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But, it's set in the modern world, but I could avoid the sensitive topics.
An Examination of Extra-Universal Systems of Government
- Thread starter Ephraim Ben Raphael
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But, it's set in the modern world, but I could avoid the sensitive topics.
The Land is the People
Here is my global cover for @Ephraim Ben Raphael's Homeland of Angola EEUSG entry. Many thanks to him for all of the help, and providing much of the text below.
- The Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire were victorious in the First Global War, and in the Second Global War.
- Germany is still under the Hohenzollerns, who transitioned begrudgingly towards a more constitutional monarchy in the 1920s.
- Austria-Hungary split into two governments, both in personal union under the Habsburgs but totally independent. Some peripheral areas, such as Bosnia and Galicia, were spun off as independent states.
- Russia is under a bitter nationalist regime which is mad that it lost both global wars, and is in denial about the former regime's responsibility for the less organized and bloody version of the Holocaust ITTL, which primarily targeted Jews, Poles, Ukrainians, the Baltic peoples, and anyone suspected of working with Germany. The modern Russian regime has become a rogue state because of its belligerence towards everyone.
- France was the first Communist country in the world, and was defeated during the Second Global War. A rump-communist regime prevails in Corsica.
- Britain lost their monarchy after the First Global War and a particularly tone-deaf King in the late twenties, and then let most of their colonies go after the Second Global War. They were the much stronger Finland to France and Russia's *Axis (the New Entente) and kept their democracy all through the war, switching to America's side when it ended. The Dominions dropped the monarchy when Britain did or not long afterwards, but Mann chose to retain its Lordship (while still being a dependency of Great Britain) and there's still a rump-House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (they brought back the old name) there.
- The Ottoman Empire gradually disintegrated after the First Global War. The Sultan and Caliph is a symbolic monarch and religious leader, with governance in the hands of the General Assembly and the Prime Minister.
- The Sultanate of Palestine (known as the Sultanate of Israel in Hebrew) is one of the legacies of the German-Ottoman plan to cultivate allies among non-Arab ethnicities, as is Kurdistan. Palestine is technically a kingdom in personal union with the Ottoman Empire, and the Sultan still appoints a ceremonial vizier. They served as a refuge for a lot of the Jewish, Druze, Christian, Yazidi, and others that had to flee when the Turks pulled out of what became the Greater Arab Union. TTL's Palestinian-Arab Conflict has a different dynamic than the OTL Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, but it's no less contentious.
- America was neutral in the First Global War, and an ally of Germany in the Second Global War.
- Japan was part of the New Entente, the opposition to the Allies in the Second Global War. The Americans were mostly responsible for beating the Japanese.
- Decolonization followed a similar pattern to OTL: bankrupt European empires spinning off colonies rather than continuing to pay for them, Geoism is a more popular ideology than communism among the ex-colonial nations and Angola was the first but far from the last to adopt it.
- The Homeland of Hindustan is a Hindu-majority state that controls the rest of the non-Indian parts of the former British Raj, including a restive Bengal. Hindustan adopted Geoism not long after Angola paved the way.
- China had a civil war instead of a warlord-era from 1916-1923 (it was mostly over by 1920 though) that ended in a victory by the United Provinces of China. The modern UPC is a rather corrupt democracy that's tried some Geoist ideas but isn't really Geoist.
I'd like to do a write-up eventually, but I'm having trouble getting the motivation to do so, so for now I'll just state my general idea; the basic premise is that India isn't partitioned between India and Pakistan after gaining independence. This in and of itself has probably been done to death, but in this India, the princely states were never abolished, and now serve as vassals to the President of India. The monarchs retain plenty of political power, with each maharaja/raja/mir/etc. being able to make laws for their respective princely states, so long as they're within federal law. This means that there are two primary political players in this India; the hereditary aristocratic rulers of the princely states and the democratically elected politicians of the rest of India. Barring the fact that the President of India is of the latter group (with any nobility running being *encouraged* to disinherit themselves prior to taking office), neither group is more politically powerful than the other, resulting in what I think would be an interesting political dynamic to explore.
Why is the Republic of Japan government mistrusted by it's people? Are it's leaders largely Christians (as the Christians were deemed more trustworthy than the Shintoists/Buddhists by the Americans) who have pro-Christian policies ala South Vietnam IOTL?
I'm pretty sure it supposed to be in a book format with the chapters on different government forms
I just had an idea but don't know if it's distinctive enough. The idea is this: the cliche medieval Europe style fedual monarchy with maximum renaissance techlevel. Which either had a tech collapse or is forcefully kept kept at that level. The main thing is that romantic ideals of feudalism, chivarly and noblesse oblige is real and almost all people are happy with what they have. There is also religious dogmatism and quasi-theocracy like real middle ages but priests are also ideal priests who are good, kind and generous.
Two more ideas both inspired by Warhammer 40k
1.a state that is in actuality the complete opposite of what is described in its constutition. IRL closest anology would be DPRK or HRE (not democratic, not peoples or not a republic)(not holy, not roman, not an empire). But the greatest example is the Imperium from 40k a militant atheist unitary absolute monarchy which is actually (before gathering storm modern 40k) a theocratic fedual oligarchy.
2.Theo-Technotrats like the AdMech.
1.a state that is in actuality the complete opposite of what is described in its constutition. IRL closest anology would be DPRK or HRE (not democratic, not peoples or not a republic)(not holy, not roman, not an empire). But the greatest example is the Imperium from 40k a militant atheist unitary absolute monarchy which is actually (before gathering storm modern 40k) a theocratic fedual oligarchy.
