal and most state governments are broke and running budget deficits that require physically unacceptable austerity measures (on top of decades of already declining infrastructure and social services) popular anger can readily be channeled into a ConCon. Americans of all ages have positive associations with this concept from childhood schooling. ConCon can happen through bypassing presidential and congressional power (it is key to isolate the federal center of oligarchic force).

People like South Carolina Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer are already talking to high level republican state politicians to have a ConCon. For disenchanted progressives, a desire for a ConCon can be the best outlet for their frustration as well. Nobody knows what ConCon will bring and it therefore serves as a point of contact for a diverse spectrum of political factions. The idea can also excite the imaginations of young and old alike due to their association of it with national greatness and renewal after a difficult period. What is more, it is a legal idea that appeals to the majority of people who are psychologically not predisposed to radicalism. The slogan should be "Convention not Revolution". At the same time, the potential of convention is so full of radical restructuring promise that for the more passionate of tea partiers, the slogan can be reworked to be "revolution through convention". Call for ConCon is a protest vote against current national elites, a call for dramatically different direction, AND meaningful legal activism all rolled up in one.

It is key to get regional elites on board by playing to their pathologically narcissistic egos and sense of importance. There is so much negativity now that controlled positive attention/affection can really puff up the psyche of small state legislator. People in every state must divide their state politicians among themselves by passionately asking their favored ones to be a ConCon supporter and "a delegate to the convention" and sharply ridiculing and alienating those who don't support it. State politicians are all former political science/history geeks and many would get a kick from the masses thinking they are worthy to represent them at a historic event of such magnitude. ConCon should be made an issue in upcoming state and local elections as well. If a dedicated minority of state politicians get excited by the idea, they'll drag many of their drinking buddy legislators along for the ride via simple social psychology. Their corporate masters should not immediately have a problem with this since ConCon isn't specific enough.

It is inevitable that activism for Convention will begin fierce polarizing debates about the key constitutional changes that need to be done at the convention itself. This is where, paradoxically, our budding city/country coalition will find additional points of contact through agreement to disagree. They will realize that the federal union needs to be loosened up into a more confederal structure with states and entire regions pursuing their own modes of popular development. Thus the more confederal structure becomes perhaps the first goal of convention. This first goal needs to be stressed because it will reenergize the diverse political spectrum by creating pseudo nationalism and lively brainstorming among regional factions. Mass reactivation of the apathetic and disenchanted young democrats and progressives can even occur if emphasis on possibilities of states rights (for northeastern states) is combined with emotional need for revenge against Obama. 

Additional regional and state elites may now join the call for ConCon since they will realize how dramatically their power will increase within a more confederal America. Unfortunately but perhaps inevitably we can expect some oligarchic corporate interests to begin supporting ConCon with the expectations of profit in the more libertarian post ConCon Southeastern region of US. Opposition to ConCon should be actively painted as federal (based in the hated congress to not alienate pro-Obama ConCon supporters) AND corporate in nature to maintain emotional focus and factional unity in the ConCon coalition.


2) Building mental associations of United States with Soviet Union, time of troubles before the Last Constitutional Convention, and/or rotten oligarchic regimes that have collapsed in the past due to a diverse and peaceful political coalition 

What helps any movement is belief that regime's collapse is inevitable and that the activists are just helping history along. What helps even more is all the recent data showing that this belief is grounded in reality. I have written how all the key structural and social problems that Soviet Union had are being experienced by present oligarchic imperial socioeconomic model in United States. It seems this society reached Soviet level of decay and dysfunction via a seemingly different ideological path (the inflexibility of which inevitably began leading to mistakes on all levels of management).

Since Americans are very educated about Soviet problems and failure, it would be very easy to begin comparisons between the two former superpowers in the minds of the tea party movement. The more they would look, the more similarities they will discover to their horror. This will help movement towards ConCon by providing an aura of inevitability when it comes to ending federal power in its current form.

