OCCUPY DANCE!

SPACE. When we occupy we are not really taking space as the word usually implies, we are instead making space: for dialogue, for ideas, for alternatives, for all voices to be heard. Space is where movement happens. And it is the movement that transforms the finite space of Zuccotti Park into the infinite space of Liberty Square (which is of course everywhere). Whether a park, a community center, a classroom, or the limitless expanse of the heart and mind; it is up to us to reclaim this common space, to recognize that we need not ask permission to reclaim what is already ours.

The raid on Zuccotti Park, the Cabaret Law, and online education - are these related? Well, let’s say one wanted to restrict the right of the people to peaceably assemble without appearing to do so, one could simply privatize all the spaces where people might choose to assemble. New York City enacted the Cabaret Law in 1926 to stem interracial dancing in Harlem Jazz Clubs. From 12,000 licensed dancing venues in the 1960’s down to less than 135 today. Perhaps it was not really dance that was being restricted, but movement. When people get together to explore their freedom, there can be unforeseen consequences. Along the same lines - it’s much more convenient to have students stay at home and learn through a virtual portal than to have them actually meet other students and potentially stray from the curriculum. Who knows what kind of trouble they might get into - who they might vote for or what state they might smash?! We must reclaim our common space in order to exercise our freedom, but also to invite others to do the same.

When I originally conceived of Occupy Dance I thought of it as political movement in a literal sense, as well as an occupation of the dance world by those who already considered themselves dancers. In a society where dancers perform and teach dance in order to make a living, how can we liberate dance so that it is accessible to all? How can we release it from commodity status, an art form only to be enjoyed as spectacle for the wealthy? But the single most important aspect of Occupy Dance was the idea that ANYONE can reclaim their own body - the space that is you. You don’t need to be qualified to dance, know the steps, have the moves, or be a “good dancer” to express yourself and explore your world.

The movement is you - Occupy Dance!

Join Occupy Dance in the NYC Dance Parade this Saturday, May 18th!
Register to dance with Occupy Dance at danceparade.org or RSVP on facebook

Please sign and share petition to repeal NYC’s Cabaret Law

Photo by Andy “Fluffy” Beck

PAYING FOR WAR

When I wrote Are we courageous enough to face the why? I was responding to how we categorize those who take actions we find unfathomable as “crazy,” their actions as “senseless.” In the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy I have read, and responded to article after article that simplify the larger issue of violence in our society (and the world) to a singular conflict over “gun control.” Each side of the conflict seems quite content to call out the opposition as “extremist,” “out of touch,” etc. Despite the enormous amount of attention dedicated to the issue, I can count on one hand the number of times I have seen the weapons industry and gun manufacturers referenced in connection to the NRA and other gun advocacy groups. Instead the emphasis has been on the outrageous “polarizing” comments of individuals, and the “fringe” interests they represent. The rhetoric on both sides seems to have so many common terms it’s becoming progressively unclear to me just who owns this conflict narrative. There are, however, several things that do seem clear to me. Presenting the narrative as a conflict ultimately serves to reinforce the perception that gun owners are under attack, and strengthens any defensive argument the gun lobby makes. The righteous indignation that follows serves as validation of what I believe is essentially a coldly calculated business decision. Seen from this perspective the “extremism” is actually quite sensible: the more guns on the streets - the more violence we see - the greater our fear - the more weapons are sold. Any regulation of guns amounts to a restriction of gun sales, and less guns sold means less weapons industry profit. I am not implying that this business decision is an ethical one, but it is a rational one, and our insistence on categorizing it as extreme, crazy, senseless is only providing cover for an industry acting in its own best interest.

The other conflict dominating the news? Proposed Social Security and Medicare cuts to stem the deficit “crisis.” Similarly here, “extreme” positions mask the underlying dynamics. I do hear some talk about the deficit being a function of lost tax revenue due to massive cuts for the rich (and straight up tax evasion) coupled with high unemployment (of folks who would otherwise be paying taxes on their income). What I rarely hear is a critique of the wholesale looting of the treasury that has been pulled off by private “defense” contractors and... you guessed it... the weapons industry. Possibly a passing reference to the costly execution of two wars, the waste and mismanagement (“incompetence”), but never an actual indictment of war profiteers themselves. In Money Out of Politics, I brought up the specter of corporate leadership buying into office and then legislating for their own profit. Borrowing from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay for the Iraq War and then sounding the alarm on program insolvency should raise a little skepticism over the sincerity of those who are clearly looking to cash in on these programs through privatization. Like “gun control” the issue will be tethered to the big government/small government (no government) narrative, but again this is only to inspire outrage and provide cover. The actual objective is to funnel government money, and ultimately the resources of our people, into the coffers of a select few. Until we free ourselves from the illusion of separation between the corporate elite and “our” government leaders, the prevailing idea that politicians are merely influenced by lobbyists and not directly connected to the corporations themselves, we will continue to be trapped inside their scripted narrative. As I wrote in Visions of Peace, “As weapons dealer to the world and our own best customer, is it any wonder that American cultural promotion of war (violence, conflict, competition) is second to none?”

Tax day. How much are you paying for war?
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Take Action - Global Day of Action on Military Spending
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Related articles:
The Atlantic - Paying the Costs of Iraq, for Decades to Come
Reuters - Iraq war costs U.S. more than $2 trillion: study
Tom Engelhardt - The Enemy-Industrial Complex

MISSING MARCH

March 22, 2003 - ten years ago tomorrow: denied a march permit for Feb 15, United for Peace & Justice organizes a march expecting 50,000 participants. Just days after the initial assault of Shock and Awe - 300,000 people flood the streets of New York to say No to War. “What do you want? When do you want it?”

Tomorrow I’m going to reclaim this power. I’m going to reflect on the feeling of freedom that came from standing in solidarity with millions around the globe. I am going to renew my vision of peace.

And I am going to march. Perhaps you will pick up a sign or a banner and join me?

On Facebook, Twitter, your blog - you can wrangle an entire banner with just one person! Feel free to swipe the sign and banner images below and share them widely. You can also find the images on Facebook. Use them to share your thoughts and your feelings. Take this opportunity to reclaim, reflect, and renew. “Peace - Now.”

INDUSTRY WHORE

“What do you do?”

“I’m a Graphic Designer.”

