How the State Deletes Outlier Voices
Examining the interactive Interface between the technological, psychological and manifest reality. Which is more automated?
Note: This post is longer than fits in an email. As I was writing events were happening that changed the post, making it longer. I decided to let the post be as long as it needs to be and continue online.
Event #1 Hidden Manipulation
In my recent post, I wrote that “ a bill search and a statute search for Dirigo Business Incentive Program, and also An Act to Modernize Maine's Business Incentive Programs, came up empty. ”
Later I discovered that when I copied and pasted the name of the act from the linked article on the maine.gov website, extra code was inserted like so: “An Act to Modernize Maine’s Business Incentive Programs:
I deleted the extra code from the title field and then I was able to bring up the bill HERE
However, the following day I tried inputting the name again by copying and pasting it from this article published by The Office Of The Governor into the title field in the advanced search screen on Maine Bill Search. The title appeared exactly as it did in the article (without the extra code) but produced “No matches” results. The address on that results page looks like this:
https://legislature.maine.gov/LawMakerWeb/searchresults.asp?StartWith=1
This is a screenshot of the results with that address:
Normally the link should work the same, whatever is in the text field. It appears that the generation of misleading code is interacting with both the text and the linked address.
Clicking HERE, displays the bill, as is expected for whatever text is in the field for the link.
The address that produced the result looks like this:
https://legislature.maine.gov/LawMakerWeb/summary.asp?ID=280089289
I self-linked it. Click and See- it still leads to the bill.
The article where the link I copied and pasted is published by the Office of the Governor and says at the bottom “A copy of the bill is expected to be released in the coming days.” The promotional article was published without a link to the bill and was never updated.
The bill information states that An Act to Modernize Maine's Business Incentive Programs was Passed To Be Enacted by the House and was in the Senate files when the Senate adjourned and so is DEAD.
The Amended Text of the bill is HERE
This bill is complex with many definitions and links to other statutes. For the time being, considering that it is currently dead, I am not investing in such a time-intensive project.
That was my encounter with a technological construct embedded in a government website. I don’t know why it is there, or who put it there. Today we must ask if the intelligence that created the obstruction is human or artificial, natural or man-made. We live in the interface between the two, which is as much a technological interface as it is a psychological one, and reinforced by material constructs of society in the form of housing and institutional design advanced by large-scale developers with the help of their partners in government.
All three layers reinforce each other by design. It is not a conspiracy theory to say so, it is just analysis and observation of how the system works as a design, on its own merits, whether the design is created by humans, robots, extraterrestrial or metaphysical force, I am not opining. I am merely observing the design made up of layers that mutually reinforce an outcome, consistently enough to be emergent from a coordinated intent.
The sociological and psychological layer
At this moment in history, the immaterial interface is dominated by a sociological and psychological construct particular to a hierarchy. Being nonmaterial, some may not give importance to this layer but the managers of the hierarchy recognize and seek to control the psychological, as the hierarchy seeks to control everything or anything which existence it recognizes. Mussolini talks about the nonmaterial interface when he says things like this:
The Fascist conception of life is a religious one, in which man is viewed in his immanent relation to a higher law, endowed with an objective will transcending the individual and raising him to conscious membership of a spiritual society. “Those who perceive nothing beyond opportunistic considerations in the religious policy of the Fascist regime fail to realize that Fascism is not only a system of government but also and above all a system of thought. Mussolini, The Doctrine of Fascism 1932
Mussolini assigns “thought” to the system as he denigrates thought in the individual by delimiting individual thought to selfish motivations. The system is raised from being a structure of operating laws to a living being with its own consciousness. In Mussolini’s worldview, only by being absorbed into the mind of the system, can the individual expand their higher consciousness and spirituality.