2.Theo-Technotrats like the AdMech.
Not sure how to write it up, but posting it here for adoption if anyone wants to do a write up.
Idea is a Kaiserreich that ends up with a Savinkov Russia liberating Europe with The Entente from the Syndicalists. Savinkov Russia eventually collapses but one of the main allies, a Iron Guard Romania is still around. Said Iron Guard Romania is a fascists state that's distinctive due to the death cult that is the government. While they managed to be Savinkov's Russia's best friend, considering the extensive territory, they have a lot of issues involving the phrase, ethnic cleansing, along with all sorts of general nastiness being a death cult that has a country.
Idea is a Kaiserreich that ends up with a Savinkov Russia liberating Europe with The Entente from the Syndicalists. Savinkov Russia eventually collapses but one of the main allies, a Iron Guard Romania is still around. Said Iron Guard Romania is a fascists state that's distinctive due to the death cult that is the government. While they managed to be Savinkov's Russia's best friend, considering the extensive territory, they have a lot of issues involving the phrase, ethnic cleansing, along with all sorts of general nastiness being a death cult that has a country.
Hail Mary
My cover of @Ephraim Ben Raphael's Kingdom of Corsica entry for EEUSG. Many thanks to him for the feedback!
- The PoD is in 1797, where the French Revolution in Corsica goes differently. This has major butterflies, including Napoleon never coming to power and the French Revolution being decisively defeated by the British, Austrians and Prussians. The Bourbons are restored to power.
- The German Revolution in the 1850s establishes the German Republic, a republic with a few sub-national monarchies. Germany expands after the Great War and the fall of the Austrian Empire.
- The establishment of Germany causes a major shift in British foreign policy, which is initially pro-French and pro-Russian. However, disputes with France and Russia over issues in America lead to them siding with Germany in the Great War.
- The alt-Mexican-American War ended with a greater American victory, and with a Northern, more imperialistic president in office, more land was annexed. This led to the admission of more free states earlier on to maintain balance in Congress, which led to a whole host of problems that ended in a far messier American Civil War. Instead of two sides with some border states, an abolitionist Northeast (calling itself Alleghany) and southwestern areas with significant Mexican minorities breaking off to fight against a Southern-dominated United States.
- The British overtly supported Alleghany during its war for independence, while the Russians backed America. This leads to more Russian involvement in American politics, which has effects such as the abolition of slavery in favor of serfdom. Unlike the Draka, American serfdom is actually serfdom, and more akin in practice to sharecropping. There are other pseudo-Tsarist aspects to this new United States: presidents are simultaneously President of the United States and governor of their home state.
- The United States took some territories to guarantee a source of slaves as the British moved to stop the slave trade, and lost those colonies to Britain during the American Civil War. After the war, the Americans focus elsewhere in Africa, establishing colonies in the Congo, Nigeria and Namibia, as an eventual location for freed serfs, many of whom were moved there by force. Serfdom persists in the African territories.
- The Great War is between Britain, Germany and Austria and France, Russia and the Ottoman Empire. The former alliance wins, although Austria collapses. The Bourbon monarchy is replaced with a German-style republic.
- Russia itself is more Pacific-oriented, and by the 21st century is considered more of an Asian power than a European one.
- Nobody pulls a Meiji. Japan becomes a British protectorate, with the shogunate staying in power. China itself stays under foreign domination and is eventually carved up into various states by European colonial powers, a situation which persists to the modern day despite the existence of pan-Sinic movements.
- Central and South America have some great powers. The New Republic of Brazil is the product of a slave revolt and leads an anti-American liberation front. Argentina takes after the United States and is a highly racially stratified society.
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Honestly I'm quite excited to see how my entry will be made into a map, though I will stay patient for the time being (and work on my projects and hobbies).
Posted with permission. Flag and map by Rvbomally.
It is with some trepidation that I travel down the streets of Omaha, though not for the common anxieties brought on by this project. This is a free society even for an outsider like myself, and the secrets of the Nutshell wouldn’t tempt any powerbrokers I was likely to meet this side of the Missouri. The issue is the risk those secrets are put at by entering this world at all, by systems of surveillance and power capable of stealing through methods unimaginable to me. But I have been given assurances that these risks are minimal so long as I keep within the provided guidelines, and a state of this nature is far too rare to overlook. So I will trust in the experts.
One would not believe by sight that Omaha was a city of five million souls, with its modest style and clean placement against the surrounding landscape. I watch it through the windows of my cab, without driver and spacious for one passenger, as I near my destination. I will be asked for no fee when I arrive, and the lack of seatbelts is unnerving on a reflexive level. My contact has told me not to be concerned. The regulation was only removed after a decade had passed without needing them.
The newest parts of Omaha are those related to the city’s drastic change in purpose over time, and the neocolonial buildings would not look out of place in the Northeast of many United States iterations. But this is not the Northeast, and were I there in this world things would look very different indeed. At one point I pass a construction site where a machine methodically extrudes and places a paste which hardens into something indistinguishable from wood framing, and I am reminded that even this is a recreation of a world gone by.
The plaza of marble domes and pillars was not my destination, but I’m given a clear view of it from the offices, each only a few stories tall. Verticality is not a popular look in this city.
“Almost like the old photographs come to life, eh?”