When it comes to young progressives, such suggestions of comparison (USSR to USA) will prove to be more difficult due to their laughter and derision of tea partiers calling Obama's policies socialist. Some may of course see the blatant similarities but they are not likely to see USA in the same light as the rural ConCon supporters. Thus it seems better in their case to compare United States to post WW2 regimes in Spain and Greece before they were ended by a broad coalition (where liberal college educated youth played a key role). Unfortunately Franco's regime and similar rich man's regimes in Portugal, Brazil, etc are not well known to the US public (due to their rot having a more common capitalistic source with US) and don't provide the same association with inevitable decay and collapse. Therefore, a hodgepodge of societies should be utilized when comparing problems of US to similar problems that other countries had. This will show demoralized progressives that America's problems are not unique, how such things were solved abroad, and how ConCon is the best legal way of bringing about the end of the current regime.

This is it for now and later sections of the recovery plan will deal with the debt situation, military industrial complex, and additional political solutions as truly bipartisan coalition builders.

What is meant by recovery is putting the country on a road back to the level of dynamic ability, social strength, and international role model status that existed at the peak of American power in 1960s (before it was gradually and systematically ground into a large banana republic by a neoliberal oligarchy). When US returns to that level of confidence, government responsiveness, and hope for a better tomorrow then new plans can be implemented that work with the the drastically improved tools at hand.

Transhumanist Collectivism Scenario

Exploration of how the research into more effective brain to machine interface may lead to hyper collectivism rather than individualism. No stance is taken on possible results of memory sharing.




Majority of transhumanists in the English speaking world often fancy that the future will continue becoming increasingly hyperindividualistic and that cybernetics will accelerate the process of divergence in pleasures, values, and modes of being due to divergence in vessels in which the human minds will find themselves. Considering the speeding up in fragmentation of cultural trends in Western culture (think of the duration and intensity of memes and trends in either music, film genres, activism, or even politics), such predictions sound like a safe bet. However, a couple of factors contribute to possible emergence of integrated collectivism the likes of which could not have been imagined before. Brain to computer interface communication is one such factor that is worth exploring. Let's discuss it systematically.

The last few years have brought great strides in the field of brain to computer interface. Paralyzed patients are now able to control cursors on computer screens with their thoughts and to type by thinking letters. Although much better communication between the brain and a machine's computer can be established through physical insertion of a net of carbon nanotube receivers straight into the brain tissue, increasingly it appears there is no need for that in many cases. The human brain waves have a frequency high enough to penetrate the skull and be read by ever more sensitive receivers on the scalp.

 Most recent breakthroughs in cybernetics still involve one way communication from the brain to the device as in the case of a monkey's mind controlling a robotic arm to feed itself and a monkey managing to move robotic legs on a treadmill by just thinking about it. It is necessary to emphasize that brain action in regards to use of the internet and non-humanoid machines can be very different than brain action in control of neuroprosthetic limbs. In the latter, the existing neural hardware is the source for outgoing brain signals and replaces missing/immobilized phantom limbs with mechanical ones while working in familiar territory. Whereas in the former, it is an unfamiliar territory and the brain has to be continuously exercised to create sufficient new neural connections and get an ever expanding stream of signals to operate programs that have little in common with human hardware.

As an example of the less familiar brain to computer interface, lets take a person's brainwaves "flying" an object (say a virtual airplane) through a simulation reality. This already exists by the way and you can get headsets allowing you to do so. At first the airplane spins wildly but the person realizes that he can steer it left when utilizing his right hemisphere and stir it to the right when utilizing the left. Frontal and posterior regions can do the up and down. The program understands the brain layout and thus utilizes it as a framework for 360 3D control. Obviously to think of math, lyrics, art, etc to control an object sounds insanely inefficient in comparison to neuroprosthetic method of thinking of moving a left thumb, right thumb, left foot, right foot, etc.

