Midnight Cowboying – Frontier Populism and Hope for America

A Labor Day Special, a real political essay by yours truly.

Posted early because it was a long Labor Day weekend and I gotta turn in early.

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Frontier Populism is relatively new school of thought, mostly being hammered into a political philosophy by young Texans. The aim is to create a society without systems for political, economic and social hierarchies controlled by the few, while still keeping true to the rugged individualism that is rampant in the Lone Star Republic. It is an answer to our years of displaced wealth in the arenas of politics, culture and economics.

The basis of this new society is that all citizens will have true and equal access to the tools of information and production, allowing for a realistic chance at the American dream. And if that fails to take hold across the nation, at least create a brand spanking new Texas one. It is basically time to end the nightmare that is imperialism cloaked as a capitalistic democracy.

For true equality to exist in the USA, we must achieve freedom from the authoritarian and private cabals that pretend not only to be democratically elected, but operating in good faith under free trade. The greatest ruse every perpetuated on the American people is that we live in economic system that is not controlled by hidden hands of the elite. Direct access to means of productions and resources for individual advancement are not available for any class of American outside of the moneyed-elite, a new form of corrupt aristocratic control.

They are an illegitimate authority in all aspects of American life, brutalizing traditional American ideals in order to fulfill their agenda for their own economic, political, religious and cultural reasons. While other countries around the world use a socialistic state, or worse, a political party in promoting true liberty and economic and social justice, this will never happen here in the USA. Those systems across the pond require a homogeneous culture working for their own collective history and brighter future. America is the purest heterogeneous state on the planet. So this is where Frontier Populism makes a dramatic leap in its own direction.

We place our hopes in the American citizens’ love of their own unique ability to claim an equal share in the American dream based on our revolutionary social contract. It is through citizens’ assemblies, netroots, grassroots and workers with common goals we hope change comes to decentralize the current power structure driving American into the ground.

To some this might sound strangely like libertarian socialism, which actually predates capitalism. As Noam Chomsky said, “a consistent libertarian must oppose private ownership of the means of production and the wage slavery which is a component of this system, as incompatible with the principle that labor must be freely undertaken and under the control of the producer.” Most Americans only associate Libertarianism with the far right, which is truly a crying shame, since the first libertarian was Joseph Déjacque, an early French anarchist communist. 

But as with most history, things have evolved and the context of both Déjacque and Chomsky are now out of date. Libertarian socialists tend to reject the state and embrace anarchism, which only works in theory, much like communism. Great ideas, but placed into real life they always lead to the exact opposite results that the political philosophy intended. This is why Frontier Populism again takes it’s own step forward towards a new direction.

The greatest power throughout the history of we clever monkeys has been through land, and mostly the landed. The mere thought of placing private property into the hands of a bureaucratic state just screams opportunities for corruption. The best way to ensure the individualistic freedom of the citizens is to make them all landed. That is why while libertarian socialist state a case for an end of private property, Frontier Populism will call for an universal homestead act, protecting the private citizen from the predators with excessive access to the capital and economic controls.

The primary purpose of government is to protect those who cannot protect themselves against forces greater than their collective bargaining power. When people assemble democratically as individuals to assert the will of the people to address grievances against a republican state and it fails, then the authority of said state is no longer valid under our social contract. The centralized political power at that point is subverting liberty and the pursuit of happiness among the citizens.

The system only works when the collective will of the people have the power to decide economic, cultural and political issues. It is only though direct democracy and individual autonomy as a sum of the whole that the citizens are released from the yoke of an unjust authority. It is only when free creativity and true free enterprise are available to each citizen and realized in our political and economic system can America call itself a true democracy.

One of the greatest barriers to individuals is their access to means of production and capital to realize their own creativity in free enterprise. With control of capital placed solely in the economic elite, the average citizen has no means to enter the private economic system as an equal against governmentally subsidized corporate oligarchies.

It is a system rigged for the rich, controlled by the rich, for the rich. While most socialism calls for state control of the industrial manufacturing sector, Frontier Populism only calls for equal access for an individual who has the skills, ideas or product that should be allowed to enter the domain of free enterprise. The reason America does not make anything anymore is because the elite have rigged the system against the citizens who wish to enter the market with an innovative idea, product or system that might challenge the authoritarian control of that sector.

This has lead to the death of the American manufacturing base, which is sandbagged by an old corporate aristocracy generations past its prime. The irony is that the morally bankrupt elite seeks to squash the very means of entry into the marketplace that allowed them to gain their own wealth. It is their desire to stay at the top of the American system with their outdated production system that has lead America into the realm of corporate-controlled capitalism, and sold to the American people under the absurd name of “free trade.”