I turn to the man, and wonder if he knows how much the statement applies to him as well. Andrew Kask is nearly a stereotype of the 20th century American politician. Square jawed and straight backed in a dark blue suit, only the tone of his skin would have marked him as odd to be a Senator for Wyoming, and he meets the illusion so well even that might be rationalized away.
I ask him if my answer will be put to public broadcast, like those being displayed all across the nation’s internet. He laughs.
“Oh no, Mr. Chana. We’re only required to wear experience recorders when on government business. Which, as I trust this interview is for educational purposes, this is not no matter who’s office we talk in.”
I ask him if that has made the measure toothless, given the manipulations it was meant to contain. His response does not skip a beat.
“Putting aside that my fellows and I in Congress have the same right to privacy as anyone else, no, the policy works as intended. You see Mr. Chana, the true nature of the experience recorders is as a deterrent, and as you’ve witnessed online a keeper of public confidence. Not only is actually getting caught the absolute end of a person’s political life, but even suspicion in the public court is enough to ensure a loss at the ballot box. If you claim you did something as a servant of this country, you better be able to produce the recordings to back it up. This is also one of the few areas where presumption of innocence doesn’t apply, and all these factors together make even skirting the lines not worth it. I’m fine with talking to you now because the Nutshell won’t be getting publishing rights in this country anytime soon, if you folk even wanted them, and whatever people think of your homeland at least you’re no Skynet.”
The troubles and wonders of this world truly began in 2016, where experiments with quantum computing and neural networks finally made a leap of the most drastic kind. Researchers at Cornell University did not intend to create a methodology for strong AI, but it was out of their hands and into the world in the span of a few months. The world would find itself plunged into economic despondency as various nations employed these AI in financial trading, uneven participation by parties with AI crowding out those using “dumb” trading computers. But for the United States in particular the worst was yet to come.
I asked Senator Kask to explain the reasons behind the Second Founding.
“Ah. Well, it all began with the 2020 elections. I’m sure you’ve at least heard of how bad it all fell apart. It’s hard to get a sense of what things were like back then, but I think the public had started to go numb to all the hostility in political life, so things ended up escalating. They didn’t even try to hold debates after the first, nobody would have tolerated it, especially not the candidates. Kinda hard to hold yourselves up as defenders of speech and debate after death threats and a sucker punch.”
But that wasn’t all that was going on, was it?
“We know that now. They didn’t. The economic crisis was bad, but people only understood the role of the AIs in it vaguely. The memetic crisis was even worse, because it was a completely one-sided battle. At least on the economic field people were putting up resistance to the AI involvement. Nobody found out just how hard the leash was being pulled on that excuse for a “President” until it was already too late, and worse, the bastard was only aware of a little of it. Talking to foreigners, sure. But being given a media feed personalized to cause anxiety and insecurity, put together by a vast analytic intelligence? Tiny barbs driving the whole cabinet against each other? It’s why our system is necessary, Mr. Chana. It’s the kind of thing the First Founders knew they’d never guess, so they left it to us to amend the Constitution when the time came.”
And the time had come then.
“A bit later. The viciousness only got worse as the impeachment proceedings occurred, then the self-pardon, and the Supreme Court validating it. Public confidence was essentially nonexistent, and the influencer AIs were exposed at the worst junction. Summer 2024.”
The Year Without An Election.
“I know what the books might say, but I still believe the machines outed themselves. The idea of a human compromising them doesn’t fit with anything we know, and it fit their goals cleanly. Why hide, when publicity is what would hurt America the most? And god, did it hurt us. Lots of people were already out of work and on the streets thanks to the economic crisis, so why not fight? There was no way the public mood at that time was going to support a gradual, painful recovery. They didn’t want to recover. They wanted revenge. Against the right, the left, the AIs, the Chinese, the Russians, the whole damn world, didn’t matter. Lincoln believed the First Republic would only destroy itself in the end, and that’s exactly what happened. They were provoked, but that provocation was only possible because of the rot that had come to undermine the whole nation.”
It was their end, but your beginning?
“I like to say we’re still one people in principle, but yes, this was what made the Second Founding necessary. After the election fell through and martial law started breaking down, the states were all pretty much on their own. The coastals were the worst off; lots of dependent people and vulnerable systems. It wasn’t exactly what you’d call a war, it was too disorganized for that, but everyone was scrambling to try and put the broken pieces back in place. The most dangerous element was probably the external military forces. Stranded all over the world, chain of command broken, and more than a few still had their hands on nukes, which were an existential threat back then. Humanity got lucky there, but that was the final accomplishment of the First Republic: Not killing us all.”
The mood had become somewhat dour discussing the destruction of his predecessors, but Kask perked up at reaching the events of the Second Founding.
“Us here in the plains were still stable enough, and the writing was on the wall for the Washington government. We got lucky with the lack of urban centralization and presence of key military facilities, because it let the state governments get together. The logic of the Second Founding was that with the destruction of the existing federal structure, the only recourse would be an Article V Convention for whatever states remained in good order. Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Kansas, Idaho, and of course Nebraska were able to answer the call. Iowa, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Utah all retained functioning government to greater or lesser degrees that they could refuse. Before you ask, this was what fulfilled the Constitutional requirement of 2/3rds agreement. The remainder of the states ignored us, and we took that as a sign they were no longer accepting the sovereign authority of the United States.”
I noted that the obvious question was as to why sovereignty had passed specifically from the District of Columbia to Nebraska.
