Lock my doors at night? Certainly! - don’t you?  Feel there is justification in having armed guards (police) protecting us? Why government? - given a fertile plot of land to provide food, could a family exist without the help of organized government? - sure – if a family could, why couldn’t a group of families? - if a group of families, why couldn’t a nation exist without government? Almost everyone would agree that a family could survive without government - almost everyone shrugs at the thought of a nation existing without government - why? Does that make the sum less than the total of its parts? Do we retire at night in blissful joy in the thought that our nation is forging ahead as leader of the world - or do most of us retire thinking of our own personal wants and needs? OK - I’ll concede, we must have government to protect us from invasion by other governments! What are governments? - just more people, like the single family on a plot of land, who could exist without government. Predators! - that’s why we form ourselves together in groups - the sum is greater and stronger than the parts! Wait a minute! just above it was proven that the part was greater than the sum! -- something’s not right here! This power in numbers group we form, what are we protecting it from? -- dogs, cats, rats, lions, bears? - no! -- people! Human beings - people! - we are the greatest predators on earth! Damn it’s coming clear - we have to get in groups to protect us from ourselves! We mark off grand plots of land and call them countries and shoot anyone who tries to invade our country - we hire armed guards to protect our other little lines and plots called Counties, States, Cities, and HOMES! -- the homes we make even more protected by buying weapons of mass destruction and keeping them under our beds or in the closets! Are these weapons to use against animals? - no against man - human man! Worst case - we go to the psychologist to make sure we know how to keep others from silently invading the little invisible boundaries surrounding each of us. "You’ve crossed a line there"!! -"I’m a predator and might chew your arm off for that!" What kind of animal are we that spends all of our time and energy protecting ourselves from ourselves? We form great societies of government which forces us to place ourselves in stuffy little holes of existence so we can protect us -- from us! We speak of love but build our entire society based on fear and hate because we are the seed of predators – no, no, -- not just them! -- but you and me! No wonder God looked down and said, "my people are stupid people"!

                                                                                   Barnum Taylor ©1999