In those days, “fascism” did not have the immediate connotations that the subsequent unfolding of history has imparted upon it. It was just the name of a political party. Mussolini rails on about the individual portraying individualism as selfishness and the absorption of the individual into the homogenous state as spiritual transcendence:
Fascism sees in the world not only those superficial, material aspects in which man appears as an individual, standing by himself, self-centered, subject to natural law, which instinctively urges him toward a life of selfish momentary pleasure; it sees not only the individual but the nation and the country; individuals and generations bound together by a moral law, with common traditions and a mission which suppressing the instinct for life closed in a brief circle of pleasure, builds up a higher life, founded on duty, a life free from the limitations of time and space, in which the individual, by selfsacrifice, the renunciation of self-interest, by death itself, can achieve that purely spiritual existence in which his value as a man consists Mussolini, The Doctrine of Fascism 1932
I spent most of my life living in the free enterprise world which is laterally organized. The difference is a hierarchal society is governed by an order above and an order below which is expected to be subservient to the order above. This results in those with no direct knowledge having decision-making power over those with direct knowledge. In a laterally organized society, the decision-making process occurs between parties that come together because each shares knowledge and interest in a common concern, which Mussolini interprets as selfishness This interpretation continues to be used today by those in power, as I have experienced.
For example, the board of Fractured Atlas extracted one word from my application as a fiscally sponsored social enterprise and twisted its general meaning beyond recognition, using their newly asserted meaning to project characteristics of large factory productions onto Andersen Design, which was established in the context of historical alternative movements responding to the factory productions that emerged during the Industrial Revolution. In order to characterize Andersen Design as “being in it only for the money” because I used the word “production”, the board had to ignore every other word in my application, as the meaning of words is usually considered in context, so the entire context needed to be deleted. In essence, the board called me a liar without ever interacting directly with me as that would also have provided context. I call the board’s behavior abusive.
Fortunately, after a time The Field found me. The Field is a hands-off fiscal sponsor, accepts me as I am, and does not attempt to manage my fundamental choices. So there are still some good apples that come around if you shake the tree long enough.
It seems pointless to submit an application where one colors between the lines of expectations when one is judged by only one word extracted from all contexts. Why not submit an application with a one-word answer to the questions? My one-word application would just say “making” since that is the politically correct word for “production” these days. Since the intentional meaning of a word is no longer defined by its context, why bother with context?
Or why not just speak your own truth since it is a rare opportunity when one is included in the conversation? Speaking one’s own truth may not be perceived as a constructive approach, but the constructive approach usually receives no response. If it does, it is a “pass the buck” response where the organization sends the name of another organization which serves no purpose other than allowing the respondent to feel they are doing their job. If one approaches the recommended organization, repeat again, with each respondent satisfying the parameters of “doing their job” within the construct of the grid of the hierarchical order. Just as an applicant needs only submit one-word answers to a question, the workers in the system have equally minimal parameters to satisfy doing their job in the grid. Every occupant of the grid must color between the lines of their cell and never step outside the lines so that everything can work like clockwork…Orange!
I realized a long time ago that engaging in the circular construct of the grid drains my time and energy, which when functioning optimally is called “psycap” in contemporary newspeak. It’s important for the alternative culture to be aware of what is constructive and what is disruptive to psycap as the system will try to take psycap away from the individual except when the individual is using their psycap in service of the ownership class.
Event #2 Inappropriate Conditional Gifts
Recently I presented a proposal to a local organization to request support for my project on The Field,(I had seen mention on the website that the organization makes donations to other non-profit causes). I included images of my brochure design for requesting tax-deductible contributions but I was also hoping to make other types of connections as the website indicates the organization exists for that purpose.
A few years back the Joint Economic Development Council of Boothbay and Boothbay Harbor spent 79000.00 of local public funds to hire New York consultants to write a development plan for the peninsula. The plan recommended museums for the area and I had just been fiscally sponsored by Fractured Atlas, also in New York, to create a museum for American designer-craftsmakers. Wendy Wolf was then the head of The JECD and so she was the person I needed to approach.