For years, this was my response. I had been developing my own definition of graphic designer ever since I came across the term in a high school careers workbook. It wasn’t the same as artist, and it had a $25,000 salary attached to it. It was not simply about self-expression, but about communicating information, and it dealt with people called clients. In college my definition expanded exponentially to encompass every new artistic discipline I could get my hands on. Photography, illustration, typography, art history - all servants to design, all simple tools to realize my larger vision. Massimo Vignelli’s spoons told me that design could be anything and everything (or was it that everything could be designed?). So imagine my surprise, after a semester long project designing a style guide, when my most cherished professor asks me if I wouldn’t be better off in fine arts? Pick a company, design a logo, select typefaces, pick colors, etc. and define how all these variables will be applied to insure a consistent identity across a multitude of applications (referred to as branding nowadays). Anti-authoritarian rule breaker that I was, I didn’t pick a company - I picked Greenpeace. Visiting the Greenpeace Action office in New York, I could see the singularity of the Greenpeace identity, but I could also see power in the diversity of ways that the group represented itself. So I set out to create a modular, customizable, identity system - rather than restrict their identity to a single symbol. This didn’t go over too well at my critique, but more importantly, my selection of a social awareness organization seemed to call into question the very nature of graphic design itself. Many of my peers were enormously critical of my choice, believing that expression had no place within graphic design. That my chosen client clearly had a great deal to express apparently had no bearing on this. One of the first promotional pieces I designed for Forth Position was a mock style guide, subverting and redefining the objectives of the format.

Hitting the streets of New York after graduation, I charmed my way into meeting after meeting with the designers who had inspired me in college. When I had the opportunity to talk face to face with these talented men and women, I became increasingly aware of the gap between the vanguard design work I was familiar with and the day to day grind demanded by the industry. This didn’t come as a total surprise, but I had imagined that there were certain designers (certain studios) that had been able to free themselves from this duality, to somehow integrate their design production and do only good work. Along the way I had the distinct pleasure of working ever so briefly with the brilliant Marlene McCarty and Donald Moffett at Bureau, and of being offered a job at M&Co (which sadly dissolved due to lack of funds). Many of my top choices were struggling through the economic recession, so I felt quite lucky when Emily Oberman, then at M&Co, referred me to her close friend Bonnie Siegler, then Art Director at VH1 On-Air Graphics. Over the next four and a half years I gained first hand experience working with all the newly emerging tools of non-linear production and motion graphics, none of which were available while I was in college. My severance bought my first Mac (clone) and my apartment was transformed into a motion graphics studio quite literally overnight. Cable network identity and movie channel promotion was certainly not part of my original design brief for Forth Position, but the work was preferable to pimping for Nike and Coca-Cola. Having written a paper in college critical of the consolidation of media, I had no illusions that in the end I was ultimately working for the same interests. I was able to command a higher day rate freelancing motion graphics, and could therefore afford to work less often. This allowed me to devote more time to political organizing, and come 2000, I went all in.

“What do you do?”

“I’m a Peacemaker.”

A stolen election, another Bush’s recession, and the war on terror - the next several years were a blur of political organizing for me. Protesting* to stop one war, protesting to prevent another, protesting the dictator himself. Hitting the streets again, this time for Peace & Justice, I was overwhelmed by the palpable feeling of freedom that came from standing in solidarity with millions around the globe. Marching with 300,000 in New York City was like being part of a river - it wasn’t about resistance, or conflict, it was about the inevitability of our momentum. The numbers were amazing, but did placing such emphasis on turnout diminish the power, the significance of other smaller rallies and marches? Why did it seem that the only way to be heard was to get thousands of people to show up? Did more people make the message more diverse, or just louder? Where did this emphasis on turnout come from? The media was insistent on the event having a singular message, a sound bite answer to the question of “what are they protesting?” There was no allowance made for multiple perspectives on the same issue, or for interrelated issues. The whole thing struck me as some kind of absurd competition orchestrated by the media and the interests they represent. The success or failure of the protest was to be measured in seconds of airtime, number of columns, size of the photograph… Time and time again we found ourselves in competition with the conveniently leaked government news event of the day. But the competition didn’t stop there. Awareness organizations, each with their own particular issue, were made to compete with each other to get their messages heard, to raise funds, even to find staff and volunteers to do the day to day work and necessary outreach. The status quo excels at provoking the conflict, escalating the argument, making the situation seem desperate - they don’t have to work so hard silencing us when they can get us shouting over the top of one another to be heard.

 

If I wasn’t on the street leading a chant, rangling banners, organizing buses, getting signatures, I was likely in a meeting discussing how to go about it. Paying work was harder to come by, with the occasional larger job affording me the resources to pursue my own independent projects. Notobush was one such project, and while it was a success, it was not a money maker. I still hadn’t found a way to make prioritizing awareness, over profit, pay the bills. For the first time in my career I felt that I had a project that should be in the design annuals that had been such an inspiration to me as a young designer. So I entered the project into the AIGA 365 competition. Taking a line from the Forth Position Design Style Manual, and in the spirit of protest/demonstration that the work had derived from, I entered the entire project under the category “signage.”

The outcome of the 2004 (s)election had many within the movement switching back to strategies of damage control. Having to argue with the tax man over notobush related fees wasn’t punishment from on high, but it sure felt like it. Most of my paying work now no longer came from the networks themselves, many relying heavily on in-house designers or contracting out to a few larger studios.  Subcontracting through another studio meant less control over the specific jobs I worked on, and refusing a job due to ethical concerns wasn’t the best way to insure your spot on the short list for the next job. After the 2008 crash, many of the folks who had been keeping me busy were out pounding the pavement themselves. In the absence of any work to speak of, a producer friend of mine and I joked about pooling our resources and starting a lemonade stand. Television and the internet now offered a virtually limitless number of “channels,” an exponential expansion in real estate to split their resources among. The rise of reality TV ushered in a significantly lower threshold (and significantly lower budgets) for quality design. Marketing shows based on other successful shows had clients looking for “design” based on prior successful designs. While there were still plenty of designers doing beautiful work, I was seeing a glut of what I began to refer to as template design: 3d typography exploding from the center of the screen - light effects and lens flares at no extra cost! As I wrote in an earlier post, it can be challenging and frightening facing the prospect that the work you have spent most of your life doing may simply no longer be necessary, but these moments also bring the opportunity to reassess what it is that you truly want to do. In my early years as a designer, I thought of the concepts of design and innovation as inseparable. Within this new market driven repetitive design model, innovation was more often an unacceptable risk. I would go as far as to say that the model was actually pitting recognition of design that was tried and true directly against appreciation for anything new. Central here is the idea that the consumer (and the client) is more likely to buy that which they already recognize, so we should give them what they “want.” Of course in an industry where the very basis of desire is fabricated, who is to say what people really want?