“You really are a professor, aren’t you? The short answer is that we were the only ones trying to retain America as America. We gave all 50 states the chance to reach the convention, even if it was to shoot us down. If they hadn’t decided to go astray already, they were in a functional state of open insurrection, and what they became in the end proves it. Was it exactly as the First Founders had intended the process? No, I suppose it wasn’t. The convention process went unused for over two hundred years, and it was critical we regained lawful order over as much of the nation as possible. Necessity saw it used that way, and it saved us. Better than a military junta, surely?”
He hadn’t entirely answered the question, but I wished to move forward to the products of the convention: The Crisis Amendments.
“Amendment Twenty-Eight, to move the United States capitol to the city of Omaha and reunite the military chain of command. Amendment Twenty-Nine, to ban the use or presence of artificial intelligence systems within the United States. Amendment Thirty, to guarantee the people’s freedom from alien influences. And Amendment Thirty-One, reorganizing the voting system, establishing the referendum system, and ensuring a public ballot.”
Given the history of the secret ballot and the traditions of media freedom, those last two must have caused controversy.
“Not as much as you’d think. Our people were concerned foremost with protecting their livelihoods, and times had changed. The secret ballot was a protection of the voter in the 19th century, but in the 21st it had become a weapon of our enemy. Without the ability to check the voting record, there was always going to be uncertainty as to if it was legitimate. If your vote was counted as something else, you would never be able to tell, not really. And as the last elections had shown us, it wasn’t always uncorrupted. That’s why the Thirty-First Amendment also strictly prohibits electronic voting machines. The AIs are tricky, but they have yet to corrupt ink and paper! We gave up the secrecy of our ballot in exchange for the survival of our democracy, but it isn’t as bad as it might sound. Political discrimination is as serious a crime here as any other. If you doubt our ability to tolerate dissent, look no further than Kansas City. You couldn’t pay me to visit them with the state they’re in, but the motto is ‘E Pluribus Unum’ for a reason.”
And the ban on alien influences? Surely this impacted freedom of speech and the press.
“I prefer to say that it enhanced those freedoms. Ask yourself, Mr. Chana: Is the press really free if it is forced to come from an algorithm instead of the heart? Near the end of the First Republic, the press no longer truly operated at all. They had become entirely bereft of legitimacy, tools of foreign influence and contentless hype. Put a man in a room with a hundred others all saying that up is down and lies are truth, and he’ll believe you even though he knows better. Asch, Milgram, and all that. Bad enough when those other hundred are really astray, worse when they’re spies of our enemies, and worst of all when they aren’t people at all but a hundred fingers of a machine intelligence. Human nature isn’t noble enough to resist on its own. So yes, in this country ‘foreign media is suppressed’ just because we don’t let AI manipulate us. The world’s ‘intelligent democracies’ and ‘cybernetic anarchies’ are nothing of the sort. They’re what you might have called managed democracy back before the machines, which is just a nice name for oligarchy and tyranny with a smiling face.”
And the Federalist Party’s electoral dominance has nothing to do with this?
“Yikes, if I knew you were gonna play hardball I might have asked my secretary first.”
I apologize, but it is a question that must be asked.
“I suppose so. Well, I can tell you with some certainty that the Federalists aren’t where we are because of some Nixonian operation. Trust me, the Skies in my home state put up a good fight every election. If there was really anything like that going on, I wouldn’t have to spend so much time with my campaign manager! No Mr. Chana, we tend to win because we have the nation’s best interests at heart and have done the job well before. Seats go this way or that, but in the end the public knows who should have them. Does it really have to be more complicated than that?”
And the criticisms of the opposition?
“Sky are good people, and we pass bills together often enough. Where we differ, the simple fact is that this is an urbanized country now. “Big Sky” is a romantic vision, but we can’t just continue propping up economies that don’t make sense. With the basic income a lot of what they say about rural communities is pure fearmongering, and we really shouldn’t have to debate the importance of secular values in this day and age. As for Horizon…well, they have the right to their opinions. Personally, I think we got real lucky back in the day, and we shouldn’t squander that now. For civility’s sake I’ll leave it at that.”
I thank the senator for his time, and he inquires what I’ll be doing next. I tell him. He looks disquieted at the very idea.
The next autonomous taxi is one of the larger ones, sent due to the length of the requested trip. In a few hours, I will be in Kansas City. The Kansas side of it, that is. When the final borders of the successors to the First Union were established, the city found itself bisected between two very different governments. On one side, the AI-phobic Restored States. On the other, the AI-integrated Atlantic Federation. Tensions were immense, and what was politically two cities was far too much like one in all practical terms. Making matters worse was the unwillingness of the Atlantic Federation to reign in their influence in Kansas, and by the 2030s Kansas City was kept in two only by the Missouri River and a questionably secure armed border carved through what was once a single land. This lead to the Omaha government declaring a “twin quarantine”: One on the entire state of Kansas, and a much harsher one surrounding Kansas City itself. I watch the drone-managed fields of Kansas state out the windows of the taxi, flying by the dozens around larger central drones on the ground. This place is far from the image of the Restored States as preserved against the influence of the AI era.
Entering the quarantine zone is easier than leaving it, and I am soon to my destination: Campaign headquarters for the Horizon Movement, or just Horizon. It doesn’t look like much for a building owned by radical transhumanists, simple brick and mortar with a flat roof.
“Professor Chana, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
Emily Pritchard wears the clothes fitting a politician, but not the colors. Where Kask did not go beyond blues and blacks with the slightest concession of white, Pritchard stands in red and orange without hesitation.
