Back at the beginning of time, my ancestral neighbor and I banded together to defend our families from the Neanderthal who lived next to us on the Serengeti.
Then our whole village banded together under a local strongman to defend against the village next door.
Before long, all the villages in our fiefdom had to band together to defend against the fiefdom across the river.
But then there was the dukedom beyond the mountains that all our fiefdoms had to defend against.
And beyond the sea were other kingdoms and beyond them other empires.
The earth will not become united until there are Klingons and Romulans to fight.
But in the meantime, the governments we have raised to protect us have nothing better to do than turn inward to seize for themselves more resources, more power, and more control.
The American Founders recognized that governments were instituted among men to secure our natural rights to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. They also recognized that whenever such a government became destructive to those ends, it was the right of the people to alter or abolish it... and "institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
Those Founders attempted to bind their government by a system of Checks and Balances that would limit its ability to exercise too much power. A good idea, but they had no better alternative than to leave the keys to those chains with a general population that would gradually, over time, vote to unshackle the beast so that it could use its awful power to prey
on their own neighbors. "The needs of the many outweigh the rights of the few."
What was needed were Checks and Balances that could
not be unlocked by the fickle and unprincipled Majority.
At its full potential, BitShares and its peers could represent a new form of Checks and Balances on Absolute Power.
But first, we need to fully face the factors that always undo the chains we hopefully place on the Beasts we design to rule our affairs.
"We have met the Enemy, and he is us."