Crusade

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Just some notes:

I can´t remember everything about the Bashir Incident, but maybe it was a Starfleet Officer that handled the case because it also was a Starfleet Officer who was more or less the subject of the case?

Citizien can have Replicators. Picards brother complained that his wife wanted to get one - he thought the replicated meals wouldn`t taste as well as home-made ones.

According to Startrek 8, Starfleet does not use money. Maybe noone is worried that he is in disadvantage, even when he worked an hour longer than his neighbour, but still has the same replicator meal and the same kind of flat than his neighbour.
(Remember, Startrek is an optimistic Universe, an Utopia, that is meant to show us what we might be able to achieve, if we just take the right path.)
It seems as if most unpleasant jobs that nobody would ever want to do are gone (be it because they are no longer needed, or that they are automated, or that now some people like these jobs) and so, everybody can do what he likes. Or, maybe, people who do these jobs don`t have to do them as long as today, and have more free time to do their own thing.
Picards Brother probably grows his grapes because he really likes the job, and he does not sell it, but just gives it away, so Federation citizens all over the world (and galaxy) can get it, if they want. (Or they can`t, and it is only locally available, and sometimes used in exchange for other products that are needed, like dilithium crystals or high-resistant-rice-plants)

Is is possible that the Starfleet does take the job of the interstellar police within the Federation, since it is costly (even without money, they still need resources for their ship) to have two, independent, space-faring organization.
There are no police officers following a bank robber (which, naturally, they don`t have without money) from Earth to Epsilon Eridani.
And if they have problems with Organized Crime, these guys probably have armed starships, so Starfleet is far better suited to fill the job.
Anyway, there seems to be a local kind of police: Wasn`t the guy that tries to save the Crushers from the "plasma-sex-ghost" a policeman on that colony?

Not many people seem to own starships, but this might only prove that building and maintaining these ships is to costly and needs to much personal that everyone does have its own.
Instead, they use transports that travel within the Federation (even non-Federation worlds have it, like the shuttles that move between Bajor and DS9 - they probably cost some latinum, but the infra-structure is existant.)

The Starfleet blackouts do not mean anything, since it can just be some kind of collection from official source. Or Starfleet just does also make these reports for their own officers.
We know that Jake wrote some articles for a civilian organization.

Finally, you should not forget: We are seeing the Startrek Universe mostly from Starfleet View. Believe me, military organiziations can seem very independent, and if you are in it, and don`t get out sometimes, you never see more than other soldiers (and, regarding the police question: Most military organizations have also a Military Police...)

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Viking Bastard]

From what I've always understood, the Federation isn't democratic, but many of the memberworlds
are. We have the Federation Council (only seen in TUC, different from the Starfleet Council) and the
Federation President (who was clearly not part of Starfleet). I've always seen it as the Fed Councillors (or
whatever you'd call 'em) are chosen individually by each world, some which might use democratic election
to do so, while others would get chosen differently (heredity, fight to the death or you only apply for the job,
et cetera).

I think it's quite clear that Starfleet seem to take care of the policing on Earth, but Earth is the HQ of both the
UFP and Starfleet so maybe it's not surprising, They also seem to be federal cops, ala FBI. But that doesn't
mean that the other member worlds don't have police systems of their own.

The thing is just that we don't know much about the UFP, just about Earth and Starfleet.

 

[Viking Bastard]

Just a note: It was never stated in FC that the UFP didn't have money, just that
it wasn't the goal of man to achieve it anymore. It was in DS9 that the absense
of money came into play, but that may just as easily been seen as the absense
of Gold Plated Latinum. Both in TNG and DS9 we see UFP citizens engaging in trade
(usually by bartering though) or talking about buying a thing or another. In TOS
there were numerous references to Federation money and that the Enterprise
and everything aboard had cost Starfleet a lot of money.

So I'd say that the UFP had a credit system that's incompatible outside of the
UFP but that Earth society (I dunno about other members) does not revolve
around the pursuit of riches anymore.

 

[S'mon]

Hm, and come to think of it, I don't think they've ever mentioned liverwurst, maple trees, or the city of Frankfurt, either. Must be that those don't exist on Earth in the Trek universe, either.

You've fallen into one of the oldest traps in the book - lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. The fact that the details of Federation governance don't get mentioned does not imply anything specific about those details. All it says is that the writers and producers chose not to tell stories about those details.

This might be credible if it was a new show and we'd only seen a few eps. Most sf settings tell us a lot about their societies in a lot less episodes than Trek has had. Do you actually think there _is_ an electoral system within the Federation? I can see an argument that individual Federation worlds could have local democratic governments (like Traveller's Imperium), but if the Federation itself was a democracy I think we might have seen some hint of it in all those hundreds of episodes.