So if I get paid to make shit smell great, to repackage the same old thing in the pre-approved newest freshest way - what am I? Am I really still a designer at all? Perhaps I was mistaken and this is what graphic design was always about? I purchased the domain industrywhore.com with the intention to explore this a bit. My original thought was to send out t-shirts emblazoned with an Industry Whore “logo” to everyone I know in the design industry, and perhaps a few others others I haven’t had the opportunity to meet personally. I started thinking about the responses I might get from my peers. Would they feel insulted by this? Would they feel liberated by someone finally stating the obvious? Would they struggle with whether or not to wear such a shirt? Would they wear it proudly, having accepted the role and the monetary reward that goes with it? Would my critique open up space for us to have a dialogue about such things or would it only provoke conflict? I’m still on the fence about all of this. When my two closest design comrades and I were in school we pledged to “burn the design world to the ground,” but I have no desire to hurt others who are doing their best to survive within a system they feel powerless to change. I must ask though - what if all of us, with our tremendous collective creativity, skill, and experience in communications, were to redirect our energies toward the change we wish to see? If this sounds too ambitious, maybe we have different ideas about the change we wish to see or have trouble imagining how we can make this change while still making a living, perhaps we could start smaller?

When I was starting out I wrote to a potential client deconstructing the pro bono process, pointing out that the firm designing their environmental campaign free of charge would likely turn around and use the work to promote themselves, ironically to score future work from the oil industry. I was attempting to position myself as an ally and a valuable resource, one that was not working simultaneously for and against the interests of my social awareness clients. Was this worth something to my clients? My friend Noah Scalin, founder of Another Limited Rebellion, writes:

It's extremely frustrating that many non-profits expect that design work should be done for free. They pay for rent, electricity, photocopies, etc. but when it comes to branding/marketing they assign no budget, and by extension no value, to it. Obviously the primary goal of an organization should be providing their products/services, whatever they may be, but if they are to have any impact at all they need to let people know that those products/services are available! It doesn't matter how great an organization they are, if no one hears about them or what they're up to, then no one will benefit from the work they're doing. And design is the primary tool by which an audience is reached with an organization's message.

When non-profits expect work done for free they're also expecting that the designers they are hiring should make a living doing something else. And there's the rub, since many times they end up working with larger ad agencies who make their profits from the very roots of the problems they're trying to resolve. And the agency's goals are generally to make award winning pieces that elevate their own status, rather than actually focusing on the success of the non-profit. If an organization truly wants to make the world a better place, they need to also consider all of the vendors that they choose to work with as well. By supporting designers that are also working for positive social change they are going to make a bigger aggregate difference.

As in my earlier example concerning turnout at a protest, I find myself asking where the emphasis on work for hire comes from? Perhaps it is intrinsic to graphic design? After all we are providing a service. But I think it is more than just this. Corporate design, advertising, design that makes money has long been prioritized within the field, even to the extent of dismissing other less profitable forms of design. Is work I am financially compensated for in competition with work I do for free? Is it possible to shift the imposed hierarchy beyond compensation, so that the values we embed in our work comprise the value of our work? What does this graphic design look like? How will it, and the designers who create it, be supported?

Lately I am finding it more challenging to answer the “what do you do?” question. I’m still in love with design, but the grand ideas and the precious details that once made it so alluring to me are easy to miss in our current culture of information overload. The systematic elimination of this preciousness by powerful interests seeking to own and propagate their singular (saleable) visions is disturbing to say the least, but my feelings are more complicated when it comes to the loss of preciousness as it relates to the rise of democracy. Throughout my organizing I have seen how important it is to allow space for dialogue, to make room for all voices to be heard. This process often requires letting go of the specific way I think something should be done, allowing the process to move forward to reveal unknown outcomes rather than predicting and controlling the result. I have spent much of my career looking for the next big idea, the quintessential project that will bring fame, fortune, and notoriety. And similarly questioning - which grand idea, which specific catalyst, will make all the difference and shift the paradigm in an instant? It occurred to me recently that this thought pattern is perhaps a product of connecting my artistry to my livelihood early on, and that giving it so much head space was blocking me from seeing other possibilities for myself. What would I do if money were no object? What would I do if the struggle was over? Can we set aside the superlatives and honor the intrinsic value of all living beings for just being alive? When I was little people would ask “what do you want to be when you grow up?” Teachers would encourage me to “be somebody.” Of course, I already was somebody. And so are you.
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*I prefer the term demonstrating, but am using protesting for the sake of clarity: demonstrating an alternative path rather than simply protesting against injustice.
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If you absolutely NEED to have an Industry Whore t-shirt, for yourself or someone you love, leave a comment or drop me a note to get the ball rolling
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March 22, 2003 World Says No to War banner photo by Diane Greene Lent

VISIONS OF PEACE?

I want to try something new with this post. Lately I’ve been exploring how concepts like control, leadership, direction and sense of purpose, relate to empowerment and the creative impulse itself. With this in mind I’ve kept this post intentionally brief to open up space for your responses.

I’ve had this idea rattling around in my head for what I think might be a film, a film called simply - Peace. Throughout my involvement in the peace & justice movement I have met a number of organizers/activists who view the movement as one long ceaseless struggle. I have great respect for my sisters and brothers, for their passion and resolve, but I find myself wondering what happens after the struggle?

I have recently come across two strategies for realizing our creative potential. One focuses on removing obstacles that get in the way of being your true self, the creative spirit effortlessly emerging with the restriction removed. The other focuses on visualizing where you are headed, seeing yourself already there; obstacles fall away, replaced by this new focus of your attention. I like both of these approaches. I conceive of the Peace “film,” as a kind of visionary reference point, a common shared experience that might make it easier for us to recognize moments of peace wherever they exist (whenever they happen) in our lives and in our world.

As weapons dealer to the world and our own best customer, is it any wonder that American cultural promotion of war is second to none? Images of war (of violence and cruelty), those depicting the harsh reality of war and those meant to hide it from us, easily come to mind. But what of peace? Does peace appear more elusive simply because we haven’t taken the time, made the effort, to develop a peace vocabulary to speak of it?

Why a film? Primarily because of the grand scope of the medium; its ability to deliver powerful, meaningful, moving images; and its ease of replication and distribution. But also because, though films usually have a director, the scope of the medium generally requires a collaborative approach. That said, there is no set medium for this project. Indeed, an exploration of the very concept of medium might be one facet in the evolution of this idea...

