Tim May wrote:

In the infamous "Twenty-Nine Palms" poll of soldiers, asking if troops would fire on civilians if ordered to carry out an order, the longer the soldier had been in the service, the less likely he was to say he would. (The context of this order is generally believed to be related to a Department of Defense involvement in the wholesale disarming of the population under a state of emergency, FEMA or U.N. orders, etc.)

Note that "Twenty-Nine Palms" was the military home/liason of those involved in the INSLAW travesty. (Everyone _not_ working for the Department of Justice who can say "Fuck You" to Congress and get away with it, raise your hand.)

This is consistent with the military retireds I know being _extremely_ anti-government. Usually with a right-wing flavor, but then that is understandable.

It is a fact that we tend to narrow our range of perception when we get involved in any cult/religion/organization and bestow some of our own innate responsibility/authority upon them. Once separated from the group, however, we then tend to regain more control over our individual beliefs and values, whereupon we are more likely to recognize where we stepped beyond or own moral/ethical values while caught up, to whatever extent, in 'group mind.' This has been discussed on the list (e.g. Declan goes to Washington!) and, thankfully, we have a weird enough assortment of not-quite-normal SubGenius Bizzaro CypherPundits to keep us pissing all over ourselves and one another to make the possibility of us becoming dues-paying members of the CypherSheeple Union a remote possibility. A CypherPunk nuking DC would not be a tragedy. What would be a tragedy would be if, after being asked "Why?", he or she turned around to ask 'the group', "Uuhhh...why did I do that, again? Hey! Where did everybody go?" Any physical war or revolution in the future will be largely dependent upon the success of the parallel InfoWar designed to direct (or prevent) the thinking of those who the government provides with weapons and authority. We need as many of them as possible to be smiling inwardly to themselves when they say, "My gun is loaded, Sarge...and I'm 'right behind' you, all the way." LoadAndUnlockMonger