1-28-06 What's Wrong With America

If you give people too many things to handle at once, they get confused.

I think that's the basis of how we're being governed, lately. Well, I suppose you could call it governance, but it looks more like rape to me.

I'm not talking a partisan line on this, because the raping and pillaging has been a joint effort for many years, now. The problem isn't that we're electing the wrong people to office. The problem is that nobody's being elected to anything anymore, because voter turnout in elections is below 50% just about all the time. Since the majority of the population in America doesn't bother to vote anymore, it's no longer a "government of the people, by the people..." and most especially, "...for the people."

It might be the heart of the matter, but there are so many other things that are askew these days that nobody really has the attention span (or the time) to become conversant with more than one or two issues. So, I'll just give you one thing to focus on, politically... you're being fucked.

The way to respond to this situation is to vote. It doesn't really matter whether you vote for one party or the other, just as long as you don't vote for any incumbents. In other words, vote against whoever's currently holding the office. The message you'll be sending is, "I don't like the way things have been going."

Of course, if you DO like the way things are going, then vote for the incumbents. The message you'll be sending in that case is, "I like the way things are going."

It's not about which party is "better" than the other, really. It's about whether you exercise the one responsibility you have as a US citizen that matters, ie- your right to vote. All the other rights and privileges that you have as an American just exist, you can either exercise any of those rights or not. It's not going to matter that much. But your right to vote carries a simple responsibilty with it. You do have to set aside that few minutes on election day, and cast your vote.

When you don't vote, the message you're sending is "I don't care how things are going."

Office holders will only pay attention to those who care enough about how things are going to actually send them a message. If the majority of the electorate sends the message, "I don't care enough about how things are going to bother to vote," then they'll assume they don't have to do anything for you. And they'll be absolutely correct in that assumption. So, in that case, who do you think they're going to be working for?

It's a very simple thing. Nobody has to strain their brain to understand how important voting is.

You can vote against all incumbents. Or you can vote for everybody that's already there. Or you can pick and choose between some who are already there, and against others that you'd like to see lose. Or you can write in votes for your favorite cartoon characters. It's all about sending the message of whether you like the way things are going or not.

But not voting at all, sending the message that you don't care how things are going, is a clear mandate for office holders to do what's best for THEM, and nobody else.

The sad fact is that if you don't vote, then YOU are what's "wrong" with America.

1-7-06 Spooky Action at a Distance

There's a thing called "quantum entanglement", a condition or state of two or more atoms that apparently can be induced in the laboratory. This somehow aligns the polarity of electron spin. I don't claim to fully understand it, but if you want to read more about it...

http://www.earthfiles.com/news/news.cfm?ID=1035&category=Science

http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/releases/cat_states.htm

Suffice to say that this is within the realm of ongoing scientific research, if you don't want to become more conversant with the technical work being done.

Once quantum entanglement has been induced, you have an alignment of the polarity of electron spin. At this point, the electron(s) are spinning in two directions at once, as explained by the uncertainty principle. But if you observe the spin of one of the "quantum entangled" atoms, it will then be going in one direction. At that exact point, the electron spin of the other atom will be going in the same direction when it's observed.

In other words, a single atom, upon observation of its electron spin, will have a 50% chance of going in one direction or the other, like flipping a coin. You can never predict which direction it will be going until you observe it. But if you induce quantum entanglement between two or more atoms, and you observe the spin of one, then you CAN predict that electron(s) in the other atom(s) will ALWAYS be going in that same direction. The change happens instantly.

They don't know WHY this has always proven to be true so far, but they not only know THAT it's true in every case that's been tested, they also know HOW TO MAKE IT HAPPEN.

So, what you've got going on in particle physics right now is this experimentation into what Einstein labelled, "Spooky action at a distance". And it really is spooky, isn't it?

However, it doesn't end there. It gets even spookier. This, however, is where experimentation has yet to be done. Quantum theory predicted the phenomena described above, which is now demonstrable and repeatable. But Quantum theory also predicts the following...

If you've got these atoms induced into a state of quantum entanglement, and then you bring one atom over to Australia and another one to Germany, and bring another one up to the Moon, and then you observe the electron spin of the one in Australia, a completely inexplicable thing happens. The electron spin of the atom in Germany and the electron spin of the atom on the Moon is INSTANTLY the same as the one you observed in Australia!