Please accept my invitation to dialogue, to share your visions of peace with myself and other readers in the comments below. Feel free to approach this from any direction, any perspective, addressing any aspect of the idea that resonates with you. I am excited to hear your thoughts and I thank you for sharing them. 

THE END OF THE WORLD

So the world didn’t actually end, or did it? On the night that Hurricane Sandy hit New York I wrote a post titled “Are you listening?” concerning the way we deal with crisis after the fact rather than addressing the root causes ahead of time. We focus on preparing for the approaching crisis so that we can “weather the storm,” but we rarely take preventative measures to deal with the real challenge and its underlying causes. I don’t want to suggest there is a one size fits all response to this pattern, but I do think that we should pay closer attention to who profits from the crisis, from not taking steps to prevent it, and how our reactions may be manipulated to that end. Perhaps we need to break with the past and start addressing potential emergencies (not to be confused with the fabricated crisis after crisis coming out of our political process) from a perspective of providing for the common good rather than a function of defense. Maybe this “end of the world,” with multiple crises, real and fabricated on tap, is a good time to re-examine our priorities.

In the quiet days following Sandy, with our internet down but our power still intact (and much of the city shut down), we ventured to the video store (remember those?). On display at the counter was the movie The Day After Tomorrow. I remember when the film was released it was promoted as a fun way to raise awareness about global warming. I love a good doomsday flick, but now, with large areas of New York underwater, hundreds of homes destroyed, countless people without power, heat, food, clothing, shelter - it had lost its appeal. My partner and I were fortunate to live in an area relatively undamaged by the impact of the storm. Over this last year we have kept a computer near the bed when we sleep to periodically check in with the National Weather Service Radar. We have become more vigilant about such things since a tornado passed within half a block of our apartment. That same summer we spent my birthday camped out in an interior room, avoiding the windows during Hurricane Irene. Having lived in this neighborhood for nearly 20 years, this is something entirely new to me. During the summer there now seems to be a fairly regular pattern of storms passing through Brooklyn, building relatively quickly, some with tornado warnings in tow. There was no warning issued prior to the tornado I witnessed - someone got caught with their pants down... Two more tornadoes touched down in Brooklyn and Queens less than two months before Hurricane Sandy arrived in NYC. Seeing the devastation after Sandy left me with a distinct impression, we were lucky - this time.

Back before the millennium, while some folks were frantically stocking up on canned goods, I was tremendously optimistic about what might be coming in the new century. All of that changed for me when an unelected imbecile was installed in the White House following the 2000 election debacle, only gaining legitimacy through his forceful response to the 9/11 tragedy. When Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans I couldn’t help but think about how the Iraq war had come home. Surely with the media focused so intensely on the details of the disaster there would be no way to hide any opportunism that might take place in the aftermath of the storm - forced relocation, land grabs, real estate developments, a redistribution of voters, privatization of schools. Imbedded Iraq war journalists might not be expected to report exactly how Iraq’s abundant oil resources would be ultimately delivered into the hands of foreign corporate interests for “safe keeping,” but this was happening right here in the USA! I don’t believe it to be mere coincidence that the largest US petroleum producing region is off the coast of Louisiana, accounting for 80% of US deep water oil production. I read news articles at the time about national guard troops mobilized from outside Louisiana (and therefore responsible to federal rather than state authority) to “protect” land that was now vacant after the relocation of former residents. This kind of federal intervention in state affairs might seem warranted in lieu of the magnitude of the crisis, but again, I think it is important to consider who stands to benefit from the shift of control. If the land and resources are held in perpetuity, does the controlling party (occupying force) have the authority to lease the land, to harvest the resources? Should these decisions be made on a local community level, or by those with a controlling stake in the oil and gas industry? The argument is generally that these resources are too important (a matter of national interest) to be managed on a local level, that “experts” must be consulted in order to manage the resources correctly and efficiently. And who are these “experts”? They are professionals from the oil and gas industry of course, “experts” that will reap the profits from the decisions they make. The fox guarding the henhouse.

Within weeks of Sandy, Congress passed (and the President signed) legislation “authorizing the Secretary of the Interior to allow the construction and operation of natural gas pipeline facilities in the Gateway National Recreation Area and for other purposes.” Will the folks who live in the Rockaways, one of the areas hardest hit by Hurricane Sandy, have any recourse if this federal level deal turns out badly for them? If many of these former residents are not allowed to return or “choose” not to return (they are bought out or informed that their land is uninhabitable, etc.) after the storm, will it go unreported as in New Orleans? Is this an attempt to create a buffer zone around industry, to shield industry from regulation, to hide questionable conduct from the public? While we focus on the crisis at hand, is industry being allowed to convert our homes and our public assets into a means of production and delivery of their product? Strangely ironic that the rationale for this initiative is presented as a means to stem climate change through transition to “cleaner burning natural gas,” sponsored by the congressional representatives of people who lost their homes to the storm.

I recently attended a demonstration down the street from Mayor Bloomberg’s uptown residence - we were not allowed to be across the street as the entire block had been barricaded on both sides before we arrived. My partner and I held simple signs made on the spot that read SANDY IS NOT OVER and OCCUPYSANDY.COM FOR MORE INFO. The relationships that Occupy Wall Street engenders through its horizontal organizing model permits a back and forth between actual people that is much harder to achieve when dealing with larger hierarchical organizations. Assessing people’s immediate needs after the storm and finding creative ways to address them was a perfect match for Occupy. Time and time again I have heard people say the simple phrase “how can I help?” There is no need to be in control, no opportunism, no ulterior motive - just a genuine desire to help. I read an AP article that claimed, “The world heard the cry as that camp grew and inspired other ones around the globe. Ultimately, though, the movement collapsed under its leaderless format, and Occupy became largely forgotten. But core members, and a spirit, have persisted and found a new cause in Occupy Sandy.” I wrote the following comment:

Americans don’t want to believe that the Occupy movement was systematically repressed around the country and around the world. It is more comfortable to believe that a “leaderless format” must inevitably lead to the demise of OWS, but just because this narrative has been repeated over and over in the main stream media does not make it true. Similarly, just because the media hasn’t been there to cover the tremendous work of OWS over the last year doesn’t mean it did not happen. Rather than wasting words forecasting the demise or longevity of Occupy (we’ve heard that all before), why not write about how amazingly effective the Occupy model continues to be despite the systematic repression that occupiers have faced across the country and around the world over this past year? It is the way OWS deals with these and other challenges that makes it so special, not necessarily the specifics of the challenges themselves.

