Sorry, GUEST, no cigar.

I have notice how quickly you changed the subject when your tirade about the RIAA was shot down. Since the RIAA is not a government agency, they don't have the power to shut the internet down. After all, the internet is a world-wide phenomenon. The genie is out of the bottle, and it's really questionable if even governments could stuff it back in. When that straw-man collapsed, you turned your guns on the Council on Foreign Relations, a think-tank (also not a government agency) that's existed since the 1920s.

As to your breakdown of the categories of people who disagree with you, you're guilty of a couple of fallacies right out of the box. First of all, "begging the question:"   begging the question (contrary to popular belief) is not asking that a question be asked, it consists of assuming that your conclusion is correct before you even examine the evidence. I leave it to you as an exercise to look up "begging the question" in a good logic textbook or web site and read up on it in detail. Second, your whole category argument consists of "argumenum ad hominem:"   that anyone who disagrees with you is wrong because they are ignorant, afraid, have a vested interest, and/or are one of the "enemy." Actually your third and fourth categories are essentially the same. Redundant.

I can't answer for everyone else, but I can certainly set you straight as far as I am concerned. Let's take your accusations point by point.

1) You're truly ignorant.

Definitely not ignorant in the way you mean it. College-educated, majored in English literature and music, with courses in philosophy, psychology, political science, the liberal arts in general, with a couple of courses in astronomy and cosmology. I also spent two years at a music conservatory. I am well read: some fiction, but mostly nonfiction. I am very knowledgeable in history, and I keep up on current events. Books read recently include Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism, by Michelle Goldberg (I also read her columns on Salon.com), and I am currently reading Imperial America: Reflections on the United States of Amnesia, by Gore Vidal. One of my favorite books within recent years was the March of Folly, by Barbara Tuchman. Written a few decades ago, it is still very current and relevant. I do watch the evening news, but I also watch programs such as the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Washington Week in Review, Now with David Brancaccio, Frontline, and P.O.V. And having cable, I often watched The National on CBC. In addition, I often watch C-SPAN and C-SPAN 2. I get a lot of my news from overseas through the internet, such as the Guardian and several other European newspapers, and in my e-mail I receive such things as the MoveOn, DefCon (Defend the Constitution), and Backbone Campaign newsletters, and AlterNet Headlines several times a week.

On the other hand, everyone is ignorant of some things. I'm fairly good with math and algebra, but I've never studied calculus. And I am a very poor cook. Nor do I know if there are earthlike planets in the Alpha Centauri system (nearest stars to our solar system), but it would be nice to think there are.

2) You're terrified of the changing world and you think that if you parrot the govt's lies you'll be able to extend your existence.

Terrified of the changing world? That verges on the downright silly. I am an old fart. I was born fairly early during the Great Depression, and you probably haven't a clue as to the number of radical changes I've seen take place over the past seven decades. When I was born, Hoover was president. I lived through four terms of FDR, and of course, World War II. I leave it to you as an exercise to look up the number of presidents I have lived through since then, and the number of regime changes that have taken place during that time. While you're at it, you can look up the number of wars this country has been involved in over that time. Communism was on the rise when I was born, I've seen it grow into a major world power, and I saw it collapse. I've seen the development of nuclear weapons and the threat of the nuclear war. At the age of six I became fascinated with the Buck Rogers comic strip in the Sunday "funnies." I was told at the time, "That's just fantasy. Space travel is impossible." In 1969, I watched on television (which didn't exist when I was a kid; I grew up with radio), as Neil Armstrong stepped off the ladder onto the surface of the Moon. Since then we've landed several exploratory probes on Mars and sent spacecraft out beyond the Outer Planets. I also seen the descendents of former slaves began to take their rightful place in society, and I have seen women move out of the kitchen and into a position where we may very well have a woman president after the present regime is retired from office in 2008. Or we may very well have an African-American president. Neither of these things was even conceivable a few decades back.

You must be very young. Me, terrified of the changing world? Don't be an idiot!

3) You're protecting your investment in the system (a pension, a job, some imagined "standing" in the community, etc.),

I have long since established my "standing in the community" and it is not "imagined." I have no worries about that. I am retired, so that takes care of the "job" part of it. Part of my income is derived from my monthly Social Security check, which even Bush can't take away without starting what you seem to want—bloody revolution. I don't have a pension (never worked at any one place long enough to qualify), but I invested in some IRAS and I have income from a few other investments (carefully selected mutual funds) made some time back. Nothing big, but nothing that the government can touch. I'm not wealthy by any means, but I'm comfortable and secure.