“The Horizon is more than just a political party. It’s a culture and a worldview. Ever since the Industrial Revolution, humanity has struggled to abandon its past. The weight of that past is our enemy. When people call us radicals, it shows they’ve romanticized all the suffering that comes with regressive ideals. You may have heard in your research, Professor, that there were once people who refused to take part in what is now accepted medical science. Who denied it to their children and put everyone else at risk, just so they could stick to the demons they knew. Tell me, are the medical advances of this day and age really so different that they should be denied to the sick and the dying? Omaha thinks so, or at least they use the rhetoric. But I’ve watched enough crash vans speeding over the Kansas boarder with “corpses” inside them to know they’re aware of the hypocrisy. Providence Medical is a fifth column, an abattoir ran by traitors, a torture pit…until the very moment those same committed “purists” need a brain restoration or emergency organ conversion. Progress is no myth, despite the stagnation period that occurred before the destruction of the United States, and it is those who resist that cause the most harm to others. Right now, this country is one of the world’s biggest resistors. Not being as bad as Australia or Bangladesh, not actually murdering us and wiping our fine city off the Earth in a hail of bombs, is not an excuse for all the harm the rest of the Restored States do by embracing luddism.”
Does this mean that Horizon agrees with the image the Federalists have of them, of pro-AI and pro-unification policies?
“I as much as anyone can see the harms AI technology have been used for, but that’s just it, they were used for that purpose. Even the most advanced AI system is just a machine tool, no fundamentally different from any other. The Federalists make us weaker, not stronger, by way of their absurd attempt at just wiping the tech out and by anthropomorphizing the danger. Down here, people laugh at the nonsense propaganda that passes for entertainment in the north. An AI only engages in nihilistic villainy if that’s what you tell it to do. The reason for the crisis that ended the First Republic was that the AIs messing with them were being directed to do so by hostile foreign powers. Everything else is a conspiracy theory by folks who spend way too much time online. It’s like saying the table saw meant to cut your finger off, it’s ridiculous. What we ought to be doing is developing a body of AI tech and experienced operators, not waiting for the quarantine cordon to fail and cause a repeat performance.
As for unification, we don’t take a stance either way. Right now, thanks to the aforementioned difficulties with AI and any technology derived from or requiring AI, the Atlantic Federation thinks folks outside KC are extremist and the westerners don’t even talk to us. Trying to get the former US nations into something workable is the kind of challenge that takes decades, and it can’t start at all until the sore thumbs in Omaha decide to stop fighting. For now, Horizon’s goals are to open full relations and put an end to at least the internal quarantine. Kansas is the economic center of the Restored States, and there’s no justification for discriminating against us like this.”
This sounds like it would involve repealing the Crisis Amendments.
“We don’t have much of an issue with Twenty-Eight, and Thirty-One isn’t officially opposed by Horizon, but Twenty-Nine and Thirty are problems for us, yes. Twenty-Nine was practically used as a writ of oppression against Horizon and Kansas as a whole back in the 40s and 50s, but through hard-won judicial review the Supreme Court set limits on what exactly counted as an AI system and dismissed the idea that Twenty-Nine universally trumped One, Four, and Five. Through that, we were able to stabilize imports of certain smart computers and AI-developed technology that didn’t require an AI controller, though this was when the quarantine went from paranoia on Nebraska’s part into full-blown federal panic. This is what we mean when we say that fear rules the politics up north. One ruling goes against them and, all of a sudden, we’re cut out from the rest of the nation. You didn’t see us freaking out when the Supreme Court validated their quarantine under national security concerns, though it was very disappointing. Thirty obviously doesn’t affect us, as much as some Federalist firebrands would like to say we’re foreigners, but it does compromise our relations with other nations and makes the kind of progress Horizon wants impossible. Both of them ought to be repealed before we fall any further away from the rest of the world and end up a fortress nation.”
Should the world expect to hear more from the Restored States soon?
“It’s that damn quarantine that’s the problem. Horizon is strong in Kansas but the troubles of traveling in and out during election season gives the Federalists and Sky the advantage everywhere else. It’s frustrating to see other democracies operate so smoothly while we’re practically fighting a war against our own border control service to campaign. We’re not revolutionaries, and yet our offices get raided on suspicion of harboring AI tech every election. They know what they’re doing. But people won’t listen to the fearmongering forever. Sky may not agree with us on much, but they don’t care for the Federalists’ dirty politics either, and the younger generation doesn’t see much point in trying to preserve regressive policies. Progress can be slowed, but it has never been stopped before, and that trend won’t change now.”
Restored States of America
It is with some trepidation that I travel down the streets of Omaha, though not for the common anxieties brought on by this project. This is a free society even for an outsider like myself, and the secrets of the Nutshell wouldn’t tempt any powerbrokers I was likely to meet this side of the Missouri. The issue is the risk those secrets are put at by entering this world at all, by systems of surveillance and power capable of stealing through methods unimaginable to me. But I have been given assurances that these risks are minimal so long as I keep within the provided guidelines, and a state of this nature is far too rare to overlook. So I will trust in the experts.
One would not believe by sight that Omaha was a city of five million souls, with its modest style and clean placement against the surrounding landscape. I watch it through the windows of my cab, without driver and spacious for one passenger, as I near my destination. I will be asked for no fee when I arrive, and the lack of seatbelts is unnerving on a reflexive level. My contact has told me not to be concerned. The regulation was only removed after a decade had passed without needing them.
