I've been pondering on that off and on for several years. The morality of Shootout at the OK Coral. I can't really find anything wrong with it. Why wouldn't it be the maximum expression of the human animal and spirit to level itself to the individual gunslinger. Even that implies opposing thumbs. We'd still be toast to any species with opposing thumbs and toes.

All conclusions suck.

cfm in Gray, ME

Nate -- I'm not sure if you included a reference to Sheldon Wolin in one of your articles here, but your comment sure reminds me of "Inverted Totalitarianism," which wolin writes about in this Nation article:

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030519/wolin

The USA has been transformed into a de facto fascist state. We are totalitarian, but run with the promise that everyone will be better off as time goes by.

with resource shortages the promised return for compliance will be ever more limited: less payoff for the masses in exchange for greatly diminished rewards. Will people comply just to live another day or week? Some people will, no doubt.

The hierarchy of rewards will become more brutal than it is, but also the punishment for non-compliance will become very brutal.

Will this create mass compliance but also revolution -- both at the same time?

Nate, the term revolution has been bouncing around recent TOD articles. It seems to me that time for some kind of affirmative action in the required direction(s) is slipping away with each day. The percieved advantage of government seems to be waning before our very eyes with the removal of the concieted veils.

Right or wrong, perhaps what is needed is a revolution.