Einstein called it "Spooky action at a distance" because it's not only spooky, but it also violates his assumption regarding the speed of light, ie- that nothing in this universe can go faster. But Quantum theory predicts that this phenomenon does just that by a factor of not "warp one" or "warp nine", but "warp infinity". In other words, it doesn't take any measurable time at all for the cause point of observation in Australia to effect the change in Germany or on the moon.

What this means is that there is now an observable phenomenon in this universe, repeatable in the laboratory, that potentially destroys one of the most fundamental premises that our understanding of the universe relies upon. The speed of light is the constant figure "C" in the most famous equation of our civilization, "E = MC2". We also base our theory of the Big Bang upon the absoluteness of the speed of light.

If the predictions of Quantum Theory about "spooky action at a distance" prove out to yield phenomena that are repeatable and consistent, then our culture is in for some major renovations in science and philosophy. On the day that any demonstrable and repeatable phenomenon shows that a causal factor elicits an effect that's faster than the speed of light, those renovations are going to reach far and wide.

Those renovations have already begun, but so far the impact has only been felt within the cloistered laboratories and halls of academia. None of this has had any effect on the culture at large yet. Out here in the world of politics and religion and the workaday world, we're still operating under the premises of nineteenth century and early twentieth century scientific breakthroughs. Despite the development of Quantum Theory in the early part of the twentieth century, however, our technology has only come up to a point in the past decade or two wherein the theories can be addressed by actual experiment.

Want to take a ride?

Well I've got some news for you... if you thought the thrill ride of science and technology was a gut-buster in the twentieth century, you ain't seen nothin' yet!

1-3-06 What about Afghanistan?

You never know how long a link will remain active, but here's one anyway...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10663339/site/newsweek/from/RSS/

There are plenty more to find, however. That's just one in a long line of stories over the past few years that continues to miss the point in what has to be the least covered story in the so-called "Global War on Terror" (GWOT), ie- the back seat that the so-called "War on Drugs" has taken in Afghanistan.

During the period that the Taliban controlled Afghanistan, opium production dropped to a level that was so insignificant that you could say it was no longer a factor for consideration in world-wide illegal drug trade. Following the US liberation of Afghanistan, however, it quickly rose to levels that bring it back into the picture as the world's number one producer of opium.

What's wrong with this picture?

Well, it isn't so much the irony or even the idea that the change is a "two edged sword". The trouble with this picture was argued rationally and eruditely by William F. Buckley, Jr. a decade ago. He argued for the legalization of drugs.

The centerpiece for his argument was a statement he gave to the New York Bar Association in 1996, a transcript of which resides on the National Review website here...

http://www.nationalreview.com/12feb96/drug.html

There are many other places on the web where you can read Buckley's additional rhetoric on the subject, if you care to search for them.

Buckley's argument is certainly the most rationally focused viewpoint regarding the "War on Drugs" that can be found anywhere. Unfortunately, prejudicial preferences rule the continued application of double standards and unrealistic expectations that keep extant drug laws in force, and adding to them almost annually. It's an inconsistency that, for instance, brings Afghanistan back into the limelight of the illegal drug trade, but only after our government toppled the only governing influence in the history of the world to have actually made any significant impact in this so-called "War on Drugs".

I certainly don't want to draw the conclusion that a fanatic theocracy, however, is the way to go in the War on Drugs. Rather, I go along with Buckley's analysis of the economic detriment in keeping drugs illegal, and I also contend that the premises of the War on Drugs are completely irrational.

The raw materials for the three most prolific illegal drugs, coca leaves, poppies, and marijuana, are commodities. Like most other commodities, they have established markets. In a free market system, it's very unrealistic to expect that any agriculturally based commodity with an established market of any kind can in any way be "erased". It simply can't be done. What can be done is to pass laws that prohibit the trade, thereby making the commodities one hundred to one thousand times more valuable, due to the increased risk.

It's simple economics.

For instance, if we outlaw orange juice, the only real expectation any sane person can have is that the price of orange juice is going to go way up.

The irrationality of strengthening any of the prejudicial, morality based laws against drugs and marrying them to any effort in waging a "War on Drugs", results only in detrimental effects for the society at large. I can think of only two benefits of this situation. One would be for a repressive government, in that the drugs and the laws prohibiting them could be used to persecute certain classes within a population. The other would be the cash cow available for covert activity. This is, effectively, what's been happening for quite a long time.

So, what about Afghanistan? I mean, the story there is the revival of the free market system. We find that the free market system works quite well there. It's practically a model, a perfect example, of what the free market system is all about. But it's an embarrassment to the powers that be who, locked into the prejudicial morality fueling the War on Drugs, can only do whatever's necessary to completely ignore the absurdity of the whole thing.