The newest parts of Omaha are those related to the city’s drastic change in purpose over time, and the neocolonial buildings would not look out of place in the Northeast of many United States iterations. But this is not the Northeast, and were I there in this world things would look very different indeed. At one point I pass a construction site where a machine methodically extrudes and places a paste which hardens into something indistinguishable from wood framing, and I am reminded that even this is a recreation of a world gone by.
The plaza of marble domes and pillars was not my destination, but I’m given a clear view of it from the offices, each only a few stories tall. Verticality is not a popular look in this city.
“Almost like the old photographs come to life, eh?”
I turn to the man, and wonder if he knows how much the statement applies to him as well. Andrew Kask is nearly a stereotype of the 20th century American politician. Square jawed and straight backed in a dark blue suit, only the tone of his skin would have marked him as odd to be a Senator for Wyoming, and he meets the illusion so well even that might be rationalized away.
I ask him if my answer will be put to public broadcast, like those being displayed all across the nation’s internet. He laughs.
“Oh no, Mr. Chana. We’re only required to wear experience recorders when on government business. Which, as I trust this interview is for educational purposes, this is not no matter who’s office we talk in.”
I ask him if that has made the measure toothless, given the manipulations it was meant to contain. His response does not skip a beat.
“Putting aside that my fellows and I in Congress have the same right to privacy as anyone else, no, the policy works as intended. You see Mr. Chana, the true nature of the experience recorders is as a deterrent, and as you’ve witnessed online a keeper of public confidence. Not only is actually getting caught the absolute end of a person’s political life, but even suspicion in the public court is enough to ensure a loss at the ballot box. If you claim you did something as a servant of this country, you better be able to produce the recordings to back it up. This is also one of the few areas where presumption of innocence doesn’t apply, and all these factors together make even skirting the lines not worth it. I’m fine with talking to you now because the Nutshell won’t be getting publishing rights in this country anytime soon, if you folk even wanted them, and whatever people think of your homeland at least you’re no Skynet.”
The troubles and wonders of this world truly began in 2016, where experiments with quantum computing and neural networks finally made a leap of the most drastic kind. Researchers at Cornell University did not intend to create a methodology for strong AI, but it was out of their hands and into the world in the span of a few months. The world would find itself plunged into economic despondency as various nations employed these AI in financial trading, uneven participation by parties with AI crowding out those using “dumb” trading computers. But for the United States in particular the worst was yet to come.
I asked Senator Kask to explain the reasons behind the Second Founding.
“Ah. Well, it all began with the 2020 elections. I’m sure you’ve at least heard of how bad it all fell apart. It’s hard to get a sense of what things were like back then, but I think the public had started to go numb to all the hostility in political life, so things ended up escalating. They didn’t even try to hold debates after the first, nobody would have tolerated it, especially not the candidates. Kinda hard to hold yourselves up as defenders of speech and debate after death threats and a sucker punch.”
But that wasn’t all that was going on, was it?
“We know that now. They didn’t. The economic crisis was bad, but people only understood the role of the AIs in it vaguely. The memetic crisis was even worse, because it was a completely one-sided battle. At least on the economic field people were putting up resistance to the AI involvement. Nobody found out just how hard the leash was being pulled on that excuse for a “President” until it was already too late, and worse, the bastard was only aware of a little of it. Talking to foreigners, sure. But being given a media feed personalized to cause anxiety and insecurity, put together by a vast analytic intelligence? Tiny barbs driving the whole cabinet against each other? It’s why our system is necessary, Mr. Chana. It’s the kind of thing the First Founders knew they’d never guess, so they left it to us to amend the Constitution when the time came.”
And the time had come then.
“A bit later. The viciousness only got worse as the impeachment proceedings occurred, then the self-pardon, and the Supreme Court validating it. Public confidence was essentially nonexistent, and the influencer AIs were exposed at the worst junction. Summer 2024.”
The Year Without An Election.
“I know what the books might say, but I still believe the machines outed themselves. The idea of a human compromising them doesn’t fit with anything we know, and it fit their goals cleanly. Why hide, when publicity is what would hurt America the most? And god, did it hurt us. Lots of people were already out of work and on the streets thanks to the economic crisis, so why not fight? There was no way the public mood at that time was going to support a gradual, painful recovery. They didn’t want to recover. They wanted revenge. Against the right, the left, the AIs, the Chinese, the Russians, the whole damn world, didn’t matter. Lincoln believed the First Republic would only destroy itself in the end, and that’s exactly what happened. They were provoked, but that provocation was only possible because of the rot that had come to undermine the whole nation.”
It was their end, but your beginning?
“I like to say we’re still one people in principle, but yes, this was what made the Second Founding necessary. After the election fell through and martial law started breaking down, the states were all pretty much on their own. The coastals were the worst off; lots of dependent people and vulnerable systems. It wasn’t exactly what you’d call a war, it was too disorganized for that, but everyone was scrambling to try and put the broken pieces back in place. The most dangerous element was probably the external military forces. Stranded all over the world, chain of command broken, and more than a few still had their hands on nukes, which were an existential threat back then. Humanity got lucky there, but that was the final accomplishment of the First Republic: Not killing us all.”
The mood had become somewhat dour discussing the destruction of his predecessors, but Kask perked up at reaching the events of the Second Founding.
