THE SYMBIONESE STATES OF AMERICA
Copyright (C) 2006 David Fischer

"If I should wake before I die, bake me a pie, bake me a pie."

I was in a really bad mood for completely unrelated reasons, so I was
expecting to be double-crossed, and more on a hair-trigger than they
expected. When the back of their van swung open to reveal two guys with
utility belts and submachineguns rather than my cousin in a fashionable
matching set of gag & handcuffs, I immediately opened fire.

On the up side, it was clearly their fuckup, so we wouldn't have to pay
the gas bill until they came back to read the meter next month, and when
we did finally receive the bill, we could deduct the cost of our
ammunition. The weird thing is that when the gas company crew comes to take
a reading, they always end up taking a hostage, but when the electric
company comes for anything, we always wind up with one of their guys
hostage.  Is this stated policy somewhere, corporate tradition, or just
a weird coincidence?

I've spent too long thinking about this already. Nothing good ever
comes from dealing with utility crews, it's always a question of the
degree of hassle.  My goal in life is to be unaffected and unaware of
anything that don't interest me, so time to forget about the gas company
and get back to work in the attic lab. (It is AMAZING how much shit you
can get away with if you build your lab and other mad scientist crap in
the ATTIC instead of the BASEMENT! EVERYONE looks in the BASEMENT! No
one looks in the ATTIC! I got that trick from a bubble gum wrapper.)

Several years ago I got a grant to crossbreed kudzu with box
jellyfish.  I guess it was some kind of fund-it-to-control-in premise,
who knows.  Anyways, I intended the hybrid to be an invasive species to
destroy civilization, but now it looks like it's going to be the
solution to the world's food problems. In either case, it's BEAUTIFULL
when it overruns a city. It spreads at a rate of about one rod per day.
It is capable of crossing medium boundaries. For example, when it
overruns a library, it causes an infestation in every fictional world
in every book on the shelves. This often leads to the infestation
making long geographical, but short logical, jumps. It will enter
Memphis Tennesse, and suddenly the history books will have references
to the strange "stinging vine plague" in the original Memphis, Sixth
Dynasty, and the infestation will pop out of the sphinx in a miniature
golf course somewhere near Detroit.

(A friend of mine can outdo that story though - he managed to get
funding for a project to crossbreed box turtles and iceburgs. 
Something about self-propelled migratory fresh water supplies.
Completely idiotic. Never really worked right, except in Australia.)

Another friend (and former housemate) used to sleep in a miniature golf
course. He told me stories about the idiot savant that designed all the
miniature golf courses in America. He was eight feet tall but completely
boneless, and lived his entire life floating in a carefully controlled
brine solution. My friend claimed this hydroponic savant encoded a secret
message into the layout of the courses, and each one provided a tiny
piece of the puzzle.  The secret message was the meaning of life on
Earth.

My friend lived in the four foot tall cement castle of that course for six
months until he finally decoded the secret message of the site as:
"Ollie Ollie Oxen Free!".  I would dismiss his claims as typical
conspiracy theory bullshit, except that he was the one who explained to
me that all weird alien shit (abductions, cattle mutilations, clone
replacements, crop circles, ginger ale, Bermuda Triangle, etc.) could
be explained as independant projects by first-year art students of alien
civilizations.

The taunt of "Ollie Ollie Oxen Free!" drove my friend insane. He knew
it was a piece of the most important message one could receive - the
explanation for all of the dillemas and parodoxes facing this world's
inhabitants - but what kind of transcendantal wisdom could contain
that phrase? Ollie Ollie Oxen Free. This life is a game and the round
is over? When you die the round is over? What else is there? Is there
a REAL world hidden behind the mirage that we see, that we've all lost 
sight of, because we're immersed in this children's game? The rat race
is over, and was really nothing more than a game?

My friend eventually got over it by going on a killing spree.

After his funeral, we realized that the problem with the miniature golf
message was that it was too generalized to be of any use. It was
directed at everything on this planet, not just man, or even mammals,
or even living organisms. Any message that is generalized enough to be
equally applicable to minerals, cloud formations, wasp pee, and
stand-up commedians is guaranteed to be useless. (Also: all philosophy
can be reduced to the three laws of thermodynamics and all theology
can be reduced to the halting problem.)

[Figure 1: Zombie children playing "Hide and go Dead".]

