Saturday, November 17, 2007
< previous day | archives | next day >
I'm writing this from the Ikea parking lot outside Pittsburg PA.
I'd hoped to find some cabinets at Ikea that would serve as desk storage under the top I built. No good. Nothing here suits me. Ikea's stuff is a bare cut above Wal-Mart. The display is interesting and it was worth the stop to see how Ikea merchandises their goods. I guess I'll build my own cabinets.
From here I think I'll head down along the Ohio River toward the Mississippi. Tomorrow. I'm all driven out for today. It snowed off and on most all day yesterday. I had hoped to get under way a bit earlier in November so I could duck south of this colder weather but there was just too much to do first.
My wool curtains are working out great - I'm glad I took the time to sew them up. I'll have to see if I can get some pictures to post here one of these days.
Night camp: Wal-Mart parking lot in Washington PA
Emergent democracy
Culture brings us together, usually at a very small scale through mutual belief, trust and common interest. It educes, not compels, behavior. Culture codified is law. It is as inevitable as the day the night that as scale increases, law increases. Law enforced is government. Government does not, in the main, educe behavior, but compels it. Democratic or otherwise, rarely, very rarely, does any concentration of power or wealth desire to see subjects well informed, truly educated, their privacy ensured or their discourse uninhibited. Those are the very things that power and wealth fear most. Old forms of government have every reason to operate in secret, while denying just that privilege to subjects. The people are to be minutely scrutinized while power is to be free of examination.