The issue here is not the development of the quickest simplest "universal remote thought control" (URTC) to control first a virtual object and then a real physical object in the form of a machine that is either attached to the body, is a short distance away, or is on the other side of the world. The issue is to create an easy to learn/use plug and play control mechanism that will have an almost non-existent lag in comparison to person's normal reflexes. Sure, we might at first have to create a simple internationally used URTC (think a simplified virtual keyboard for your brain to control a great number of programs from computer operating systems to lawn mowers to transport construction robots).

Lets take a ridiculous example of a lawn mower for instance (ridiculous in that it's easier to create an autonomous lawn mower than for a person to control it with thoughts). A person can direct the mower registered to his ID (can't have a citizen be able to control other people's property) over a lawn the way he directs a cursor over a screen. He can think at it some universally recognizable equivalent symbol of "faster" or "slower", to go to any of a handful of functions as well as of course to turn on and off. For many machines that is enough and same principles could be applied to literally thousands of gadgets of various sizes. Such a control scheme is not sufficient due to the lag involved. When a person is controlling his robot dog this way and a car is about to hit the dog, the middlemen of URTC can cause a lag that gets the robot smashed by the car. This problem is even greater when operating a passenger vehicle this way or some military bot. The advantages of the old joystick and wheel then become readily evident.

It now becomes more apparent that there are a number of possible thought control methods (with those relying on the most newly evolved linguistic parts of the brain being perhaps the slowest and least efficient). The linguistic thinking process may be enough for just communication (thinking up a word instead of typing it) but not for high speed and reliable manipulation of machinery. For that the more reptilian/ancient reflex oriented brain parts are probably needed.


Yes, but what does this have to do with emergence of possible collectivism?

The military and corporate organs will eventually be driven to find ways of capturing the total brain signal command output by capturing the information out of the spinal column as well as from the surface of the brain. This will be done with the purpose of achieving a reflex level control by the human brain over a desired computer program. Simultaneously there will be research done into creating a way to send signals from the machine to the brain to create a two way cybernetic communication. The breakthroughs in two way communication are the most exciting part if you ask any transhumanist. These are the technologies that will allow a blind person to have a spectrum of vision from the microscopic to the telescopic, for a deaf person to hear heartbeats, etc. As of today, research in this area involves making neuroprosthetics realistic so a person with a robotic hand can feel what it touches as well as command it smoothly with his nerves and brain.
 
If you consider that eventually, the total neural signal output will be captured, you'll see that this data can then be stored, streamed, modified, etc. In essence, the ability to read the total output will allow to fully record a person's experience as it happens and thus allow external storage of such experiences (memories). Reverse engineering of the total one way communication from the brain to machine will enable a total one way communication from machine to the brain. This means that the memories recorded from one person in real time can be stored and then played for another person.

Lets not even think of very augmented humans at this point and think of the implications for relatively familiar humanity that such technology creates. Playback of memories easily defeats movies as an entertainment medium. Eventually broadband speeds will enable streaming of such entertainment in real time to millions if not billions of humans (those who have the augmentation necessary to get the signal data). This in turn enables the sharing of virtually identical experiences (one's perception of the experiences is a different matter which is a topic for another day). We can see that people would like to spend their time and resources playing the most exciting memories and not the lousy ones. The more they do so, the more they become identical since what we are is just a collection of our unique memories with a physiological neural operating system.

We can conceptualize subcultures and religious sects where the members share the memories to such a degree that they increasingly relate more and more to each due to the fact of them increasingly becoming each other. Even without such inclination to overly share, we can see a youtube type sharing of thousands of key memories by millions of individuals who become one without really trying to do so. Rather than continue becoming individualized, the process will begin to revert itself as people from around the world gradually melt into one giant increasingly homogeneous collective. The more they become one the more that will influence which memories they seek out next which just accelerates the process. Of course since there are a number of different psychological breeds among humans, such process should result in a number of increasingly polarized collectives within one loosely integrated global one. After all, there would be thousands of hours of exciting memories yet not enough time to watch them all. Person's cultural, educational, psychological background would decide.

In a way this is already happening on the internet and the collectivization through a global or regional internet culture is the other factor in potential emergence of transhuman collectivism. I will explore the two factors more fully in part 2.