Introduction (Revised)

Well.

Looking over my old introduction I see that it's kind of flakey. Reading it nowadays I would wonder, "What kind of wierdo is this guy, anyway?"

Three years is a long time. At least, the past three have been for me.

I started this website to represent my Ideal World - not the way it is, of course, but the way it should be. It was to be my way of spouting off about how rotten things were, and how good the could be. I hoped people would take my ideas to heart, but I was determined not to be hung up if they didn't.

That's what a personal website is for, isn't it?

Now, well ... okay, I'll admit it, I'm a little hung up. I really did want the Whole Wide World to go over to the Holocene Calendar, for instance. But mostly I'm as amazed and perplexed at the way things turned out as most of you are.

We're living in a strange time.

As Claire Wolfe said, "It's too late to work within the system, and too early to shoot the bastards."

A lot of us thought there was going to be some big, WWF-style Super-Smackdown with the Government. Many thought it would be on or around January 1, 2000. I know the failure of the World's computers to totally discombobulate left a lot of people disappointed. We really wanted Y2K to be a big disaster so we could justify packing away all that survival gear. Well, it didn't happen, although a friend of mine who worked on the Y2K Problem for a major insurance company tells me it's just put off for another 20 or 30 years.

(And all that survival gear is still useful, you know.)

We also didn't have that big Government Showdown. After Waco, Ruby Ridge and a thousand other outrages, we were looking forward to it. You could say the Feds robbed us of satisfaction by wising up. It was wise, too: now that they've quieted down - at least learned to conceal their abominations if not let up on them - the militia movement seems to have died out. How conveeeeenient for them.

A lot of people are very relieved that they've got a Republican in the White House too, as if that would change anything. But people are gullible. Yes, it's as if the 1990s never happened, what with everyone concentrating on their SUVs, their stocks, their home entertainment systems and, of course, their websites. Just as if everything's all peachy again.

Hmmmmmm .....

Looking at the apparent retreat of my fellow gun-loving kooks into their well-upholstered electronic cottages, I can't help thinking things are not as they seem. The people *I* know are no fly-by-night patriots. They are sincere, dedicated and concerned adults who are very, very worried about they way our World seems to be going to hell in a handbasket. The false (?) alarm of Y2K and the lack of news on the latest police atrocities would not cause these people to just shrug it off and say, "Ehh, forget it."

Instead I see a different, more inspiring (and for our opponents much more dangerous) thing happening. Rather than giving up, we have simply moved on to the next stage.

I'm really glad the militia movement as we knew it is finished. Those camo-clad commandoes with their poorly-Xeroxed pamphlets really did nothing effective, and they only turned the Vast Unaligned Middle against us. What we've done is wised up and realized that there is never going to be some big Smackdown in the woods. Why would there be? The Feds know where we live; they can just come and terrorize us at home!

And so we stay at home. We wear sneakers, jeans and t-shirts just like Normal People. We've taken a lesson from the Viet Cong and decided to blend in with the proletarian crowd. But inside, we're still the same as ever.

The fact that there are fewer people lighting up my in-box with blazing screeds is also reassuring. Those people haven't gone away, nor have they changed their minds. They just realize that the time for screaming bloody murder is over with. Now, at this point in our ever-evolving revolution, is the time for action.

What kind of action? Well, as the fair CW put it, it really is too late to work within the system. It's also still too early to shoot the bastards, at least on a practical level (morally speaking it is never too soon). But we're not trying to turn back the clock, nor are we just waiting for things to collapse. We've chosen a (pardon the term) third way.

Mostly we are working on just going our own way regardless of what the Feds think or do. Some are Doing Freedom by moving themselves into international PT life, getting beyond the USA to where they can be Permanent Tourists. Others, like David Cowlishaw are developing mass-conservative space drives to help us physically break free of this single, over-Governed orb we live on. The fine folks at Fusor.Net are working on power sources for the craft David and his cohorts will build. Still others at The Mars Society and The Foresight Institute are thinking of how to survive on other planets, and how to make our lives on this one a lot more worthwhile.

And, of course, there are the millions of people all over the World who are just muddling through on their own, avoiding Government where they can and dealing with it where they can't. Modern technology makes us more able to do that than ever before; it will make us even more capable in the future.

They say the winds are calmest just before the storm. If that's true then you can expect things to get a bit stormy soon, because it's amazingly calm now.

Here on Kelley's Planet you will find everything oriented toward the coming storm. Lots of links, lots of essays by Your Webmaster and, I hope, lots of connections you will find useful. Enjoy ... and don't forget to wear your rubbers.

For Freedom,

Jim Kelley
Monday, June 25 12001