Remember in the Godfather how Michael Corleone played his enemies against each other to assume ultimate power? Well, America pretty much did that during the first fifty years of its existence. The French helped us win the Revolutionary War against Britain and was ready to invade us themselves only fifteen years later when they were engaged in a declared war with Britain.

See, historically, alliances between nations lasted hundred of years. But we stepped back. We were done fighting and ready to get back to our farming, our fishing, our law-making and our incessant worship of the enforcement of man-made laws. We were ready to be civilized again. So, we said no to the French. And, not only that, we signed Jay's Treaty with Great Britain which really pissed off the French. Consider that this was only thirteen revolutions of the earth around the sun after the close of the Revolutionary War.

So France kind of had a right to be pissed.

But George Washington left us with what is perhaps the most prophetic and wise opinion on how We the People could best steer the ship of government so that is does not run into the rocks of history. In his Farewell Address to the Nation on September 19, 1796, the father of our country warned us, emphatically, against becoming permanently allied with foreign powers.

But that was only the beginning of America. Our Founding Fathers were agrarian farmers who loved their families and their relationship with the natural world around them as well as the spiritual worlds inside them. These gentlemen, brilliant as they may have been, had no foreknowledge of what the Industrial and Information Revolutions would do to human society in terms of economics, politics, science, the press and, of course, in human warfare. Had they known the bloody and awful truth of what it would take to maintain this society from meandering in the river of time and crashing into some very big and very nasty rocks, they may have thrown down their pitchforks and muskets and ran back as His Majesty's Loyal Subjects.

But we've done a pretty damn good job of steering this vessel so far.

We, the United States of America, are responsible for opening access to free expression of ideas, services, and products to millions of individual human beings beyond our borders and We are directly responsible for improving the living conditions of man in relationship to man (society) in what will eventually reach out and ecompass all of humanity. It's time we said it and it's time the world damn well acknowledges it. Our principles and our ship of state, which has gone from sail to steam to rocket and now breaks gravity waves in interplanetary and interstellar space, will not be walked on by any foreign power even if that power happens to hold one one of the many reigns of our government. We the People have been endowed with the machinery to weed out the vampire tyrants in our midst and expose them to the sunlight so that they burn in political hell before our eyes (metaphorically speaking, of course referencing the death of their public personae--i.e. Gray Davis, Trent Lott, Dan Rather, etc.). This machine is our Constitution and it may rattle and hum but it still gets the damn job done.

Some people claim that we have ignored George Washington's plea for neutrality to the detriment of the entire human race. I hear what you're saying and it may seem like wisdom except for the stirrings of my heart (An ode to Peter Jackson and George Lucas--Thank you, Gentlemen. You have both done very good work upon this earth and the world is a better place because of your actualized artistic visions) but the historical situation that is currently unfolding is much more complicated than that.

The problem is that we are standing on a rushing river bank with one hand around a solid tree, leaning out over the rapids, trying to pull out as many screaming bodies as we possibly can. But we must be very careful that we do not shift our weight in places that will weaken our grip on the tree, lest we foolishly fall back into the river of sorrow, which is Time.

It is interesting to note that Muslim society lived very much under this same mission statement in their attempt to secure the peaceful exchange of goods, services and ideas while promiting a spiritual relationship with the material world outside and the spiritual worlds inside. This was, of course, until the Roman Empire embraced Christianity as a last best attempt at self preservation; all they needed was a new Caesar to fight for and they got that icon--it looked like this †. The Crusades utterly destroyed the flourishing Muslim civilization which truly improved the living conditions of the world around them and here we are today. (For a great old book that lays the social and spiritual evolutions of human beings, read the book The Mainspring of Human Progress by Henry Grady Weaver--it's an oldie but goodie!).

There is an American mission that is written in the history of our people--you must be able to read Time to decipher the mission statement, however. And if you can't read the language of Time (history), relax because there are crib notes which lie in the most perfect single sentence ever written by a human being.

"We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness--That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Power in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

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I find this pretty interesting that, through geological research and supposition alone, we have essentially captured an evolutionary choice being made by one particular species.

However, has anyone considered the possibility that this individual dinosaur could have made a conscious choice to lay off meat and begin eating only vegetation? A good way to test this hypothesis is to find other fossils of this species and weigh the evidence.

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Hat tip to Fark.

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I think they should name it "Flat-Headed Plant Eater"--oh, wait--sorry, Moby already has that nickname.

Josh reads from his new masterpiece of polemic Common Sense 2005 (When Republicans & Democrats Both Become the A$$holes!)

(12:00)

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