As a tool for persecution and a cash cow for covert activity, we can hardly expect illegal drugs to be viewed rationally within our society for the actual problem that it is. Vested interests generate so much money with these commodities that they have amassed great power to corrupt, using that wealth. Any efforts to legalize and regulate trade in these commodities runs up against long established vested interests that would stand to lose billions.

In addition to those generating billions of dollars of illegal cash income, there are also those who legally profit from the situation now, but who would also lose out if drugs were legalized. How many employees of prisons would be put out of work if drugs were made legal and regulated? How many prisons would be closed completely? How many police forces across the country would have their personnel levels dropped by drastic numbers? How many home security businesses would find their level of business drop so radically that their continued viability would be in doubt? After all, more than half of all criminal activity in this country is drug-related.

It's not just the people directly involved with the growing, processing, transport, and/or distribution of illegal drugs that are making money, here. Millions of people's livelihoods depend entirely upon the continued illegality of these drugs. The vested interest in keeping drugs illegal is based in money flows that are vastly greater than any money flows resulting from a legal drug scenario.

In addition, so much propaganda has been generated regarding the "dangers" of drugs, the "immorality" of drugs, and so forth, that very large segments of the population have been, effectively, brainwashed into believing that there is no alternative to the problems that currently exist, never mind the possibility that their stance on the subject just may be one of the biggest roadblocks to resolving those problems.

Consequently, proposing to make drugs legal runs up squarely against the moral and ethical objections, unwittingly in league with those who profit. It is somewhat like proposing to legislate any other established and booming business out of existence.

(For instance, we all pay extra for "long distance" telephone calls. This regulated system of fees for the additional service was established way back when human operators had to do the job of manually patching these calls through. The phone companies had to pay these people, and this is why it cost them more money to provide the service. This is no longer the case, however. The service is, essentially, provided by the phone companies without the original added expense. The infrastructure for automatically routing long distance calls was bought and paid for a long ago. So, the extra money we pay is for... well, it's for nothing! Those fees we pay are ALL GRAVY. But to propose that the regulatory laws be changed to reflect that reality would run up against the cash cow that it is, and the money power that can effectively lobby against such a proposal.)

In my view, a rational society would be trading futures on the commodities market for opium, coca, and marijuana. The government would be regulating the processing, transport, and sale of the raw materials and the processed derivative products. Anyone wishing to use any of these products would have to be registered as a user, and that information would be in the public domain. If you applied for a job, that information could be legal grounds for not being hired if the company chose. It could also possibly be grounds for denying other privileges such as acquiring various licenses, depending on usage levels. In other words, it wouldn't be regulated as frivolously as alcohol.

Under a system like that, I'd feel a whole lot safer. Instead of the junkies breaking into my house to steal things, fence them, and buy overpriced illegal heroin, I could, for instance, make my decision about who's going to install the new siding on my house based on whether the guy is a registered drug user, and buys a lot of heroin... or not.

The only argument I've ever heard against legalizing drugs is that more people would use drugs, and that this could hardly be viewed as a benefit to society. Well, I'm certainly not of the opinion that drug usage should ever be viewed as anything less than a personal vice. And the argument is a valid one, more people would find it easier to try drugs. But the basis for any arguments that more people trying drugs will lead to a drug epidemic is demonstrably lacking.

What I AM saying is that drug usage is currently a means of turning otherwise innocuous people into criminals. I'm saying that keeping drugs and drug usage illegal is costing us far more money and causing vastly more human misery than legalizing them ever would.

I'm also saying that the least covered story in the GWOT is the story of Afghanistan's stunningly fast economic recovery, and its exemplary demonstration of the whole idea behind this so-called "free market system". It's the least covered story because it's the most embarrassing of them all. It's the most embarrassing because it reveals the hypocrisy and irrationality and absurdity of the "War on Drugs", but only if you really take an honest, rational, and unbiased look at it.

1-1-06 (2) Low Spark of High End Business

When you're a cog in a corporate wheel, there's a definite sense of purposelessness in every day's activities. It's not much beyond serfdom in a feudal society. No matter how hard you work, you just never seem to "get ahead".

The basic premise for getting a good job is do some trading of value. You provide the value of your services to the company in exchange for money. Then you trade the money for the things that you need and want in order to live. The idea is that you work in order to live.