And as unjust as the elite’s control of the means of production and capital is, that pales in comparison to their control of entry into the system of politics. With the infusion of cash from the elite combined with their control over media has lead to a disenfranchisement of the average citizen to enter into politics. Today, state level campaigns require cash on hands that rival Presidential campaigns no more than 50 years ago. This intervention against the social will of the America people has produced a new breed of politicians whose first goal is to please those who keep them in power, as opposed to those who placed them into a position of representation. Only when the political system is released from the pressure of the elite and allowed operate as a direct democracy can America start to operate under a true mandate of the people.

It is only when the mandate of the people supplants the will of the corporate oligarchy that change and hope will return to America. From there the collective will of the citizen will be heard instead of the talking points handed down by the corrupt elite. It is only then that true aspects of Frontier Populism can be implemented.

The first is to produce the best citizens possible in the future generations of America. Instead of recycling money between the elite in the name of military-industrial-complex, an aggressive reform of our military must happen. Instead of a never-ending offensive position in all corners of the globe, we must withdraw the current empire to within our own borders for strictly defensive reasons. No longer will the blood and treasury of the citizens be used to protect corporate interests around the planet. Only the elite enjoy the lucrative benefits of this system, while the citizens carry all of its burden.

Once the American economic system is released from this blood money monopoly, we can then use our new found wealth to improve our infrastructure. The primary pressing needs will be to use the trillions of dollars spent to pay the elite to have wars abroad to improve and update our education, transportation, power, municipal and economic systems.

It is the goal of Frontier Populism to produce at the age of 22 the most productive citizen possible.  From pre-school to the higher education, to trade schools to school lunches, it is in the nation’s best interest to fund every aspect of our developing citizens lives. By overhauling our education system to create citizens ready to take on the responsibility of creative and economic freedom, we can finally crush the current method used to produce slave wagers.

It is in the elite’s interest not to generate citizen capable of supplanting them at the top by living out the American dream, and it is time to change this crime against the pursuit of happiness. Every developing citizen will be given equal and ample opportunity to higher education or development of trade, funded by the state. Secondary education will no longer be geared towards testing, but development of skills that will benefit not only the individual, but also society as a whole. Each developing citizen will have freedom of choice of their desired skill sets and education, and the state will see to it they are allowed to develop to best of their ability.

Since the maintenance and development of the country’s infrastructure requires huge capital and co-ordination, the state must step in here. It will be responsibility of the state to not only repair our aging transportation grid, but to update it using new and emerging technologies. It will also push greener transportation models with state funding instead of subsidizing archaic fossil fuel systems we use today. One of the greatest goals will be a national wireless transmission of energy system to power all vehicles, homes and companies in a new Apollo-type project.

One of the most ambitious goals of Frontier Populism is to reopen the American manufacturing base. While some other schools of thought depend on unions and workers boards, the citizens should be allowed the choice of free assemble in the means of access to capital to enter the market. This means that to right the wrong of generations of corrupt corporate control of the system, the state will end all subsidized to the corporate elite and begin taxing them aggressively. The state will then use this generated capital to fund the start-up of everything from mom and pop shops on main street to huge hard product manufacturing.

This will be done by direct democracy collectives of sizes from 1 to as large as the collective can grow. There is nothing more democratic than citizens all enjoying equal private rights to their labor in a system meant to free them from being slave wagers. The state will only provide capital for the start up of these collective, expecting them to compete for profit in the free enterprise market. All aspects of current free trade, which favor the corporate oligarchy, will be stripped away, and only the best products for the best price will gain traction in trade. If the collective fails to produce an economically viable product, the collective will not be supported by the state past what can be considered a realistic start-up phase. This is to safeguard against an economic nanny-state, while still allowing citizens access to capital after years of being shut out of the system.

Two examples of this would be a hardware shop opened by a couple in small-town America. They are afford by the state the means to open a place of business once enjoyed by middle class America before the corporate oligarchy gamed the system and drove them out of business with unfair business practices. Once the hardware store shows a profit, the couple pays back the capital investment by the state back in payments that will not hurt their economic viability. The reason is two-fold, first so they do not go broke trying to pay back the capital, and the second is so the capital fund for other citizens is replenished for future generations of entrepreneurs.

If the business fails, the couple is not liable for the capital, but the state will not fund future endeavors for said couple unless they have a more viable business plan. It should also be noted; even though the state is the capital funder for their business, at no point ever does the state have any economic stake in their business. The state is only there to help restore the middle class of America, and to help the worker class have equal access to the America dream.

On a large scale, an example would be the reopening of manufacturing plants in Detroit for the product of green vehicles. Requiring a huge investment, the direct collective would never be able to afford the retooling, raw products and distribution system without access to huge amounts of capital. This requires investment rivaling that of public works under FDR. The state will allow for this without any say in the structure of the business.

