that will make things better

sorry for no blogging. life just a touch overfull of late. but i am back, beeches. this series in the washpost is well worth reading: policing as a racket. (also, the layout/presentation of the series is interesting as an example of the way news might look in the future.) it really has reached the point where i just do not understand how any even vaguely rational person could defend the legitimacy of the political state, or how anyone could think of it as a realistic solution to anything. why don't we just grab a bunch of people - at random, or because they are people who like that sort of thing - and hand them a bunch of clubs and guns and decorate them with devices symbolizing their superiority and impunity when they take our stuff or shoot our ass. that will make things better. it's quite like believing in leprechauns, only less harmless and less empirical: a suicide cult, maybe, but not a decent or coherent position, and i say that that could not be more obvious.