While researching for this post I came across a piece by Kevin Gosztola responding along the same lines to the false assessment in the AP article. What I think is really important to recognize here is that while it is clearly a good idea for us to address major challenges like climate change and its effects (as well as other emergencies) through some type of collective action, we must get beyond the default of relying on our military (and other hierarchical institutions) in these situations. It really should not be surprising when institutions focused largely on force and control turn out not to be the best suited to provide assistance and comfort. And we should not be surprised if, when these institutions are deployed, there turns out to be some motivation beyond the goodwill of the American people.

So what will it take for us to prioritize caring for one another over controlling one another? As we narrowly escape yet another “end of the world” and enter into this new year can we take a moment to visualize the path that we wish to take forward, setting aside the restrictions of what may or may not be possible? Can we see this as an opportunity for us to rethink our conditioned responses, to reset our reactions, to renew our resolve? Is this cultural obsession with catastrophic endings just a way for us to avoid the possibility that we may actually all have to live here together forever? It certainly makes it easier not to take responsibility for our actions, for how we treat one another, if the whole thing is going up in smoke anyway. There doesn’t seem to be any indication of catastrophe at the “end” of the Mayan calendar. We don’t expect the world to end every New Year’s Eve (well there was that one in 1999...). A cycle ends, another begins - it is up to us how we choose to take advantage of this new day. The more I hear the ceaseless din of crisis, the clearer it becomes that the first step through the noise may simply be to not join in the hysteria and outrage. If we can reroute this energy into seeking out a deeper camaraderie and compassion through interaction with our sisters and brothers, we will already be demonstrating a new vision of what is possible.

Peace in the New Year.
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Forth Position designed sign for Febuary 17th climate change rally/march in DC.

Are we courageous enough to face the why?

It’s hard for me to approach this subject. I have no desire to capitalize on the current news cycle frenzy, but each time something of this magnitude happens I find myself thinking along very similar lines, and I feel I would be remiss if I did not call attention to the pattern that I see played out over and over and over...

Despite the continuous coverage dedicated to these events, the incessant repetitive replaying of every possible detail, the why of the tragedy never seems to come fully into focus. Those responsible are quickly categorized as “crazy,” their actions as “senseless,” any acknowledgement of their motivations is carefully sidestepped to avoid the appearance of endorsing their actions. Faced with such horror, people reflexively recoil; it is too frightening to think that there could be a reason for this behavior, that there might be a rationale to it, that it might be a predictable pattern. It is far easier to see it as the random terrible act of a disturbed individual, to see the act and the perpetrator as “evil.” But if we refuse to deal with the specifics of these tragedies in this way, how can we ever hope to address the multitude of factors that give rise to such tragic events?

We live in a society that is perpetually redefining our very concept of reality. Our leaders routinely tell half truths and often outright lie in order to score political points, their agendas validated by a media that willfully reinforces the chosen narratives. They initiate pre-emptive wars based on false intelligence, rationalizing the death of innocents through an ever escalating campaign of fear. While we watch our president shed tears for the Sandy Hook victims, his administration executes a predator drone kill list, resulting in numerous civilian casualties; men, women and children. We have been at war for the longest period in our country’s history, but less than 1% of our population is actively serving in our military. More soldiers are committing suicide than are being killed in action. The best selling video game of all time is a first-person shooter called Call of Duty: Black Ops, selling more than 25 million copies worldwide with more than half of those sold in the US alone.

We have “reality” television where the focus is almost invariably fame and fortune, certainly not the banal day to day details of our daily lives (there’s no ratings potential in that). Similarly, the “news” is so focused on sensational stories, that investigative reporting has become the exception rather than the rule. Important events often go unreported - as if they didn’t actually occur. Blockbuster films are increasingly dark and “gritty,” to infuse them with a sense of “realism.” Of late I have noted a reliance on depictions of pain and suffering to connect with the audience on a more visceral level, to convince them that what they are witnessing on the screen is more than fiction. These type of depictions no longer seem to have a genre (or story) specific character, and show up all over the map. Of course, the more common these depictions become, the less we respond to them, and the more intense they must be to elicit any response at all.

Inundated with images of violence and cruelty, our dominant narrative one of competition and conflict - are we losing our ability to envision alternatives? Politics, entertainment, & marketing have become indistinguishable, their influence on our lives so omnipresent that it is increasingly difficult to recognize their presence. The privatization of education is but another step in this process, another method for restricting our perception of “reality.” Many parents & teachers believe that they are preparing children for “the real world,” sparing them future suffering by forcing them to follow the rules. But the resulting stigmatization of difference, of resistance, of creativity can create a confusing impasse. We encourage them to be the best, to excel, to stand out from the crowd while we simultaneously demand they fit in. How are their young minds to make sense of this contradiction? Are we teaching them to create their own reality or simply accept the ones marketed to them?

Somehow, despite all the mixed messages, we expect people to be able to discern what is real and what is not, to recognize right from wrong, and to do it on their own. Ruling with absolute authority, whether as a politician or a parent, leaves precious little space for dialogue. In our punitive culture, where any deviation from the prescribed plan is met with ridicule, is it any wonder that people suffer in silence rather than seek counsel? Do people stay silent because they fear there will be consequences if they reveal their thoughts? Are we tolerant enough not to penalize those that step forward - tolerant enough to hear perceptions that may not match our own? Are we compassionate enough to deal with the sense of powerlessness that many in our society feel? Are we responsible enough to recognize our role in modeling violence as the solution of choice? Are we creative enough, and sensible enough, to come up with alternatives?

In the wake of the tragedy there are calls for gun control legislation, treatment for mental illness, greater security in our schools; but perhaps we need to move beyond these singular solutions. Are we courageous enough to face the why?
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Related - NYT Business, 12/24: Real and Virtual Firearms Nurture a Marketing Link

VOTE EVERY DAY

As to be expected, there is a lot of post election speculation as to how and why the Obama campaign emerged victorious. While the variety of explanations are as numerous as the reports themselves, there is one uniformly consistent thread that was sited before and after the election - voter turnout. On one side of the proverbial aisle are those who forecast another close election with a razor thin margin of victory, on the other are those that point to pre-election polls that seem to have predicted the final results with surprising accuracy. The emphasis on voter turnout comes out of the close election scenario: when the electorate is evenly split, the deciding factor may well be how many people show up versus how many stay home. Voter turnout may seem like a given in terms of deciding an election (any election), but the overemphasis on it in this particular case feels artificial to me, as if it is being used to draw attention away from some other perspective. I recently wrote a post questioning the 50/50 electoral polarization myth that has become such a staple of our political discussions. Voter turnout can be a factor when one party has a clear majority, but even if the minority party turns out every last one of their voters, they may still be in the minority.