“Us here in the plains were still stable enough, and the writing was on the wall for the Washington government. We got lucky with the lack of urban centralization and presence of key military facilities, because it let the state governments get together. The logic of the Second Founding was that with the destruction of the existing federal structure, the only recourse would be an Article V Convention for whatever states remained in good order. Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Kansas, Idaho, and of course Nebraska were able to answer the call. Iowa, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Utah all retained functioning government to greater or lesser degrees that they could refuse. Before you ask, this was what fulfilled the Constitutional requirement of 2/3rds agreement. The remainder of the states ignored us, and we took that as a sign they were no longer accepting the sovereign authority of the United States.”
I noted that the obvious question was as to why sovereignty had passed specifically from the District of Columbia to Nebraska.
“You really are a professor, aren’t you? The short answer is that we were the only ones trying to retain America as America. We gave all 50 states the chance to reach the convention, even if it was to shoot us down. If they hadn’t decided to go astray already, they were in a functional state of open insurrection, and what they became in the end proves it. Was it exactly as the First Founders had intended the process? No, I suppose it wasn’t. The convention process went unused for over two hundred years, and it was critical we regained lawful order over as much of the nation as possible. Necessity saw it used that way, and it saved us. Better than a military junta, surely?”
He hadn’t entirely answered the question, but I wished to move forward to the products of the convention: The Crisis Amendments.
“Amendment Twenty-Eight, to move the United States capitol to the city of Omaha and reunite the military chain of command. Amendment Twenty-Nine, to ban the use or presence of artificial intelligence systems within the United States. Amendment Thirty, to guarantee the people’s freedom from alien influences. And Amendment Thirty-One, reorganizing the voting system, establishing the referendum system, and ensuring a public ballot.”
Given the history of the secret ballot and the traditions of media freedom, those last two must have caused controversy.
“Not as much as you’d think. Our people were concerned foremost with protecting their livelihoods, and times had changed. The secret ballot was a protection of the voter in the 19th century, but in the 21st it had become a weapon of our enemy. Without the ability to check the voting record, there was always going to be uncertainty as to if it was legitimate. If your vote was counted as something else, you would never be able to tell, not really. And as the last elections had shown us, it wasn’t always uncorrupted. That’s why the Thirty-First Amendment also strictly prohibits electronic voting machines. The AIs are tricky, but they have yet to corrupt ink and paper! We gave up the secrecy of our ballot in exchange for the survival of our democracy, but it isn’t as bad as it might sound. Political discrimination is as serious a crime here as any other. If you doubt our ability to tolerate dissent, look no further than Kansas City. You couldn’t pay me to visit them with the state they’re in, but the motto is ‘E Pluribus Unum’ for a reason.”
And the ban on alien influences? Surely this impacted freedom of speech and the press.
“I prefer to say that it enhanced those freedoms. Ask yourself, Mr. Chana: Is the press really free if it is forced to come from an algorithm instead of the heart? Near the end of the First Republic, the press no longer truly operated at all. They had become entirely bereft of legitimacy, tools of foreign influence and contentless hype. Put a man in a room with a hundred others all saying that up is down and lies are truth, and he’ll believe you even though he knows better. Asch, Milgram, and all that. Bad enough when those other hundred are really astray, worse when they’re spies of our enemies, and worst of all when they aren’t people at all but a hundred fingers of a machine intelligence. Human nature isn’t noble enough to resist on its own. So yes, in this country ‘foreign media is suppressed’ just because we don’t let AI manipulate us. The world’s ‘intelligent democracies’ and ‘cybernetic anarchies’ are nothing of the sort. They’re what you might have called managed democracy back before the machines, which is just a nice name for oligarchy and tyranny with a smiling face.”
And the Federalist Party’s electoral dominance has nothing to do with this?
“Yikes, if I knew you were gonna play hardball I might have asked my secretary first.”
I apologize, but it is a question that must be asked.
“I suppose so. Well, I can tell you with some certainty that the Federalists aren’t where we are because of some Nixonian operation. Trust me, the Skies in my home state put up a good fight every election. If there was really anything like that going on, I wouldn’t have to spend so much time with my campaign manager! No Mr. Chana, we tend to win because we have the nation’s best interests at heart and have done the job well before. Seats go this way or that, but in the end the public knows who should have them. Does it really have to be more complicated than that?”
And the criticisms of the opposition?
“Sky are good people, and we pass bills together often enough. Where we differ, the simple fact is that this is an urbanized country now. “Big Sky” is a romantic vision, but we can’t just continue propping up economies that don’t make sense. With the basic income a lot of what they say about rural communities is pure fearmongering, and we really shouldn’t have to debate the importance of secular values in this day and age. As for Horizon…well, they have the right to their opinions. Personally, I think we got real lucky back in the day, and we shouldn’t squander that now. For civility’s sake I’ll leave it at that.”
I thank the senator for his time, and he inquires what I’ll be doing next. I tell him. He looks disquieted at the very idea.
The next autonomous taxi is one of the larger ones, sent due to the length of the requested trip. In a few hours, I will be in Kansas City. The Kansas side of it, that is. When the final borders of the successors to the First Union were established, the city found itself bisected between two very different governments. On one side, the AI-phobic Restored States. On the other, the AI-integrated Atlantic Federation. Tensions were immense, and what was politically two cities was far too much like one in all practical terms. Making matters worse was the unwillingness of the Atlantic Federation to reign in their influence in Kansas, and by the 2030s Kansas City was kept in two only by the Missouri River and a questionably secure armed border carved through what was once a single land. This lead to the Omaha government declaring a “twin quarantine”: One on the entire state of Kansas, and a much harsher one surrounding Kansas City itself. I watch the drone-managed fields of Kansas state out the windows of the taxi, flying by the dozens around larger central drones on the ground. This place is far from the image of the Restored States as preserved against the influence of the AI era.