Wendy Wolf neither acknowledged my presentation nor my status as fiscally sponsored to start a museum. She told me to “go get help from my own peer group” and said that the JECD could not support “individual businesses”, despite talking points spoken when she was running for a political office that called for “attracting and retaining” businesses, and claiming solidarity with local history.
Afterward from the lips of Wendy Wolf, down through the same organization I recently approached, came the message, ”I should not approach the JECD, on my own initiative. Instead, I should attend their meetings in silence for a year to show my respect.”
The person whom I was told to approach in my recent pursuit of community support has another governmental role. In that context, she does not respond to my correspondence unless I make an FOAA request and so I do not feel a rapport with her that would provide a basis for relating to her.
I treated the request as an independent exercise in telling my own truth and afterward published it in this newsletter. I wrote what I would say to my community, to resounding silence from the targeted recipient.
Again I received no response but I got to thinking that at least recognition that the request had been received should be standard protocol, especially from a local organization that says things like the following on its website:
“It Takes a Village”.
“No one Should Have to meet Challenges Alone”,
When we all work together, we all thrive. And that's the kind of place we can all call home.
So I sent an email asking for confirmation that my request had been received.
The director’s response confirmed in my own mind that I would not have received a response if I had not asked for a confirmation of receipt of my request. The first thing I see is my last name misspelled as Anderson. My family business is called Andersen Design and was established on this peninsula in 1952, and yet the director, who also comes from a local family, did not know how to spell my last name.
It is recommended practice to establish a funding goal and explain how the funds will be allocated, which is not intended as a request from any one donor for the entire amount. A director of a non-profit organization should know this but the director depicted my request as asking the organization to fund the entire amount of my first-stage funding goal. I felt her misreading and misrepresentation of my request reflects her unwillingness to accept that an individual can be fiscally sponsored to accept tax-deductible contributions as she did not acknowledge the nature of my request or the cause that I spoke about.
It’s a very radical concept to introduce fiscally sponsored individuals into a centrally managed society, but every organization begins with at least one individual and so my first funding goals target what I need to bring more people into my cause so that it can advance to the level of an organization.
“Anti-individualistic, the Fascist conception of life stresses the importance of the State and accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of the State, which stands for the conscience and the universal, will of man as a historic entity“, Mussolini, The Doctrine of Fascism 1932
The director’s response offered only that I should contact a different organization.
I put my mind in an imaginary world and responded to her email in the manner of an activist for the inclusion of home businesses and the remote worker’s movement among the causes that the organization supports, referencing several promotional quotes on their website, and I explained how Andersen Design’s productivity assets can be instrumental in helping others to develop an independent income in their homes or a studio attached to a home.
I received a response through the lower chain of command. I was told that before the organization would make a donation to my fiscally sponsored project, I must apply for general assistance from the Town to show that I am doing “everything I can do”- or what the director defines as “everything I can do” as she is also out of touch with reality.
The Town also gives money to non-profits. The director did not say I should apply to the town for a non-profit donation, she said, or implied, that before the organization would make a tax-deductible donation to my cause, I would have to show that I was doing “all I can do” by applying for public assistance.
Mackenzie Andersen is a sponsored artist with The Performance Zone Inc (dba The Field), a not-for-profit, tax-exempt, 501(c)(3) organization serving the performing arts community. Contributions to The Field earmarked for Mackenzie Andersen are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law. For more information about The Field, or for our national charities registration, contact: The Field, 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 906 New York, NY 10038, phone: 212-691-6969. A copy of our latest financial report may be obtained from The Field or from the Office of Attorney General, Charities Bureau, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.
I answered, via the lower chain of command that answered me.
So you are saying before **** would consider making a donation to my fiscally sponsored project they want me first to apply for general assistance.