4) You work for the govt as an active employee, or you serve as a passive employee doing some kind of community service assigned to you by the court system.

As I said, I'm retired. Through most of my life, I was a professional musician, doing concerts, television, club dates, and coffeehouses. I also taught classic and folk guitar, and I had a full schedule of students. I have also worked for the Boeing Airplane Company as a technical illustrator (commercial airplane devision—non-government). I spent eight years as a radio announcer and newscaster. I have also worked at the telephone company as an operator. And the nearest thing to a government job that I've ever had was working as a technical writer under contract to the Bonneville Power Administration. The BPA was regulated by the Department of Energy, but it was local agency rather than Federal. I support community service through a local church—although I am not particularly religious. The church is very liberal and socially oriented (it sponsors free meal programs and finds housing for homeless and low income folks, among other services to the community), and I see it as a way of maximizing my own efforts.

So much for that.

I became aware of the penchant that some people have for conspiracy theories, early on. My father was a health professional, and like many such, he wound up on a lot of mailing lists. One of the "newsletters" he used to receive regularly was from some paranoiac who was convinced that the drug companies were taking over the world. There were no such things as germs. This was a fiction promulgated by the drug companies to sell you expensive and ineffective drugs. Who was behind this plot? The Rockefellers! All of these drugs, the writer said, were made from petroleum products which are supplied by Standard Oil, which, of course, was owned by the Rockefellers.

There were other newsletters. One proclaimed that the Jews are taking over the world. It contained many quotes from a thing called "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion." This kind of nonsense fell into disrepute, toward the end of World War II and the discovery of the death camps. People began to realize just how evil a thing anti-Semitism and other forms of religious and/or racial prejudice can be. Although, of course, it still goes on.

Then we were warned about the Masons. And we were warned about the Illuminati. Then suddenly "flying saucers" began making headlines, and we were warned of imminent alien invasions. And then we were warned about government agencies denying the existence of "unidentified flying objects" because either the government was in on the plot, or it was afraid that the populace might panic if they knew how grave the danger of invasion was. And then, when it was discovered that people who drink water with naturally occurring fluoride in it had fewer cavities, and there was a move to add fluoride to the drinking water of communities which were not so naturally endowed, we were warned that this was a government plot to turn our brains to mush and make us all malleable and obedient slaves. And then there were men in black suits. And chemtrails. And plots to control the weather. And the mysterious black helicopters.

I have heard it all!

Now this is not to say that there are not real conspiracies going on. After Goldwater's abysmal loss in his bid for the presidency, conservative Republicans put together a quite efficient plan. They got all of the factions of the Republican Party together, and talked them into putting aside their miscellaneous minor differences, and working together under "the big tent." Their first major success was the election of Ronald Reagan. A bit of a setback when Clinton was elected. But the more conservative factions within the Republican Party conspired to find anything they could, true or otherwise, with which to discredit the Clintons. The next major success was the election of the organ grinder (Cheney) and his monkey (Bush). Karl Rove's lifetime career is conspiracy.

The Democrats are conspiring to take back the government. The Green Party is conspiring. The Libertarian Party is conspiring. The Constitution Party is conspiring. The Socialist workers Party is conspiring. Various independents are conspiring. The Project for the New American Century has been conspiring for some time to take over the world. Right now, they're keeping a low profile, because their last attempt, through the Bush administration, turned out to be such a pig's breakfast that they'd rather not call attention to themselves.

There are liberals and progressives who are conspiring to take over the country. I know, because I'm one of them.

Muslim fundamentalists are conspiring to take over the world. Christian fundamentalists are conspiring first to take over the nation, and then to take over the world.

The Council on Foreign Relations is undoubtedly conspiring to take over the world. But they're just like everybody else who's trying to cram their way through the revolving door.

Stay alert. Be watchful. Be politically active. But don't be so naïve as to focus on only one thing. And for Chrissake, DON'T PANIC!!

Don Firth

P. S. Just as a point of interest, writing this didn't take any where near as long as one might assume from its length. I just sat here, drinking my morning coffee, and dictating it into the computer with Dragon NaturallySpeaking, a voice recognition program. I'm saving my fingers for practicing on the guitar this afternoon.