Entering the quarantine zone is easier than leaving it, and I am soon to my destination: Campaign headquarters for the Horizon Movement, or just Horizon. It doesn’t look like much for a building owned by radical transhumanists, simple brick and mortar with a flat roof.
“Professor Chana, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
Emily Pritchard wears the clothes fitting a politician, but not the colors. Where Kask did not go beyond blues and blacks with the slightest concession of white, Pritchard stands in red and orange without hesitation.
“The Horizon is more than just a political party. It’s a culture and a worldview. Ever since the Industrial Revolution, humanity has struggled to abandon its past. The weight of that past is our enemy. When people call us radicals, it shows they’ve romanticized all the suffering that comes with regressive ideals. You may have heard in your research, Professor, that there were once people who refused to take part in what is now accepted medical science. Who denied it to their children and put everyone else at risk, just so they could stick to the demons they knew. Tell me, are the medical advances of this day and age really so different that they should be denied to the sick and the dying? Omaha thinks so, or at least they use the rhetoric. But I’ve watched enough crash vans speeding over the Kansas boarder with “corpses” inside them to know they’re aware of the hypocrisy. Providence Medical is a fifth column, an abattoir ran by traitors, a torture pit…until the very moment those same committed “purists” need a brain restoration or emergency organ conversion. Progress is no myth, despite the stagnation period that occurred before the destruction of the United States, and it is those who resist that cause the most harm to others. Right now, this country is one of the world’s biggest resistors. Not being as bad as Australia or Bangladesh, not actually murdering us and wiping our fine city off the Earth in a hail of bombs, is not an excuse for all the harm the rest of the Restored States do by embracing luddism.”
Does this mean that Horizon agrees with the image the Federalists have of them, of pro-AI and pro-unification policies?
“I as much as anyone can see the harms AI technology have been used for, but that’s just it, they were used for that purpose. Even the most advanced AI system is just a machine tool, no fundamentally different from any other. The Federalists make us weaker, not stronger, by way of their absurd attempt at just wiping the tech out and by anthropomorphizing the danger. Down here, people laugh at the nonsense propaganda that passes for entertainment in the north. An AI only engages in nihilistic villainy if that’s what you tell it to do. The reason for the crisis that ended the First Republic was that the AIs messing with them were being directed to do so by hostile foreign powers. Everything else is a conspiracy theory by folks who spend way too much time online. It’s like saying the table saw meant to cut your finger off, it’s ridiculous. What we ought to be doing is developing a body of AI tech and experienced operators, not waiting for the quarantine cordon to fail and cause a repeat performance.
As for unification, we don’t take a stance either way. Right now, thanks to the aforementioned difficulties with AI and any technology derived from or requiring AI, the Atlantic Federation thinks folks outside KC are extremist and the westerners don’t even talk to us. Trying to get the former US nations into something workable is the kind of challenge that takes decades, and it can’t start at all until the sore thumbs in Omaha decide to stop fighting. For now, Horizon’s goals are to open full relations and put an end to at least the internal quarantine. Kansas is the economic center of the Restored States, and there’s no justification for discriminating against us like this.”
This sounds like it would involve repealing the Crisis Amendments.
“We don’t have much of an issue with Twenty-Eight, and Thirty-One isn’t officially opposed by Horizon, but Twenty-Nine and Thirty are problems for us, yes. Twenty-Nine was practically used as a writ of oppression against Horizon and Kansas as a whole back in the 40s and 50s, but through hard-won judicial review the Supreme Court set limits on what exactly counted as an AI system and dismissed the idea that Twenty-Nine universally trumped One, Four, and Five. Through that, we were able to stabilize imports of certain smart computers and AI-developed technology that didn’t require an AI controller, though this was when the quarantine went from paranoia on Nebraska’s part into full-blown federal panic. This is what we mean when we say that fear rules the politics up north. One ruling goes against them and, all of a sudden, we’re cut out from the rest of the nation. You didn’t see us freaking out when the Supreme Court validated their quarantine under national security concerns, though it was very disappointing. Thirty obviously doesn’t affect us, as much as some Federalist firebrands would like to say we’re foreigners, but it does compromise our relations with other nations and makes the kind of progress Horizon wants impossible. Both of them ought to be repealed before we fall any further away from the rest of the world and end up a fortress nation.”
Should the world expect to hear more from the Restored States soon?
“It’s that damn quarantine that’s the problem. Horizon is strong in Kansas but the troubles of traveling in and out during election season gives the Federalists and Sky the advantage everywhere else. It’s frustrating to see other democracies operate so smoothly while we’re practically fighting a war against our own border control service to campaign. We’re not revolutionaries, and yet our offices get raided on suspicion of harboring AI tech every election. They know what they’re doing. But people won’t listen to the fearmongering forever. Sky may not agree with us on much, but they don’t care for the Federalists’ dirty politics either, and the younger generation doesn’t see much point in trying to preserve regressive policies. Progress can be slowed, but it has never been stopped before, and that trend won’t change now.”
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Has anyone submitted a pedagogocracy yet? Something akin to a bureaucratic, collegiate confederation?
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