• The American Revolution was fought because the people felt oppressed by a government that didn’t seem like their own. The American Civil War was fought because a group of people felt as if their rights were threatened by the government. The People’s Revolution was fought because the people felt abandoned by their government. America as a whole has been formed on years and years of the people disagreeing with the government. Most times it was very small things from bills being passed, and a few major things that sparked the Three Wars. All in all, the government hasn’t always been the true voice of the people.
    Some History books still contain accurate stories of the first two wars, but any book printed that have stories of the last revolution are controlled by “The Illustrious Government of the Interdependent States of America” and you’re very unlikely to get any truth from them. My grandfather told me the true story, the one that he gathered from listening to all viewpoints and taking detailed notes. He taught me how to get the truth, and I trust the validity of this story completely. This might take a while, so I suggest you settle into a nearby chair.
    The United States of America had been a very prosperous country for many, many years. The people were relatively content, and the government would do as they were told most of the time. It seemed to be an ideal place to live, but the seeds of corruption are very subtle evils. All it took was one congressman to rig a bit of an election, and in a matter of a few decades the entire country was paying money into the government. The president was like the leader of congress’s moneymaking army, taking wealth as far away from the people as they could, transferring it into accounts stationed in Europe. They used a national debt as cover for their own wasteful stockpiling, and the people didn’t have any idea. The news media was less than active and was fully willing to sit back and report exactly what the government wanted the people to hear. Even with the lack of true information, the degrading of the people’s lives was causing unrest. Some people began wondering if the government was truly what it was supposed to be.
    Even with the beginnings of unrest, the people wouldn’t have been motivated enough to force a bill into congress for many years had not a young reporter stumbled upon something that he was not supposed to find out. The young man had been working on a report on the national debt for quite some time, investigating cases as if he were a police officer. He was looking into a computer in the capital building, thinking he would just find the average reports that he had always seen. What he did find was a shocking compilation of bank statements and personal notes on money. It seemed that every congressman had been shoveling money directly from taxes into their own personal accounts. He even saw that he true national debt, while still large by normal standards, was not nearly as large as congress claimed it to be. He quickly stored all of the data into a flash drive in a file labeled “The Cure” and left the building just before anyone noticed that he shouldn’t have had access to that computer. He quickly took it back to his office and put it all together into one large tell-all news story.
    The events that followed would become known as the Media Revolution. Normally, the people would not have believed this kind of story, dismissing it as idle fancy of a tabloid journalist. This time, however, there was significant proof of the truth in his story. The foreign powers from whom the U.S. had borrowed money cooperated and found the real total of the money they were owed by the Americans, then announced it for all of the world to hear. This announcement planted an undeniable seed of honesty into the news media, and things began to change. The large companies who were content to sit on their behinds were beginning to get up and report the real stories, and the people were learning more and more about the government that they never knew they had. Soon there was a new term for the political system of the U.S. coined by a young lawyer from Florida, the Kleptocracy, or government by thieves.
    The people began to take legislative action, hoping to use the rules of the government against the government. When the first shell was launched at the capital of Virginia just before it had voted through a petition, the people knew that the government no longer cared about its own rules. Most people could now see what it would take, a revolution was finally at hand, but they would need someone to lead them. Someone who could be their modern day George Washington, someone who wouldn’t be afraid of the government and would gladly fight for their ideals. They found this leader in the form of recently retired Sergeant Samuel “Rooster” Daniels. He was a gruff man, who knew military strategy and wasn’t afraid to put it into action. He and the few hundred soldiers who had followed him to fight for the people began training people for a militia to fight the government. The government searched desperately for his training centers, but every time they thought they had found one, they would only discover empty land with no sign of any facilities. They had no idea that the Sergeant was using underground bunkers for housing, and his marching exercises were a few miles long, ending at their next bunker. They kept very well stocked bunkers, sending out specific agents to gather food or other supplies. It was only a few short months before they were ready to fight.
