Bob,
> > it does seem like the 'infrastructure' is in place for
> > a tree of auditable information.
>
> Unfortunately our friendly neighbourhood ISP
> is no more/less trustworthy than the local
> supermarket or used car dealer.
...
> In my opinion we will have to come up with
> our own way to verify identity. We can't even
> trust governments world wide to do our work
> for us.
"Everybody's gotta be on somebody's bond." Are you saying you
don't trust anybody? (If so, I'm sorry for you.) ISPs would register
the same as anybody else, and their operation would be registered
as a repository of neighborhood addresses as well. Yes, there are
security issues, but between encryption and plain data analysis
(e.g. of systematic
'voting' patterns) I think they can be settled.
> The result of that in nations that do
> not believe in universal sufferage will be a
> whole bunch of really cool people sitting in
> jails, being beaten in the streets and maybe
> even worse. There must be a way but it ain't
> through governments that are more often than
> not oppressive, bogus and downright murderous.
>
> Suggestions?
The best person to protect your rights as an individual is you;
'government' is not a problem but a convenience where that
tautology is admitted. The bogies you raise are the consequence of
a social system in which individuals have delegated their rights for
so long that they have let them be delegated right away. (Do I
sound libertarian ;-?)
But the 'solution' is not less government per se, but more
*responsible govt; that is, we cannot regard it as something 'out
there,' psychologically displaced and independent of ourselves as
citizens, but as a mechanism which responds to us and our
expressions of rights and needs. Integrating that mechanism into
ones life means 'governing' all the way through the system, from
the 'responsible' language one uses to the 'responsible' company
one keeps to the 'responsible' selection of a person (or
organization) to represent one's beliefs in forums where *collective
changes are to be made.
As you might suspect, my suggestion is at odds with 'top-down'
structuring for any purpose. Is there a present problem of
'administration' of a system? Then the first agendum of those who
perceive it is to *make it recognizable* by everyone involved, so
that *they can determine its role, its mechanisms, channels,
obligations, etc. Is there great difficulty in imagining that 'they' can
work through to a solution? Then the first step in implementing the
agendum is to provide the tools for the work. Are those tools a bit
complicated? Then the first task of implementation is (you guessed
it) to make them recognizable as tools -- and so on, all the way
down, until 'those who perceive' are talking with those who dont in
language which is understood by all. At that point 'verification of
identity' (or 'enforcement') is a moot point, because everybody is
looking after themselves, taking care, all the phrases which have
been suborned and distorted by a concept of 'government' (or
'education' or 'parenting') which has really been doing the looking
after and the 'caring' *for* them.
Can we get there from here? That I think is the question of the day;
the problem which most urgently needs to be addressed. But what
earthly sense does it make for *us* to wait for 'the administration'
to tell us that they have finally 'identifed' it? Havent we got the
tools? Dont we understand how to use them? Or have we been
bamboozled, befuddled, sidetracked into 'exploring solutions' which
only defer the issue, in the same way that ICANN has deferred
public representation to the SO, and DNSO will defer it to
'commercial entities'?
kerry
