Glad to be back near a computer... I think all revolutionary movements are quickly co-opted by the Other Side, and that this is an accelerating process; governments and corporations have gotten really hip in this Century. Think about the body counts we got during Vietnam: gloating over the fallen enemy. Today when we bomb villages the media is barely credulous that we might have hurt anybody: 'The Iraqis claim that a civilian was injured in the bombing...' But I don't think this is a reason to throw up my hands in despair. Yeah, ST is full of ruthless oppurtunists. And look what happened to the French Revolution, or the Russian Revolution, or the Cuban Revolution...they all degenerate to man-bites-man sooner or later. That does not mean that they accomplished nothing. More importantly, that does not mean that revolutions are bad...I think the problem is that revolutions *stop*, stop questioning the system the moment they become the system. The Trotsky thing. And of course, the problem is that none of us are going to be around for the End Of The War, so we get really wrapped up in the battles. And the battles--even the really huge battles, the liberation of whole peoples, whatever--are not complete by themselves. I am afraid I am rambling. Final thingy before I go to sleep: One of the ways that people who are somewhat active keep a fire under their ass is by being really harsh on themselves. Sometimes this even works to politicize people who aren't. But it can also be a sort of a vice, a bad habit...if you really convince yourself that anything you do is pointless, you'll stop doing it...and then your humility has the same effect as everyone else's apathy. Sleepy ---- Ethan