On the TV there was a newsflash that the police had the President
cornered in a warehouse after a botched bank robbery, and were trying
to keep her pinned down until the SWAT team arrived. A few minutes
later the street filled with smoke and gunfire and the police had
pulled back with a few officers down. Once again, the President's
backup had beat the police's to the site and staged a daring rescue.
The police were left empty handed.

Police blockades and searches of all vehicles entering the White House
were futile as expected. President Mizmoon III is an undisputed master
of disguise, and no one has ever managed to detect her entering or
leaving the White House.

Meanwhile back at the bank, a bomb-sniffing robot had identified a
package wrapped in newspaper as suspicious, and been pulled back for
the bomb techs to investigate. (Robots are extremely usefull in some
aspects of bomb squad work, but they were far too expensive to risk on
deactivating bombs. Humans are always sent in once a serious threat
has been identified.) It later turned out to be a false positive - the
robot had been thrown by the leftest slant of the newspaper the package
was wrapped in.  (Which actually did turn out to be a bomb, but not the
one they were looking for. It had been left behind during a similar
incident the day before, when officials from the Zoo had taken two
hostages during a botched bank deposit.)

An hour later the President's press secretary explained to reporters
that the money from the bank heist was intended to fund Social Security
for the next fiscal year, which was in jeopardy due to interference
from THE MAN. But rest easy, The Symbionese States of America will
never give up. MOTHERFUCKING PIGS AGAINST THE WALL! Oddly, he refused
to take any questions from the press, and the newscast went straight
into the national anthem (Kick out the Jams) as he pinned medals on the
Black Panther security personnel that had been involved in the rescue.

Meanwhile, back in the Oval Office, President Mizmoon III was cleaning her 
sawed-off M1 Carbine. What a fucking day. She would have killed
all of the bank guards, but she didn't have time. Damn it!

Vice President Zonker came in with dinner, dumpstered from the
pizza place across the street. Better than yesterday's sack of dead
puppies from the university medical lab.  The fire roaring in
the center of the Oval Office barely illuminated the Helter Skelter
graffiti that covered the walls.

I sometimes wonder what the Founding Fathers of the United States of
America would think of the Founding Sisters of the Symbionese States of
America. In elementary school we were taught that George Washington
was based on one of the ghosts in Pacman, but that doesn't really make
much sense. I suppose history often seems counter-intuitive.

Our past is nothing but a giant pile of random occurances. What would
the world be like if Mizmoon's mother hadn't dropped her off at that
no-kill orphanage?  Would the converging social forces have worked
their same ends through another figurehead? A nice question that could
not possibly be answered, by scientists or historians. (That
distinction was always foremost in Mizmoon's mind.  She had a very low
regard for the objectivity of historians.)

If the SLA hadn't had the initiative to upgrade the west coast's
reservoir & water distribution system when they first came to power, a
full ten years before the droughts that ravaged most of the Northern
Hemisphere, would they still have the support of 51% of the American
voters?

During the heady days of the Apollo Space Program, who would have ever
guessed that NASA would be disbanded and replaced with a partnership
with the Elephant Space Program, based in Kenya? Hell, did anyone even
KNOW that the elephants had conquered space back then?  My history
professor could never answer that question to my satisfaction.  Would
the American Cultural Revolution have happened right after the SLA won
the Second American Civil War if it wasn't for the inspiration from the
Chinese Cultural Revolution, the Paris Commune, and the Spahn Ranch?

Too many questions to ponder. Too many mysteries.  Would Florida still
be habitable if we hadn't been so aggressive about citris tarrifs
during the crisis of '21?  Would the Mississippi still flow from north
to south if it wasn't for that out-of-control dredging fad that swept
through the inner-city gangs after the Ebola Riots?  Would Alaska have
spawned so much positive youth culture if it had remained
geographically seperated from Sri Lanka?  Would sand have become the
dominant stock index if the trading companies hadn't all been bought
out by international megacorporation Sandco?  (And would Sandco have
ever reached its present size and influence without those bizarre gifts
from the Atlanteans? (And would we have ever achieved communications
with the Atlanteans without the daring takeover of Woods Hole by
operatives from Orgonon? (Although I do think it is clear that Orgonon's
current position of influence was destined to be, even without the
SLA's move to have them replace the NSF in its entirety. Their future
had always seemed bright.)))