This is why people start businesses. The basic premise is to create something of value, exchange it for money, and then use the money to exchange for things of value that you need and want in order to live. Businesses are started by people in order to live.

It's all about the most basic part of any economy. People create value in goods and services by doing the work. These are traded for money, then the money is traded for what's needed or wanted in order to live.

You'll notice that the money isn't the end product, however.

But there can be other agendas involved with the exchange of values using money. For instance, my employer may not look at the exchange on those terms at all. They may not even look at it as an exchange of values. They may have another agenda at work, like, for instance, the agenda of the accounting department. In the accounting department, the payroll is an "expense" item. From that perspective, my pay is something that cuts into profits. Anything that cuts into profits is looked at by the accounting department as "bad"...

This is actually a very old way of looking at things in western culture. The medieval monks who invented the accounting standards that are still in use today chose to put income on the right hand side of the ledger, and anything paid out on the left hand side of the ledger. This is because the right hand makes the sign of God, and is the "good" hand, and the left hand makes the sign of the Devil, and is the "evil" hand. They even used to persecute people who were left-handed. Anything to do with the left hand side of things was "bad" or "evil". This goes way back in time.

Also, entries on the left hand side of the ledger are made in the color of blood. The "good" entries on the right hand side are made in black. It's all very medieval and barbaric, to say the least.

So it comes as no surprise, now that accountants rule business, that anything on the left hand side of the ledger is constantly considered for elimination. Clearly, the basic premise of any business operating in this fashion has been long lost.

The original basic premise behind business is to find some way of creating value that can then be traded for things needed or wanted in order to live. We don't live in order to work.

Businesses always had some form of keeping track of the activity, usually the accounting method, but it was never viewed as the most important part of the business. Instead, it was where a record of the statistics could be kept. If you wanted to know how many buggy-whips your business manufactured last month, you could go to the beady-eyed accountant over in that dusty corner of the office and he'd be able to look up the exact number for you. Then you could compare that to previous months and see whether production was up or down.

Today, the accounting department determines whether the business is "making money" or not. If they are "making money", then the hotshots in the accounting department damned well better be able to hide as much of it as possible from the IRS, or there'll be hell to pay!

Actually, that's the only reason accounting ever got raised up out of that dusty corner of the office, ie- to find all the loop-holes in the income tax laws as possible, and utilize them to maximum advantage. That was the first step away from the basic premise for starting the business.

Today, the ultimate divurgence from the basic premise of a business is running the route to being a publicly traded company. This is where the original activity effectively stops. Whatever value they originally got into business to create (the actual product or service) is no longer the guiding premise behind the bulk of the activity. Nobody cares how many buggy-whips got made last month, but everybody is concerned about how the statistics listing money in black ink and money in red ink is "balancing out".

In other words, the statistics of the business have become more important than anything the statistics might actually represent.

If you work in one of these "low spark" businesses, you know what I mean. It's "low spark" because there's really no purpose to the activity at all. Whatever's left of the original activity that actually creates value is just a sideshow.

You'll notice that the money has become the end product...

Unfortunately, money is just a statistic.

What makes it possible to generate wealth with this statistic is hidden manipulation. Why do people manipulate this data? Because they CAN. Consequently, there's a whole imaginary world of fake value that came into existence over the years. We can philosphize and theorize forever upon the complexities of national and international economics, but the existance of fake values within any system can only introduce a detriment to actual values.

People can get excited about being in on ways to create wealth in this manner, however, and they can be infused with a burning purpose to create as much wealth as they can, as fast as they can. But it's a truly unethical purpose when it violates trust.

We trust that the value represented by money will be fairly regarded. But when that trust is violated for personal gain, a detriment to actual values is inevitably introduced. The underlying source of this unethical behavior is the promotion of the idea that money, itself, has value.

So, as long as you continue to misunderstand what the money really is, you can easily be roped into this pervasive activity of having your own personal sense of self-worth devalued constantly.

Money today behaves like energy. It has to flow, in order to have any power. At the level of personal earning and spending, you have to trade your money for things of actual value as fast as possible. Thinking that you can "save up" any amount of money, just means that you still haven't gotten the idea. If you want to build up anything of value, the last thing you should do is "save money" because money loses value over time, just like a battery loses energy if you leave it on a shelf.

What matters is the "money flow" on a weekly or monthly basis. Generate as much as you can, but flow it right back OUT as fast as you can. And if you accumulate anything of lasting value along the way, then so much the better.