The appeal to fear of a changing electorate was overwhelmingly strident throughout this electoral cycle. Republicans’ brazen attacks on African American, Latino, LGBT, and Women’s rights inspired a surge at the polls that could not be stopped even through rampant voter suppression. But the extremity of these attacks simultaneously allowed Democrats to adopt a protective stance, rather than one advocating to expand the rights in question. The fear cuts both ways it seems, insuring that those less enthusiastic about Obama’s record don’t take the risk of voting for someone more in line with their concerns. The Obama Administration is happy to accept your support whether or not you agree with their agenda - just keep it to yourself. But perhaps the changing electorate is more than the Democrats bargained for. What if those so passionately mobilized to vote by the attacks on their rights refuse to back down? What if they move beyond this protective stance to mobilize for the expansion of those rights? What if they shift en masse from a strategy of simply making demands on those in power to one of development and mobilization of their own alternatives, and start using those alternatives to withdraw their consent from the status quo? What if they are no longer satisfied with voting every four (two, four, six) years? What if they choose instead to vote every day?

A freshly re-elected president brought to tears in a moment of connection with the young volunteers so integral to his campaign; it was certainly not something I had seen before, and I found myself surprisingly moved by the spectacle. It appeared intimate, and personal, and the president’s words were remarkably humble. After I watched it I thought about how this address might be different from others that the president has made. Watching him enter and exit the scene I wondered if there would be any opportunity for these “smarter,” “better organized” and “more effective” volunteers to share their hopes and dreams for the country, to participate in an actual dialogue with their president? A little more than a week later I read a short article titled, “Obama campaign asks: What do we do next?” The link in the article delivered me to an Obama for America survey. Was this the medium for dialogue? Perhaps this document could be a starting point for the volunteers to input their ideas beyond the election cycle? As I read through the three pages it was apparent that the reference point for the questions was mostly limited to the campaign and future campaigns. There were a few questions that allowed for short “write in” answers and several at the end requested a sentence or two, but by and large the questions focused more on “how can we campaign better” than “What do we do next?”

One survey question asked “What issues would you be interested in volunteering or organizing around in the future?” Among the 24 options there was only one issue that expressed a specific viewpoint in the way that it was stated: “Avoiding the fiscal cliff.” When the Bush tax cuts were originally supposed to sunset in 2010, the Republicans played their tried and true “tax and spend liberal” card to flip the switch and claim that allowing the tax cuts to expire was in fact Obama raising taxes. A clear majority of the country was not in favor of extending the tax cuts for the wealthy, but Bush & Co. were crafty enough to design the tax cuts as a reduction of rates across the board. The tax cuts for the lower tax brackets were a pittance next to the windfall for the 1%, but tethering the two together allowed Republicans to push the idea that Obama would be “raising taxes” on everyone. The ball was already rolling on the so called “fiscal cliff” prior to the election, setting it up as a showdown, an impending crisis just beyond the horizon. Once again the Republicans are playing that same card, attempting to run the table. My understanding is that even after we go over the “cliff” Congress could pass legislation retroactive to January 1 (extending the cuts for the “middle class”), but the narrative would be significantly different. With the cuts officially expired, the Republicans would have to defend higher taxes on the “middle class.” Sounds like a pretty good move strategically, so why then is Obama for America promoting the “fiscal cliff” narrative?

I’m hearing a lot of talk about the Obama ground game and the effective use of collected information - this tremendous marketing campaign seems to have paid off, but what have we learned? Are we being sold a president the same way we are sold a pair of sneakers or a box of cereal? Are we being invited to participate in our democracy when we answer the polls and surveys? Is this collected information useful in addressing the challenges we face or is it just a mechanism for securing our vote, and through that vote our deference to authority? I read an article that mentioned grassroots movements in conjunction with supporting the administration’s agenda, but this top down approach (the agenda being set by the president) seems contrary to the very nature of grassroots organizing. In yet another post election piece I read this:

Following re-election, the president wasted no time taking advantage of the organization's massive base. Obama spoke to 30,000 supporters on a conference call last Tuesday about the fiscal cliff, rallying the troops as he began negotiations with congressional leaders to find a deficit-reduction package.

"Our work can't stop now," he said, according to audio of the call. "We're going to need you guys to stay active. We need you to stick with us and stay on this and I'm pledging to do a better job even than we did in the first term in making sure you guys stay involved, that you guys know exactly what we're doing, that we're giving you guys clear directions and talking points in terms of how we keep mobilizing across the country."

We don’t need a marketing campaign to keep us engaged, keep us busy, keep us quiet. Can the OFA network, or perhaps another network altogether, be used instead to ask our people how they think we should address the challenges we face? Perhaps as a means to submit proposals, compile ideas, develop solutions to these challenges? Elevation of ideas from the bottom up is what grassroots is all about - the community participates, not as de facto liberal lobbyists and cheerleaders, but in the actual process of policy development and decision making. When it comes to the “fiscal cliff” Obama is asking us to make Republicans concede to his demands, not to make him concede to ours. With few specifics being offered we are expected to support an agenda that we have had no part in creating. I can recall talking to Bush supporters in 2004 about their “$300 tax rebate” when they brought it up as a reason to re-(s)elect Bush, and asking them if their city and state taxes went up to balance the loss of federal revenue. Isn’t bush getting your vote for nothing if the same amount of income is extracted from you one way or the other? How do you feel about getting duped like that? Will our states and cities be made to compensate for Obama’s proposed federal spending cuts? What and how much will we be asked to sacrifice in order to keep “our” tax cut and make the 1% pay their “fair share”? When you get to the end of the survey there’s a button labeled “submit.”

Is this entire campaign an empty distraction? Mobilizing Americans, not to stop federal fracking legislation, not to repeal NDAA indefinite detention, not to press for climate change ACTION in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, but to tell stories to their congressional representative about what they could do with that 2,000 bucks (for a “typical” middle class family of four). I've written before about how electoral politics is used to distract us from pursuing any kind of direct democratic action: as a siphon of limited time and organizing energy, but also as a restraint to keep us in line. Is this new perpetual Obama campaign just another method of instilling a false sense of purpose in the volunteers? On Black Friday I saw a report on the news where a young man interviewed outside the local Walmart talked about the sense of camaraderie he found waiting in line - it was like they all had a common cause...