That falls under conditional gifts
My fiscally sponsored project is not structured on accepting "conditional gifts"My project is set up to accept tax deductible donations, that means I cannot offer other rewards such as an item on my website because the tax deduction is the reward, I feel that sort of bargaining falls into a category of offering an additional reward for a tax-deductible contribution.
I don't want to put my fiscal sponsorship at risk so I cannot go down that road.
My years of reading the state economic policy expose a system in which wealth is distributed to the lower part of the economy as living rations accompanied by rules designed to prohibit the individual from pursuing opportunities to better their material status while wealth is redistributed to the top of the economy as public capitalization of private ownership of everything, aka, public-private relationships.
My project challenges that system and advocates developing opportunities at the roots of the economic totem pole, but the system “accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with those of the State” Therefore the system repeatedly refuses to acknowledge the content of my proposals or even that I presented an idea, as my cause challenges deeply entrenched state policy designed to discourage economic mobility at the roots of the economy.
Once I receive such a clear attempt to negotiate terms for making a tax-deductible contribution, I cannot accept a donation from the organization. The email is the record of the negotiation. A tax-deductible donation cannot be negotiated. It is supposed to be an unconditional gift, other than the condition being the tax deduction which does not impact the recipient of the gift.
Going along with the terms of the negotiation, as put forth by the grapevine leading back to the director to whom I was instructed to address my request, would require suspending disbelief that the organization would make a tax-deductible contribution to my cause after trying to negotiate terms for a tax-deductible contribution.
If I should go on general assistance as a condition of receiving a tax-deductible donation from this organization, I would become disqualified for general assistance as soon as they meet their end of the deal based on the director’s interpretation that I was asking the organization to fund my entire goal.
The suggested deal is about diminishing a person as portrayed in South Korean dramas when one character demands that another bow down on the ground before them.
Event #3 Reality Sets In
Today with the vote on the school looming, leadership is writing letters to the editor claiming to be stating “the facts” in letters that never identify the source of what are claimed to be facts. The status of “facts” is implied to be based on the speaker’s leadership role, alone.
Recently, in the Boothbay Register, Town Manager, Dan Bryer was quoted as saying that “based on the school charter” either town can veto the other.
Selectmen also learned the referendum questions must be approved by each town. Town Manager Dan Bryer reported based on the school charter, either town could veto one or both referendum questions. source (emphasis by author)
I copied and pasted the quote into the comments and said that it was no longer so since the boards had repealed and replaced the school charter, and it was signed into law in June. Since the replacement charter contains the words ”eliminates numerous outdated charter provisions and aligns governance and operations with state law”, then unless someone can point to this provision in state law, that provision is gone.
Afterward, the sentence identifying the school charter as the authority was deleted from the article and a correction was published in a stand-alone article. I believe the text of the correction statement has changed after being discussed in the comments. Note the date of the article is the 18th but starts with talking about a statement made on the 19th.
In the comments, Desirre Sorcia asked:
So how does this actually work? BBay and BBH count votes, then exactly how are they added together? Clearly with addition, but who oversees this? How is it official?
I believe the text of Corrections was changed after Desiree asked her question but the correction consistently leaves out the part where Town Manager Dan Bryer says that the governing provision is in the Boothbay School Charter. The message in the correction is trying to shift authority to AOS98 which is a regional group and it submits that the regional organization has the authority to merge two independent municipalities and treat them as one municipality, clearly an infringement on home rule. The replacement charter transferred local authority over the Boothbay School Charter to the state with the words” ”eliminates numerous outdated charter provisions and aligns governance and operations with state law”
The replacement charter tells us where to look to resolve referendum issues:
Sec. 8. District referendum procedures. The community school district shall conduct referenda for purposes described in this Act or state law in the manner provided for regional school units under the Maine Revised Statutes, Title 20-A, chapter 103-A.
If the right to treat two sovereign municipalities as one is awarded to the regional organization by these words it should be found where the charter tells us to seek it.
