The European and the Indian

 Excerpts from The European and the Indian, James Axtell, Oxford University Press (1981)

". . . they [Indians] seem to have an insurmountable aversion to labour; and though they discover some energy in the chase, wholly want it in husbandry and the arts of life."  So tempting was the native way of life that many Indian converts apostatized because, as the English admitted, “they can live with less labour, and more pleasure and plenty, as Indians, than they can with us.”  In fact, one of the reasons given by colonists who either ran away to the Indians or refused to return from captivity was that amongst the Indians they enjoyed the “most perfect freedom, the ease of living, [and] the absence of those cares and corroding solicitudes which so often prevail with us.” (Axtell, 49)

Ben Franklin wondered that

When an Indian Child has been brought up among us, taught our language and habituated to our Customs, yet if he goes to see his relations and make one Indian Ramble with them, there is no perswading him ever to return. [But] when white persons of either sex have been taken prisoners young by the Indians, and lived a while among them, tho’ ransomed by their Friends, and treated with all imaginable tenderness to prevail them to stay among the English, yet in a Short time they become disgusted with our manner of life, and the care and pains that are necessary to support it, and take the first Opportunity of escaping again in the Woods, from whence there is no reclaiming them.  (Axtell, 172)

End Game

The global economy is built on the erroneous belief that the marketplace—read human greed—should dictate human behavior and that economies can expand eternally. Globalism works under the assumption that the ecosystem can continue to be battered by massive carbon emissions without major consequences. And the engine of global economic expansion is based on the assurance that there will always be plentiful and cheap oil. The inability to confront simple truths about human nature and the natural world leaves the elites unable to articulate new social, economic and political paradigms. They look only for ways to perpetuate a dying system. Thomas Friedman and the array of other propagandists for globalization make as much sense as Charlie Sheen.

-Chris Hedges

On the Nature of Man; Thomas Hobbes

From Leviathan

So that in the nature of man, we find three principal causes of quarrel. First, competition; secondly, diffidence; thirdly, glory.

The first maketh men invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the third, for reputation. The first use violence, to make themselves masters of other men's persons, wives, children, and cattle; the second, to defend them; the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile, a different opinion, and any other sign of undervalue, either direct in their persons or by reflection in their kindred, their friends, their nation, their profession, or their name.

Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man. For war consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting, but in a tract of time, wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of time is to be considered in the nature of war, as it is in the nature of weather. For as the nature of foul weather lieth not in a shower or two of rain, but in an inclination thereto of many days together: so the nature of war consisteth not in actual fighting, but in the known disposition thereto during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is peace.

Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving and removing such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.

Winner of Smith Essay Contest, Adam Stevens

Jeff Smith is a liberal Democrat from Missouri who ran for a seat in the House of Representatives. Mr. Smith began the Democrat primary election as an unknown and he finished in second place, barely losing to Russ Carnahan. Smith's campaign was chronicled in a documentary entitled Can Mr. Smith Get To Washington Anymore?. This documentary accurately portrays the political situation in the United States today through the precise depiction of political dynasties, voter habits, and the impact of the media.

Mr. Smith faced one of the most crucial roadblocks to success in the form of his name. He was running against Russ Carnahan, who was the latest politico in the Carnahan dynasty. Due to his heritage, Mr. Carnahan had superb amounts of financial backing. Mr. Smith had no political pedigree and had trouble raising money and getting voters because of his last name. Since they could not rely on name recognition (Dye, 248) for donations, the Smith campaign had to focus on grassroots campaigning (Class), which involves door-to-door and one-on-one contact with the electorate, and therefore does not require the massive amounts of money that television campaigning does. Smith's name caused even further difficulties when he and Joan Barry held a joint press conference exposing Russ Carnahan's absence during many voting sessions of the Missouri House of Representatives. Carnahan's campaign responded with destructive comments on Smith and Barry's behavior as “bedfellows”. When the Smith campaign wished to give a press conference in response to the dirty politics (Class) practiced by Carnahan, the media refused to give them airtime. The only thing they were allowed to do was purchase ads. Unfortunately, that was out of the question due to cost. Smith had a difficult time responding to the claims of the Carnahan side due to the financial situation of the Smith campaign.

Jeff Smith encountered difficulties that would not be expected if one were looking into the voting process from the outside. Smith is a rather liberal Democrat who is against the war in Iraq, pro Social Security, and strives for equal education for all. His world views were shaped politically by growing up in a low income and predominantly African-American community. As such, he understands the desires of said community. He has even established a string of inner-city charter schools known as the Confluence Academies. Despite all of his understanding of African-American culture, he had difficulty getting the vote of the black community. This is due to the political environment surrounding African Americans. In order to get favorable laws passed, African Americans must support the white Democratic power base. Jeff Smith is a white Democrat, but he is more liberal than the majority of the Democratic power base. As such, if the black community were to vote for Smith, they would in essence abandon their support of the group that will pass the most legislation in their favor: the middle-of-the-road Democrats. Eventually, Mr. Smith did get votes from African Americans, but not as many as he could have received had he been a little more conservative. This thought process of the electorate led to Jeff Smith's loss of the Democratic Primary and continues to plague fringe and third party candidates.