Another example - who would have thought that when the Earth Liberation
Front successfully sued the Center for Disease Control and forced them
to release smallpox back into the wild, based on the Endangered Species
Act, that it would be wildly popular with the general public? Yet voter
initiatives to update the law to prevent such occurances in the future
were shot down by a surprisingly comfortable margin, all around the
country! And that was long before the microbe lobby had reached their
current level of influence in Washington. ("Microbe-ton", as the
wags now jest.)

The shocking discovery that glaciers were responsable for stonehenge
was the first piece of hard evidence pointing to glacial interest in
astronomy.  The first of many, of course.

Hunger. Terror. Ambivalence. The three elemental forces of civilization.
In the SSA, they reached a level of purity and clarity never before seen.

So we got a paying gig doing a public service announcement for the
local access cable station. It started out with a native child and a
elder, sitting around a campfire in traditional clothing, when the
child suddenly points up into the sky and exclaims:

"Look, a shooting star!"

The elder looks very serious and turns to the child. "That was not a
star, that was the tear of a warrior."

"Oh..... the warrior must have had something in his eye."

"Yes, my child. Which is why he should have been wearing eye
protection." And then the elder pulls out two pairs of goggles,
hands one to the child, and they both put them on.

Then they both look at the camera and sing, in unison: "Traditional
costume is no excuse for dangerous working conditions. Always wear
proper eye protection."

The piece ends with a sudden cowboy attack and numerous bullets bouncing
harmlessly off their goggles.

The righteous and progressive credentials of the SSA are undisputed.
The SSA was the first state to recognize the Eridu Government in Exile,
and send a goodwill ambassador to visit their offices in Baltimore.
When their border dispute with the Nippur Government in Exile
threatened the fragile peace, it was Vice President Zonker of the SSA
who helped negotiate a compromise, and the eventual even split of
Oregon between the approximately thirty surviving descendants of both
ruling families.  No other state offered diplomats to help in this
crisis.

The SSA was also the first country to initiate an annual random ICBM
launch to help equalize global power struggles via a Monte Carlo
method. (Trivia: this resulted in the world's first and only nuclear
attack via ICBM of delta coordinates (0,0). Black box recordings of
the control room indicate wild cheering immediately following the launch.
This has never been explained. There have been claims that those were
not actually the coordinates they were supposed to target, but again,
no motive has ever been offered.)

The Police Department provides a prime example of the regressive and
destructive tendencies of counter-revolutionaries everywhere.
Stubbornly holding onto power after the SLA routed the Nationalist
forces and took possesion of the White House, the various Federal
Police Departments (US Marshals, ATF, DEA, & FBI), along with the Fish
and Game Commission, and the Migratory Bird Conservation Commission,
are the only departments of the Federal Government to refuse to
acknowledge the end of the Second American Civil War, some eighty-six
years ago. Although they do continue to recognize the executive branch,
their interperetation of new laws is always as far from the original
intent as they can possibly twist the words.

"I have a friendship-ending suggestion."

We had scheduled good weather for the picnic, rain or shine!

The first effective weather control devices were an offshoot of the
Earth rotation control technology that was developed by the US &
Soviets just prior to the civil war. The problem that the cold war
mongers had run up against was that ICBM launches were easily
detectable, and the trajectory was obvious and visible.  Their solution
was to fire missiles at the enemy, taking the scenic route around the
sun. Firing a rocket forward along the path of the Earth's orbit, it
would eventually catch up from behind, and hit its target with no
warning whatsoever, like a meteor.

The problem of course, was targeting. The solution to this problem
became the new arms race to control the Earth's rotation. If you could
speed up or slow down the rotation of the globe, then you could place
any target you wanted (along a latitudinal line, obviously) under the
point of impact. As soon as both powers had developed this technology,
the conflict again became psychological, and all of the rotational
changes became feints and distractions. There was "The Sepetember That
Never Ended", when the Earth's rotation completely stalled on
September 13th, 1993, as the US & Soviets pushed in opposite directions, and
people were faced with the end of the day/night cycle for a period of
(what should have been) almost twelve years before it mysteriously
returned to normal.

We had scheduled good weather for the apocalypse, rain or shine!

There was a knock on the door and I paniced for a moment.  There is a
$50 fine per bomb for misuse of the munitions that the government
stores in every citizen's home. I hope they weren't here to do an
inventory...