I could do the work and look into this myself but why aren’t the people in leadership who get paid to do this work (after they have applied for public assistance, I am sure) doing so- or did they already look into it and find out it isn’t there?
When I tried to apply as a volunteer for the Administrative Code Committee, after seeing a notice on the town website, Mr. Bryer told me the committee did not exist, despite being advertised on the town website. I was told that I could not apply for the position for which I have unique qualifications pursuant to my independent study of Maine statutes. Really why should I do the work now?
The first place I would check is Title 20-A, chapter 103-A Subchapter 5: REFERENDUM 20-A §1503. Referendum procedures. Don’t tell me no one else has figured it out that this is where to begin. Why haven’t they said so?
I posted the location of the statute in the comments. I won’t read the statute unless someone else does so first. It’s a lot of work, and I do not get paid for my research work. Let the people who get paid do the work! Let the people who repealed and replaced our school charter do the work, and those who testified for the repealed and replaced school charter do the work, including the director of the organization in Event #2. Did they read state law? For that matter did they read the replacement charter?
Event #4 Making Public Testimony Inaccessible
At the time the charter was being considered by the Maine Legislature I testified that the words “align with state law” should be removed. My testimony was not considered by the Maine Legislature and was ignored by everyone else but at least it was a part of the permanent record under the Testimony, or so I once believed.
The testimonials used to be listed under “Testimony”, a menu that is displayed by clicking on “Bill Text and Other Documents” on the page for the Bill. In this case, the Bill page will display An Act to Repeal and Replace the Charter of the Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor Community School District at the top of the page.
Taking it from the beginning
Open Maine Bill Search and select the Advanced Search Link
Type “Boothbay” into the Title Field
Select option 2 LD 1786
Select Bill Text and Other Documents from the menu
Select Testimony from the search menu
If you are bored and looking for idle entertainment keep hitting the refresh button and watch the screen land on the testimony screen for a nanosecond before it switches to a general bill search screen and stays there
Head back to the search menu and try the other options in the menu to get the same result, begging the question, why is the search menu there if one cannot use it?
I tried it for other bills such as LD 2023 in the 130th session. In the past, once I had reached step # 5 and clicked on Testimony the screen would open up to a list of the written testimonies, which for LD 2003 was a very long list.
But that menu is no longer in search options. which includes the following three options only:
You can click on those links and see that they all lead back to the general Bill Search Page, sometimes with slight variations such as when clicking on Text and Bill Tracking, one gets a screen that contains another Testimony link, I click on that and get a new general search form for any bill, not the specific bill screen I was in. I have to know a variety of specific information to find a specific testimony, but there does not appear to be a way to generate a list of all testimonies for that bill.
I know that I testified to the Education and Cultural Affairs Committee I searched for all three versions of my name and every time it produced an error page
I discovered a listing under Committee Testimony that displays bills considered in each category for a specific session but I did not find An Act to Repeal and Replace the Charter of the Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor Community School District, possibly because it is a special act of legislation.
I could keep looking, but even if I found the testimonies, the system has been changed to make finding public testimony difficult, at best one needs to already know specific information such as the name of the person who testified.
And so the voices of those who do not serve the purposes of the state are sent into the fifth dimension.
However, I also posted my testimony in this newsletter, HERE
During the legislative session, the testimony supporting the replacement charter frequently relied on the ”archaic language” in the charter originally created in the 1950s when people still talked in the manner of cavemen as we can see from watching 1950s movies and listening to 1950s music.
Some dramatized the number of times the charter was amended implying it was an indicator of grave incompetence to revise the charter many times in the course of 7+ decades, and thereby reasoned that the existing charter should be thrown and replaced with a charter that starts from scratch.
Thus we are facing the questions posed by Desiree Scorcia a couple of weeks before a major referendum vote.
With no discussion of what is in state law, the boards handed authority for our local school system to the state. Was it politics or laziness or both?
.