I recently worked on a video for a David Weinberger talk titled “The Networking of Knowledge and Storytelling.” The producer on the project and I had a discussion at our initial meeting about the formation and evolution of ideas, sketching tiny diagrams to represent the flow of information. Person A says “Apple,” person B says “Orange.” Weinberger presented a model of networked knowledge stemming from linked ideas, ideas often in contention. “We know now in networks, not as individuals.” It reminded me of concepts that I was becoming familiar with through involvement with Occupy Wall Street. I had been learning about consensus and was beginning to understand how an idea that was evolved through a small group, a working group or an affinity group, might avoid the defensive trappings of ideas proposed by individuals. An individual might spark the process in the group, but it seemed to me that most ideas had a kind of life of their own that preceded their initial proposal. It struck me that this process was a method to free “our” ideas from ownership, to let them exist independent of individual ego and belief, to invite and encourage modification of the ideas through alternative perspectives. Of course, the form of horizontal direct democracy that OWS is evolving is quite different than what we see practiced in our government.

When the president tells us that his first job is “to keep the American people safe,” he is fortifying his patriarchal role, inviting us to breathe a collective sigh of relief that we have someone in the White House watching out for us. Certainly there is comfort in trusting that our leaders know what to do and how to do it, but how does the president’s role as decider - protector - leader fit into the community organizing model that he seems to favor? There is comfort in having direction and feeling a sense of purpose, but folks need never define these things for themselves if they are consistently provided for them. Is it ultimately more empowering to take control and lead the way, or to allow people the freedom to choose their own path? And what do we lose when we supplant the collective potential of many people with the perspective of a single individual? The representative democracy practiced in the US need not inhibit community empowerment so long as representatives are selected by the community to represent the ideas of the community, but where there is forceful repression of alternative forms of democracy, there will likely be “leaders” who are no longer representative.

When Obama says “we’re all in this together,” does this togetherness involve us organizing/mobilizing with and for each other or only in support of the president’s agenda? The close election scenario, the polarized electorate, the “fiscal cliff,” whatever it is called - it is a contest, a conflict, a crisis marketed to the masses. Another distraction in a long series of ever more urgent events, signaling our minds to shut down our creative potential and focus on securing our survival. There may be actual consequences if action is not taken immediately (what kind of crisis would it be without dire consequences after all?), but this does not change the fact that it is a fabrication, an abstraction that we have created and that we consent to. We should not limit ourselves solely to the options that are placed before us, Democrat or Republican, taxes and/or spending cuts, jobs or environment, unions or budget shortfalls, energy independence or climate change action... This process is self perpetuating in that the original challenge is replaced by a conflict, requiring us to make a “choice” rather than seek a creative solution (or multiple solutions). Is it even possible within the present construct for the President to ask us for ideas and assistance without compromising his status as a “leader”? Whatever the answer, we must recognize that the limits of the presidency, the Congress, the government do not need to be our limits as well. Thank you for voting. Thank you for exercising your power. It’s yours - you can do it every day.

33%

Ok - I have this theory that is looking for some research, but how does one research something like this? Since the 2000 (s)election, possibly even before that, my political advisor and I have been talking about a breakdown of the American electorate that amounts to approximately 60% of folks who are eligible to vote actually voting. A 50+% majority of this group of voters is therefore only 30+% of those eligible to vote. This brought me to a simple, perhaps unverifiable, intuitive idea: what if this 50/50 split, this “polarized” electorate we hear about after every presidential (s)election, before and after every congressional vote, is a myth? Why would the Republican party put such herculean effort into suppressing the vote (chasing statistically non-existent “voter fraud”) if they actually had the numbers to win? So I came up with a shorthand to use in our conversations: Republicans/Conservatives are only 33% of the electorate - there are no more votes beyond that cap. I believe this is why Bush & his cabal had to steal two elections and why the mobilization of greater numbers of eligible voters has made it impossible for the RNC to keep up. I have often wondered why the Democratic party and it’s supporters do not simply make these numbers (provided my intuitive sense is correct here) known publicly. Perhaps they are concerned that this would seem overly partisan? That going on record with something like this might be suppressive in itself, akin to telling Republicans/Conservatives that they can’t win so they should just stay home. Maybe it’s just too hard to get a real fix on these numbers in a country where the number of people who don’t vote is consistently higher than the “majority” that “wins” the (s)election. With that in mind, maybe the status quo (the 50/50 horserace model) is more appealing to the Democrats than the risky prospect of informing the electorate that a third party win is statistically possible...

I think that questioning authority requires a recognition that those in authority have the means to manipulate what we accept as “objective” facts, including control over delivery of these “objective” facts (via media, education, socialization, etc.). It is up to us to look to one another, alternative sources of information, and our intuitive understanding to see through the veneer of this “objectivity.” This is not to say that we should make a policy of disregarding “reality,” “truth,” or the “facts” but that a greater understanding comes when we keep in mind that we are all subjective beings, each with our own perceptions and interpretations of the “reality” around us.

SNAKE OIL SALESMEN

Monday morning, back to work. The day before the election, a week after the storm. So many still in darkness. Challenging times like these can be opportunities to reflect on the decisions we have made and the path before us. I sincerely hope that we do not miss this opportunity in a rush back to the comfort of our normal routine.

Health Care, Education, Energy, Environment, Jobs... During the 2008 election cycle I produced two campaign videos to draw attention to the essential differences between Kucinich policy positions and the obligatory bullet points found on each of the other democratic primary candidates respective websites. For example, when Dennis Kucinich talked about “universal health care,” he was talking about a not-for-profit single payer system: Medicare for all - House Resolution 676. Barack Obama and media covering the primary used the term “universal health care” interchangeably with the newly minted “affordable health care,” obscuring the definition of the term “universal” and making it next to impossible to have a conversation about the relative differences of the policies. Later in the primary (long after Kucinich had been vanquished from the debate), we learned that this was a special enforceable mandate free kind of affordable. The five points were spelled out phonetically in the videos to poke fun at their over use and mis-use, to mock the arrogance of a political system that time and again presents these same bullet points as a bottled panacea to cure all that ails us. They treat us like children, too ignorant to understand the finer points of our own suffering. As is often the case with real children, we are rarely consulted and included in these adult discussions of our fate. We are relegated to the status of “swing state” campaign stop backdrop, selected as a scripted validation of whatever political point needs to be made.