The worst thing you can do is borrow money for anything that won't increase in value over time.

Admittedly, for most of us, it's a losing battle trying to build up any kind of "estate" over our lifetimes. Even the equity we build up in our homes is far outstripped by the interest paid on a typical mortgage. But at least we get some amount of value building up over those years.

Underneath it all is the ongoing rape of value in exchange for nothing of value in return. Wherever this is going on, you'll find the "low spark" effects that high end thievery causes for all the honest people in the world.

This imaginary fake value is understood for what it really is by these slime-balls; it's the generation of energy in an imaginary world. It only relates to the real world that generates real things of real value in that we both use the same measuring stick... the money. Lots of fake value is generated, but as soon as it's "cashed in", that's when the real value level within the system decreases by exactly that same amount.

The low spark of high end business? It's that feeling of purposelessness that comes from being robbed blind on a regular basis, and not even realizing it.

1-1-06 Driving

In the film "Repo Man", the repo garage maintenance man says, "I don't drive. I don't wanna drive... The more you drive, the less intelligent you get."

Based on my experience, having been driving since I was sixteen (over four decades ago), we probably lose about one point of IQ for every 100,000 miles that we drive. This probably brings me down to around 140, at this point.

I've noticed the decrease. It preys upon my sense of self-worth, and gives me nightmares at night. But now I understand how it works.

It's not actually the driving, itself, that eats away at your cognitive abilities or intelligence level. It's the phenomena attached to driving situations where reaction, rather than reasoned response, takes place.

Driving is an acquired taste. It takes years of practice just to come up to a level where you might feel safe enough in heavy traffic on the interstate to take your eyes off the road long enough to glance at the speedometer. But a false comfort level obviously sets in with most people long before that. It did with me, anyway.

I hadn't even gotten out of my teens before I had a sense of comfort behind the wheel. I took all sorts of dangerous chances all the time. In my first car, I got distracted by a girl in the front seat with me, and the next thing I knew I had driven into a couple of those cement roadside markers they used to have. I was really surprised at how easily they broke away, and the minimal damage they did to the front of the car.

A few months later, I was distracted yet again by a girl in the front seat with me, and I ended up rear-ending a '65 ford sedan that was stopped to make a left turn. I hit the guy at around 35 mph, badly damaging the front of my car, but hardly damaging the ford at all. The girl in the front seat got a small bruise on her knee, but nobody else got injured at all. (Today, with all the safety measures that have been incorporated since that time, we both would've gotten face burns from the airbags and the goddamn seatbelt harness would've crushed my cigarettes. The damage to both cars would've been much more extensive and expensive, as well. More about safety measures later...)

After that, I had a sense of caution while driving. It was a sort of tensing up that I did, whenever behind the wheel. I concentrated on my level of alertness to what was going on around me. It was a driving pattern that I stayed with for many years.

The reaction patterns I developed were enough to save me from many accidents, but my driving habits tended to fall into a classic set of testosterone induced game playing attitudes on the road. I viewed cars in front of me as barriers that I had to get past, and I tended to handle intersections with the view that I always have the right of way, unless eye contact is made.

Although we hardly had any slightest sense of the term for many years, "road rage" was always a routine part of the driving experience until the past decade or so, when it was finally given a name. People apparently understood that the road rage behavior pattern was a very real possibility each day, and we all tended to be as intentionally unintrusive to other drivers' "territory" and implicit rights to their inertia. You did have a sense that there were consequences to any stupid trespasses into other drivers' "space".

It was more like the old west, actually. I mean, when most people carried guns, people were a lot more polite. The same was true before we called it "road rage" on the roads and highways. Back then, it was the proper response to having some bone-head piss you off. And it usually didn't last, either. Once anyone went into attack mode, the message was abundantly clear that the move made that pissed them off was a real transgression.
But somewhere along the line, the rules of the road changed. We got confused about it, and today we have people running up and down the roads and highways on varying sets of rules.

One apparent rule of the road brings us back to all the safety measures that have been incorporated into cars over the years. This is the "Volvo" rule, which says that since the person bought a Volvo, touted as the car you're most likely not to get hurt in if you get into an accident, it follows that you don't have to worry about getting into an accident. The Volvo rule accelerates the loss of intelligence from driving.