 

[S'mon]

I agree with Mr Bastard - on the evidence presented, Earth appears to be a military/police state run by Starfleet, but other Federation worlds may be largely free to run their own affairs as long as they are purely domestic. The important point about the Bashir incident is that Starfleet had jurisdiction over Bashir's civilian parents, not just Bashir.

 

[JacktheRabbit]

Just a note: It was never stated in FC that the UFP didn't have money, just that it wasn't the goal of man to achieve it anymore. .

In STNG there was an episode where 3 people from the past were thawed out.

One of the men made comment that he needed to talk to his brockerage company to see how his portfolio was doing.

Picard and the rest of the crew had no concept what so ever what the man meant when he said portfolio. The whole concept was completely alien to them. Once it was explained by Data I believe their ignorance actually turned to a degree of arrogant disdain. Picard and company felt the man was a primitive because of his capitalist background.

How far down the pinko commie path do you have to go to get to that point?

 

[JacktheRabbit]

So I'd say that the UFP had a credit system that's incompatible outside of the UFP but that Earth society (I dunno about other members) does not revolve around the pursuit of riches anymore.

1. The term is called banana currency and describes money from places like the Old Soviet Union. The money is completely useless outside the country because the government enforces an artificial exchange rate that makes the money meaningless outside the territory.

2. The pursuit of riches comment is just dumb coming from Star Trek. According to Troi there is no longer sickness, greed, war, or poverty. Yet time and time again we see all of those items. DS9 showed us criminal organizations full of humans, STNG showed us entire human colonies that degenerated into utter anarchy (Tasha Yar's homeworld). In DS9 we saw Starfleet officers join the Maqui and become terrorists and we saw a Starfleet admiral on Earth try to take over Starfleet.


Basically try looking at what HAPPENS in Star Trek as opposed to the statements (which are little more than propoganda) made by people on the show and are in fact quite often and quite easily contradicted by the show itself.

The Federation is a totalitarian communist state who gives little freedom to its people and holds absolute authority over everyone who lives under it, even people like the Baku in Insurrection were under the "authority" of the Federation even though they were not members of the Federation.

 

[JacktheRabbit]

I agree with Mr Bastard - on the evidence presented, Earth appears to be a military/police state run by Starfleet, but other Federation worlds may be largely free to run their own affairs as long as they are purely domestic. The important point about the Bashir incident is that Starfleet had jurisdiction over Bashir's civilian parents, not just Bashir.

Not accurate. Star Trek Insurrection showed that Starfleet and the Federation Council feel they have absolute authority over anyone and anything within Federation Space. This even includes planets who are not members of the Federation.

 

[S'mon]

Not accurate. Star Trek Insurrection showed that Starfleet and the Federation Council feel they have absolute authority over anyone and anything within Federation Space. This even includes planets who are not members of the Federation.

I started watching Insurrection on tv but had to turn off because it was so boring. I got the impression the world was a 'primitive' one and that's why Starfleet felt they could do what they liked there? I was thinking that Federation member worlds might be allowed to retain local systems of government (the Vulcans in TOS certainly did), which might include democracy? I admit I can't think of any evidence of this from the recent shows.

 

[Viking Bastard]

It is quite certain that the Federation is gettin' corrupt. That's what too much Utopia will
do to you. DS9 dealt with it a lot (and not just with S31).

Not accurate. Star Trek Insurrection showed that Starfleet and the Federation Council feel they have absolute authority over anyone and anything within Federation Space. This even includes planets who are not members of the Federation.

Actually, it only shows that they felt that the gain of destroying the Ba'ku homeworld
outweighed the immorality of the action. Corrupt? All the way. That's what the movie
was all about. Military dictatorship? No. Just people. Not everyone is as higher-than-thou
as Picard. Not even in the 24th century.

How far down the pinko commie path do you have to go to get to that point?

And that's a bad thing? So they don't have Wall Street? Doesn't mean there isn't some
kind of money, just that they don't have a stock market. Probably all businesses are privately
owned. We do know there are businesses. The whole 'world-is-controlled-by-capitalism'
is seen in negative light in the future? Gosh. It's seen as negative now.

Plus, I'm not saying they ain't socialist, to me, that's a good thing. I'm just saying that that
doesn't mean they're a dictatorship. Can you give me any real evidence of that? Really.

The fact is just that we don't know enough about the workings of the UFP to really say.
You are just jumping to conclusions. Maybe you're right. But you can't prove it.