    My grandfather never told me much about the battles, saying that it was better for our kind to fight with words, so I can’t really tell you about any of them. All I know is that by the time the militia had finally made it to the District Of Columbia, the country had been torn apart and the government officials had taken all of the money they could get their hands on and fled to many different countries overseas. So the people began working on a new government to take place of the old one. They asked the Sergeant to be the new leader of the government, but he refused. He told the people in an official announcement that he was a soldier, not a politician, and it was best to leave things to the ones who knew how to do it. Little did he know that his choice would open the door for a new regime of corruption that had been secretly building its plan since the beginning of the revolution.
    The foundation of the new government was sound, with a constitution very similar to the one originally set out at the beginning of the United States. What most people did not realize, however, was that it contained a few barely noticeable loopholes that would allow the aspiring regime to quickly work the government to their own advantage. They quickly passed laws through the system that cemented their new single party rule. The government became completely autonomous, putting up fake elections and other related things that made sure that the people would feel included while all of the real decisions were being made by congress. The president’s position was kept, but stripped of all of its powers so that it became nothing more than a figurehead while the people were happy and a scapegoat when they were discontent. Congress made taxes for almost no other purpose than paying into their salary. In a move to erase any debts left over from the previous government, congress cut off all ties with foreign nations, only keeping a strained relationship with Canada.
    The new nation had it’s ground set, all it needed was a new name. The states were no longer truly united, only connected by the need for order that the government provided, at least that was what they had told the people. The nation was named for this loose connection of the states, the Interdependent States of America. The name was satisfactory in the eyes of the people, who only cared about the new feeling of the government. All that they wanted was for it to be different after the revolution. They had no idea just how different it was going to be.
    The next few years were uneventful at best with a few scattered events here and there, with two great occurrences that would shape the world that we now live in. The first was the formation of the Red Shields, who set out on the mission to provide medicine to the people in a more effective fashion than the old government had with its programs. The founders of this group negotiated a deal with congress that allowed them to be exempted from taxes on their supplies as long as they made them themselves, and even allowed an amount of money to be paid to the active doctors from a small piece of the government’s tax profits. One small note before I move on: You would need to have a real desire to help people to agree to work for the Red Shields’ salaries. The other was the formation of the Rangers. The Rangers were formed by close friends of the founders of the Red Shields, who happened to be troops that served directly under Sergeant Daniels. They put in a similar offer to Congress, which would allow them to cover the laws of the land through a bounty system, which increased according to proven testimonies of illegal actions. While the bounty amounts were controlled by the Rangers, the government was responsible for the payments. While loathe to spend any unnecessary money, Congress agreed to the deal, as they had other things that they needed to focus on. In completion of this deal Rangers were allowed to supersede over the government in the area of law, even appointing judges over particular areas. I’m sure that you already know most of the functions of the two groups that help you out every day, so I’ll not continue on about them.
    It wasn’t very long after those factions were formed that the government felt the need for an insurance policy against revolutionaries. A small group of people had attempted to rise up and start another revolution for their own personal gain. While their uprising was ill advised and unsupported, it still put a bit of fear into Congress. They formed something like an army, though armed forces were not considered as needed after the isolation policy. This army-like unit is more commonly and infamously know as the NPF, the National Police Force. You know them, right? The straight and tall people in the uniforms and gasmasks that stand outside in the street and watch the people go by. The enforcers of the law who handle crimes when they are committed so that the rangers have an easier time, that’s the official reason, anyway. What they are really there to do is get rid of anyone who seems to be sparking a form of revolution against our wonderful government so that Congress can comfortably control our lives without threat.
    I may have said some negative things about them, but they aren’t all bad. In fact, a certain member of that force once saved my life and aided me in meeting the two people who encouraged me to write this article. The two people who changed my view on the government from the type of attitude that was common in the news media back in the old union. But that is a story for another day. For now, as always. Stay informed, my friends.
    -Mike Rivers, ace reporter.