Of course, non-Volvo drivers rarely realize that Volvo drivers operate under this belief that they are driving in an alternate universe (where everything is completely safe). Consequently, you can see Volvos making some pretty weird maneuvers, causing other cars to make compensatory maneuvers that often get them into accidents. Naturally, the offending Volvos are never directly involved in the actual collisions with other cars, further adding to the uncanny sense of driving in an alternate universe where everything is completely safe. But the safety bubble of the Volvo driver can never succeed when going up against a truck.

The bigger the truck, the larger the "space" it needs to stop, swerve, or accelerate in. Most car drivers are aware of the larger space needed for a truck to accelerate, so they do whatever's necessary to get out from behind them before they get to the next hill or traffic light. But then they have no clue about the rest of the truck inertia situations, so that when the trailer overloaded with several tons of payload comes up behind a car in the middle lane that's going slower than all the rest of the traffic around them, the idiot in the car has no slightest idea of the potential for disaster looming in their rear-view mirror.

The highway affords all sorts of examples for the varied mix of apparent rules that people drive under. Some people operate under the belief that you can only pass on the left, so they stay in the left lane. Other people operate under the belief that the middle lane is the "travel lane", so they don't feel they have any obligation to pass anyone in the right lane. And everyone has their own beliefs about what the real speed limit is on the highway.

The posted speed limit is never the real speed limit, y'see...

The real speed limit is the speed that cops will put down their coffee, shift out of Park, and chase you down and give you a ticket for. Generally, this speed limit is the "flow of the traffic" speed. I mean, if 99% of the cars around you are all going 75, even though the speed limit is 65, then the cops are only going to go after the one who's bobbing back and forth between the middle lane and the left lane, doing 85 or more.

The "flow of the traffic" rule is that you remain in your place in line and just "go with the flow". For the most part, experienced commuters will be happy enough to follow this rule as long as the traffic flow stays 5 miles per hour or more over the speed limit. Of course, within this kind of traffic, there's a couple of rules, as well.

One of them is that if you have chosen the left lane to travel in, it's your absolute duty to the rest of the cars behind you to NEVER leave enough space between your car and the car in front of you for someone in the middle lane to squeeze into. It's also your duty to all the cars behind you to make every effort to keep that left lane moving faster than the middle lane, otherwise you should eat crow and find a place in the middle lane as soon as humanly possible.

Here is where we come into the realm of what I like to call "the Courtesy Clowns". The Courtesy Clowns operate in some oddly warped mindset that no traffic exists behind them. They see someone that wants to come into the traffic flow and so they LET THEM PULL OUT IN FRONT OF THEM!

Exactly opposite to the Courtesy Clowns, there are the ones who make it their mission in life to turn everyone else on the road into a Courtesy Clown. These are the ones who wait for the opportunity to pull out in front of you, with the attitude that if you don't like it, then you're "not being very courteous." And these insufferable morons will not only pull out in front of you as fast as they can, they will then go slower than the traffic flow that existed before they inserted themselves in front of you.

But there's some truly supernatural phenomena to be observed in all of this, if you care to notice it. Nine times out of ten, when some insufferable moron pulls out in front of you like that, if you follow them patiently enough for a while, you'll see that they usually get a "payback" in the exact form within a minute or two when somebody else pulls the same dumb maneuver on them. It's "instant Karma" on the highways!

And there's more supernatural phenomena, as well. If you've been driving long enough, you CAN TELL when somebody wants to invade your space, wants to change lanes and insert themselves in front of you, wants to make a left turn but never uses their turn signal, wants to pull out in front of you from a side street. You can FEEL the intended maneuver before any outward signs manifest themselves. This is when you get the urge to give your car just enough additional speed to close the gap, to make it as difficult or dangerous as possible for the other driver to do what you FEEL they want to do.

And brother, THIS is where "road rage" really lives and breathes! It's a goddammed PSYCHIC WAR out there! It's where total insanity takes over from an otherwise reasonable existance. What REALLY pisses people off on the roads and highways is this sense that one has not only had their physical space threatened, but that their intentions have somehow been picked up, as well! It's also a real kick in the head to find yourself outsmarted by anyone, having failed utterly to "pick up on it" soon enough before it happened to have done anything about it!

This is where the decreasing level of intelligence actually takes place. There you are, driving for years and going through these little dramas every day, sensing this and feeling that, and responding according to your "gut feelings" in this manner. But then when it comes to the final moment of the game, no matter who wins or loses in the final maneuver, both drivers DENY the higher level of the gamesmanship.

The mechanism by which driving can make you less intelligent is denying that this level of perception and game playing can exist at all.

If you argue for your own limitations then, sure enough, they're yours.