It turned out to be missionaries from Aum Shinrikyo though, so I let
them in and we had coffee while they told me about their inner city
chemistry training initiative to take overpriviledged children from
underpopulated neighborhoods and give them basic training in chemistry
and lab work.  I gave them a small donation of methylphosphonyl
dichloride and sent them on their way.

Like most people, we keep a seperate set of clothes to ritualisticly
wash and hang out to dry on the line. The clothesline was part of
ancient ritual long before it was adapted to be a functional part of
clothes washing. Then the birds come and ritualisticly shit all over
the laundry, and we rush out and pretend to scare them away. You can
see adherents of this tradition everywhere you go.

I was apprehensive before my first session. What if they found
something unexpected? Something I had kept hidden. Something I didn't
even know about?  Or what if I didn't respond? What if I failed to have
the expected psychological response to the session? It isn't just a
question of embarassment due to exposure or failure, because Stockholm
Therapy is so deeply ingrained in our society, forming the core of our
cultural creation myths. To fail to respond is a traitorous act. A
counter-revolutionary act. A giant invisible letter A sewn into your
clothing. All the worry was for nothing though - as soon as the door
of the closet closed, I felt completely relaxed and in capable 
handcuffs.

Greetings from clocktowers everywhere!

We spent a lovely afternoon at the park where the cliffs overlook the
crashing waves of the Atlantacific Ocean (long story). At low tide you
can wade through pools in the sand and collect Blue Ringed Octopus for
the night's barbeque. Overhead, the food carts flitted here and there,
occasionally forming into a flock and swooping down on an unguarded
fuel truck.

It all dates back to The Road Warrior. The character of "The Gyro
Captain" inspired an engineer several years ago to start a
helicopter-based sandwich shop, operating under that name. It was
hugely successful, mainly because of the coincidental massive surge in
interest in hang-gliding. Hang-gliders are notoriously easy marks for
any business because of the novelty. A hang-glider will buy anything in
mid-air, just because it seems so strange. "LOOK AT ME! I'm buying a
sandwich.  IN MIDAIR!" Yes, you just bought a sandwich. A TWENTY DOLLAR
SANDWICH.  Consisting of WHOLE WHEAT ON RYE. Thank YOU.

Soon enough others followed into this newly blazed territory, and the
sky was filled with hovering pushcarts. Would there be a new pushcart
war, between the heli-shops and the commercial air traffic? No, of
course not. Jetliners noticed the Gyro Captain's immitators just like
they noticed geese - a momentary drag in one turbine.

There's this guy (Let's call him "Pete".) that built an espresso
machine into a helicopter constructed entirely from imaginary bike
parts. His "javacopter" was wildly popular for a time, before becoming
mired in controversy and fishing lines.  Most gliders regretted the
loss after driving him away. He was last seen pedaling slowly towards
the horizon, having forsaken the domain of birds forever. (Because
that's his name.)

The State Police Department put on their annual Christmas extravaganza -
"The Turner Diaries on Ice" at the civic center downtown. Meanwhile
city hall was dedicating burnt offerings to Mothra.

Chestnuts roasting on an open wound.

My idea was, if your compiler can only find, say, 1.5 instructions per
clock on typical code to schedule for an integer unit, then what you
really want is, say, eight instruction streams being scheduled onto
twelve IUs.  So you have the decode stage of eight logical processors
feeding a scheduler that batches them into VLIW instructions on the
fly, for the actual microengine hiding in the background. Effectively
cross-thread superscalar.  Register starvation is an issue.

Of course a quick glance at any recent world map will tell you that
the Soviets won the arms race!

A few more steps, quietly, carefully, one more foot.... and I ripped
open the passenger side door and had my blade at the electrician's
throat before he knew I was there. He started coughing and choking,
and wound up spilling bong water all over his lap. The guy in the
driver's seat was desperately trying to get my attention, to surrender,
and the guy in the back of the van was still asleep.

Oh fuck it, if it's that easy, what's the point? I gave them my
knife, cancelled the work order for upgrading my basement electrical
panel (which was entirely a trap, I didn't actually have any electrical
problems), and went back inside to drink hot chocolate with marshmallows.

Sometimes bureaucracy just isn't worth dealing with. Even revolutionary
bureaucracy.