The Fourth Estate (Class) had a great affect on the campaign of Jeff Smith, as it does on all political campaigns. The Fourth Estate is a synonym for the media. It has been given this name because of the extraordinary power that it wields over the world, almost as if it were a fourth branch of government (hence Fourth Estate). It was the media which helped decide the outcome of the election by paying more attention to Russ Carnahan than Jeff Smith. They gave this attention to Carnahan due to the appeal of his role in the greater Carnahan dynasty. The media are in existence to make money, and they treated the House of Representatives election in Missouri accordingly, by providing horse race coverage (Dye, 182), which is coverage of those ahead and those behind only. When Smith and Barry revealed Carnahan's poor voting record, the media flocked to the press conference. When Carnahan responded by claiming that Barry and Smith were fabricating lies, his statements were widely covered. When Smith wished to respond, the media were already glutting themselves on Carnahan's comments, and little attention was paid to Smith's response. Another effect that the media had on the campaign was the rift that it created between those with money and those without. Russ Carnahan's campaign was rich compared to Jeff Smith's, and Carnahan could afford copious amounts of television advertising. Since Smith didn't have nearly as much campaign funding as Carnahan, he had to rely on other strategies, such as grassroots campaigning to contact voters. The intense media focus on horse race coverage and the nature of the media as a business causes many campaigns to run unequally, regardless of individual candidate qualifications.

Jeff Smith in Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore? experienced the same struggles in campaigning that plague all elections in America today. The only differences between Smith's campaign and campaigns running today are the names of the players. Whether it is campaigning or aligning oneself with a political party, candidates will always face differences in funding, name recognition, and the almighty power of the Fourth Estate.

Winner of Smith Essay Contest, Pat McMahon

The movie Can Mr. Smith Get to Washington Anymore truly exemplifies the superficial and ostentatious nature of elections in the modern United States. The movie's tragic plot explores and uncovers the unforgiving, unchanging, and dogmatic political system we have and how its very nature lends to the superiority of the elite.

To begin with, it is vital to look at how Jeff Smith was so much of an underdog simply from the get-go. First of all, his ideas were far too “radical” for his own party to endorse; they subtly and pusillanimously deprecated his campaign by simply attempting to ignore him and endorse other candidates. If he were to pull off a victory in the primaries (Dye 217), the in-party election to decide the candidate to run in the national election, he would far more likely to lose in the general (Dye 217), or national, election than a more moderate democrat; the parties do not want him in the general election because it does not attend to the main party goal: winning elections (Dye 209). If he is less likely to win the general election, than the Democratic Party is less likely to gain that seat in congress; therefore, the party itself loses a small, although certainly not negligible, amount of Federal power. Secondly, Jeff had absolutely no political connections going into his campaign. Without the huge and powerful political ties of the social elite, Jeff had no chance of overcoming the name recognition (Dye 248), the blind tendency for voters to simply cast their ballots for those who have a family background in politics, of Russ Carnahan, coming from a very strong political family in Massachusetts. Because of name recognition, it is very difficult in this time of established political lineages for new names to enter into the ballots; this effectively keeps only the social elites in power and does not allow for changes in the government. Thirdly, campaigns have become such a massive financial burden that Jeff, a young man with weak financial ties and completely devoid of any support from interest groups, would not be able to run campaigns the same way as the social, and generally economic, elites that continually win the elections. This stage is major roadblock for any and all underdogs on the political campaign trail and very few make it past this point; in this situation Jeff was one of very few who broke the political paradigm and attempted grassroots campaigning (class), going door-to-door and personally attempting to gather votes.

The media is another massive factor in the absolute domination of political atmosphere, either inadvertently or aggressively scathingly ripping through the campaigns of the politically unknown. Many times they do not necessarily purposely damage the campaigns of candidates when they report the campaigns by what is known as “horse-race reporting”, where they focus only on how each candidate is doing in the polls and not on their ideology. This can unintentionally hurt the candidates as many voters will not vote for the lesser-known candidates simply because they know that they will not win and will not want to waste their single ballot and, in turn, the possibility for representation in government. This happened in Jeff Smith's case as some voters said that they would vote for him, but they know Carnahan is going to win and therefore would be a waste of their vote. However, many times the media will intentionally degrade or ignore the campaigns of lesser-known candidates, either because of personal or economic support for other candidates or the belief that the political elites should stay in office and should continue to run our government. Many of the media outlets in the movie simply did not want to waste time with Jeff Smith and ignored his campaign completely, preferring instead to simply continue to endorse Carnahan's campaign.

Another massively crippling factor against lesser known candidates is the lack of political pull they possess; any possible supporters to a cause will undoubtedly be pulled more strongly towards the political elites - their endorsement guarantees them more financial and political stability from the government; this is an ideal that is far more appealing than appeasing and empowering unknowns unlikely to win anything. Jeff Smith had been incredibly active in the African-American communities in St. Louis and devoted a large amount of personal time and money to improving them, even establishing a very stable pre-school system; however, when it came time for the election he did not receive much, if any, support from the African-American community because of his political status. By endorsing Russ Carnahan's campaign, who was far more likely to win both the primary and general elections, they had a much better chance of getting representation in general, but also representation in the elites of society. As they had very little in the ways of economic power, their community was extremely reliant on the elites of society to provide for them; the only way they know they can get that kind of representation is by endorsing the Carnahan campaign rather than that of Jeff Smith's, who was extremely active and supportive in the African-American community and was inarguably a better leader in that situation. Unfortunately, once again, the pull of the political elites is simply too overpowering for even the most charismatic, personable, intelligent, and socially active candidates.

The movie is a dreadful, albeit eye-opening, look into the way our political system actually functions. It is simply a ruse; a disingenuous masquerade for the political machines to continue along with their agendas while allowing the public to believe that elections are something that truly matter and can be won by anyone.