It will be up to the direct collective to vote in the power structure, one of the most radically democratic business models ever. No longer will the CEO be chosen in boardrooms for the benefit for the few, but put to ballot for the benefit of all the employees. This direct system will also protect against abusive salary structures and compensation packages that are not rooted in reality. Every worker will have an equal say in the direction of their company, which as above most still prove economically viable or lose funding by the state for start-up.

It is never the goal of the state to own any enterprise, but instead to facilitate the citizens’ entry back into the economic process. The state will also protect these enterprises from foreign predators not acting in good faith. One example would be to apply a tariff to every product from China until it reflects to true price point of the under-valued yen. Since we are currently under their economic control, such practices are not viable right now, but hopefully once we stop trying to be emperors of the world, we can use our new found surplus to pay back our astounding debt to all foreign investors and use our new emerging manufacturing base to help combat our trade deficits. It is the goal Frontier Populism to have “Made in the USA” stamped on the product that world uses once again.

The direction of the funding will also be decided by direct democracy of citizens instead of by the state. This puts the onus of the viability of the project on to the direct democracy collectives. They most prove to their fellow citizens that their business will not only be beneficial to the community, but economically viable as well. Local projects such as a shop on main street will be decided locally, while larger investments will be voted on the state and even national level if need be. This is to keep cronyism and favoritism out of the system, and truly opening the means of capital to all.

The backbone of any nation are the farmers and ranchers, and this country has turned their backs on this very important group of citizens. A drastic overhaul of the system is in order to protect the small farmer and rancher from the predators of big agri-business that are supported by the current corrupt corporate capitalism system. One major new direction will be the labeling of all food with country of origin and if it contains GMO products. Small family farmers will also be protected from GMO seed invasion, with the onus of the spread of GMO seeds placed on the back of big agri-business instead of the small farmer or rancher. Any invasion of traditional family seed stock will be compensated by these predators instead of the other way around. Small farmers will also be first in line for support from the state in the form of the direct democracy collectives, insuring that generations of work are not lost to corporate greed.

Another area of concern is the corporate control of health care. It is the belief of Frontier Populism that health care is a universal right of very citizen. Economic wealth and position should never mandate the quality of the health care available to citizens of enlightened country. Every one should enjoy the same access to medical care no matter what their position in society is, anything less is nothing but a crypto-aristocracy masquerading as a modern caste system. No longer will health care be profit driven, instead it will be used to help keep the citizens as productive as they wish to be.

Health care will still be the free choice of citizens, but it will no longer be withheld because it cuts into the bottom-line of the elite. This will relieve huge economic burden on the average citizen, while helping society as whole with a drastic increase in the quality life of the individual.

The environmental health of the country is also a primary goal of Frontier Populism. It is the expansion of the corporate oligarchy using capitalism that has lead to environmental degradation. Without any check against their power, they have polluted and reaped the resources of the land without any regard to decency or economic punishment for their crimes. Long have they gotten away with destroying local environments leaving the clean-up bill for the people to pay instead of cutting into their profit. This will change.

All national-owned land will become the collective patrimony of all citizens of the United States of America. No longer will our national treasures be sold to corporations in back rooms for the gain of only the economic elite. Any corporation who violates public trust and openly pollutes the common areas of our lands while be forced to endure the economic challenge and burden of cleaning up any environmental disaster they have incurred. They will also no longer be protected by the old system to incur resource depletion that goes against the good of society.

The state will also aggressively seek direct democracy collectives whose goal it is to restore the environment to pristine, or at least viable, conditions. With a love of the frontier, as included in the name of this political thought, the goal will be to keep portions of America as living monument to the natural history of our land. Frontier Populism will make sure that future generations are allowed to have open access to these lands for all activities that do not lead to its demise. This includes conversational hunting and fishing, access to outdoor activities and enjoyment of all nature lovers.

One last aspect is a concept referred to as “Death with Dignity.” What happens to the elder in this country in nursing homes is a national disgrace. As with helping produce the best citizen by age 22, when a citizen is no longer able to care for themselves the state will step in and provide for that individual a quality of life that is not considered barbaric. The goal is not to be a nanny is the last stages of life, but to ensure a sense of dignity to all no matter what their economic situation. This is the least the state can offer for its citizens who have lead productive lives, a safeguard against disgraceful practices that currently occurs across the country today.

Overall, Frontier Populism’s goal is to promote individual access to the political, economic and social systems of America, with free and equal access to tools of information and production, while preserving individual private property and entry into free enterprise. It will use the power of a state created by direct democracy to right the wrongs of years of corporate aristocracy who have operated as a corrupt oligarchy in all aspects of society. But it will have a constant check against becoming a nanny-state by aspects of rugged individualism beloved on the frontier woven into system.

It is the best hope for open access to true liberty and the pursuit of happiness of all in this land, not matter which womb you came out of, and provides a future that will restore America’s place as the shining city on the hill.

Playing Brazoria’s hand,
Pinche Tejano

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