~ MonteSite

Currently i still feel many of us are “talking” past each other,
but we are consistently increasingly on the same page.

I still have a sense that the vast majority of the GPUS basically agrees on how to do things,
down to the content of the platform by and large,
and trust that the NC will find a way to articulate that in voting for good proposals.

As i have come to see the GPUS NC, as it currently is, as un-poll-able,
excepting putting a proposal in que for formal vote,
i come increasingly to believe many votes should fail,
and many more should be tuned up and brought back around frequently,
in one form or another, until we have found something
approaching (albeit barely) optimum.

Unfortunately, in a personal sense i seldom vote against the imperfect,
and prefer to vote for what i believe is considered near consensus.

The rise of hierarchy is due to the fact
that consensus does not work well on the battlefield.

In this era the battlefield is an electronic one,
supporting broad consensus and more diverse and distributed visions and decisions.
Electronic means can bring the responsiveness of hierarchy to consensual decision making.

We can build the tools to embody such self governance in GPUS bodies,
we can proof them out and graft them onto US “democracy” as law,
when it gets us elected…

While we do, the corps(es) will be building similar toolage,
people will more frequently expect to join in governance council,
in the “private” sphere.

None of this will change the core dynamic of consensus.

No matter who he is, or what he has done,
Sitting Bull must still go sit for days at the fire of Red Cloud’s clan
many times before he is ready to call for Grand Council.

One must work out the issues between one’s clan and any others,
and eliminate faction and discord in the nation,
then find the favored plan and means of major clans and elders,
then work to forge a plan that all can consent to.

Then one goes to council with one’s nation.

Lacking leisurely time to react to the changes we have wrought,
we at this point can only be jealous of the ancient practices,
before kings, priests, soldiers, and guns.

Telephones, TV, Radio, the papers,
we have become inured to the idea that mass media
is either one on one, or one to many.

The email list is no camp fire, we must find better ways,
but until we do, any elder must still go to the camp of his competitor,
and find a way to caress his ear with what he wants to hear.

However, we do increasingly have the means to create the electronic clan fire,
and we do not have much time to do it.

We all know this, but as individuals we all keep forgetting.

The process as we have come to expect it is unwieldy,
and we are far from helpless to fix it.

Until then, patience will remain it’s own reward in these matters.