In 2012 this already deficient five point perennial campaign platform has been narrowed even further, all other issues funneled through one single point - jobs. Health care in the USA continues to exist primarily as a benefit of a “good job,” rather than as a function of the common good. The power of this incentive (coupled with the scarcity of “good jobs”) keeps many tethered to jobs (and treatment on the job) they would otherwise reject. Education “reform” is predicated on the idea of lifting young people out of poverty by enabling them to compete for these “good jobs.” Absent from this argument is any discussion of how education enriches and empowers our youth (and our society) through creative and critical thought, regardless of economic outcomes. It has been suggested that a college education may be as key to attaining the highly specialized jobs of the 21st Century as secondary education was in the 20th century. Between this and the retraining of workers to keep up with technological progress, how much life will we actually spend learning to live? Most outrageous, in light of the recent storm, is how the issues of energy and environment have been consumed whole by this focus on jobs. Democrats and Republicans (and a complacent media) conveniently limit any discussion to the relative economics and job potential of their respective “plans.” Environmental, health and safety concerns have all been labeled “job killing.” In the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, some economists are even talking about a potential bump to the economy in particular sectors...

About a week ago I watched a news program that brought together Mike Caputo, Vice President of The United Mine Workers of America and Tyson Slocum, director of the Public Citizen Energy Program. Mr. Caputo spoke in depth about the 70,000 - 100,000 dollar jobs with excellent health care and benefits, as well as the families and the economies of entire communities that depend on these jobs. Mr. Slocum pointed out that, despite wide acceptance of the science of climate change, the politics and economics of energy policy dominates the discussion specifically because the US is the largest fossil fuel producer on the planet. I enjoy watching this show because of the host’s ability to bring people together in constructive dialogue, but here there didn’t seem to be time to go much deeper than presenting two sides of the argument. One thing that really struck me was when Caputo mentioned that the jobs that wind farms create are minuscule compared to coal mining. I haven’t fact checked this claim myself, but I thought about how he might actually be making a sustainability argument for coal jobs, after all coal needs to be mined continuously as it is used. Wind power? Not so much. But isn’t that part of the point? Is the labor intensive nature of mining actually an asset? If in fact we are maintaining an industry that is detrimental not only to the planet (and all life on it), but also to the long term health and safety of those involved in it, can’t we find other (perhaps better?) ways to address the issue of job security for these workers? Can we do this in a way that is mindful of the dignity and self worth that is engendered through work? I faced some of these feelings myself when the economy crashed and I couldn’t find work. It can be challenging and frightening facing the prospect that the work you have spent most of your life doing may simply no longer be necessary. All of this got me thinking about the underlying hopes and fears of all involved, wondering what could be accomplished if our politicians were not consistently framing the argument as a battle between environmentalists and those directly affected in terms of their livelihood. Everyone involved and affected must be included in the discussion, and after Hurricane Sandy there will likely be many more in the United States who will have reason to participate in this discussion. And what of the millions affected by Sandy and multiple storms this season outside the US? They must be involved in this discussion as well. This isn’t about government bureaucrats making decisions that adversely affect the lives of citizens (as it is commonly spun); this is, at its heart, about a 1% that profits from the desperation of those who are made to prioritize their immediate survival over their survival a year, ten years, 50 years from now…

Romney claims he will win the election if he wins Ohio. When I read articles about Romney family holdings in a company that manufactures voting machines, it is hard not to hear his claim as back story to validate another stolen election. Key to stealing an election is the appearance of a close race, and that is just what the pundits are spinning about Ohio. When Romney and Obama got into a pissing match over who loves coal more in the second CPD debate, they were talking to “coal voters” throughout south eastern Ohio and West Virginia. Notably their focus was on the coal industry itself rather than the welfare of these workers and their families. Is this really about jobs, or is it a cynical manipulation of the fears of these men and women? Are they making a case for the prosperity of these workers or are they relying on the fear of a lost job to drive these workers into the voting booth? And if this is the case, how does this relate to policies that keep these families dependent enough to submit to this manipulation? During the match, neither candidate addressed the mining disasters that have made the headlines recently, and how the corporations responsible in those cases get fined, rather than shut down. Not surprisingly neither of them addressed acid rain, mountain top removal, or climate change either. The singular focus on jobs dominates the discussion, wiping away all other concerns. Month after month of “opinion polls” pushing this single word to the top of the pile, conditioning us to accept that only the most pressing, most desperate, of concerns need be addressed. Everything else is extravagance, a burden we can’t afford to even talk about. So says the austerity model.

Matthew Fox writes in his book The Reinvention of Work:

Under the pressure of the world economic crunch that is creating a worldwide depression, the grave danger looms that we will seek only jobs–jobs at any price–and ignore the deeper questions of work such as how, why, and for whom we do our work.

So, if all of these issues are being funneled through this single point, what happens when we remove jobs from the equation? Just for kicks, what happens with climate change if all coal miners the world over were to suddenly find themselves independently wealthy? What if all the tax payer money we spend subsidizing the mythical “clean coal” was spent instead to provide a cushion for miners to decide what they want to do without it being a question of economic survival for their families and their towns? And I’m not talking about a bridge loan here, or a program to retrain these workers, or a mandatory resume writing seminar to get your unemployment check. I’m talking about dignity, and respect, and a well deserved reward for years of hard work. What if health care was independent of your job so you could make career choices based on what you want to do rather than what type of benefit package you can get? What if we dealt with child poverty (which is of course family poverty, community poverty, etc.) before we sent children to school, rather than as the ultimate objective of education, so that our youth could instead focus on how best to contribute their unique genius to our society? When our politicians speak of “winning the future” through education fueled innovation, what kind of message are we sending to our youth? Are we at all concerned about their freedom to build the life, the world, they desire? Or are we just priming them to take their role in saving the existing system from collapse? What is the impact on innovation when an entire generation of young people seek MBAs based on the ratio of return for their education dollar? And finally, what impact would removing this singular focus on jobs from the equation have on our elections? If your boss sends you a memo “encouraging” you to vote for a particular candidate, is it ok for you to send  a reply “encouraging” your boss to mind their own business? Which issues rise to the top of your list when the issue of jobs is removed? How many of them are issues of economics? What would it take for you to prioritize the ones that are not?   

One percent power players love to use the term “redistribution of wealth” to attack those seeking economic justice, but they never use this term to refer to the enormous direct and indirect government subsidies (tax breaks, tax credits, loans, incentives, deals, etc.) their own corporations receive. Occupy Wall Street chants, “Banks got bailed out - we got sold out!” This is a somewhat different response from the Wall Street vs. Main Street narrative I heard over and over after the crash. The idea of taxing Wall Street a small percentage on transactions, in order to generate funds to offset the damage done to Main Street is clearly a downward spiral. Getting a kickback from the guy who is robbing you will not get back the home or the job you lost. And he can always gouge you more (put you into debt) to pay off your cut... It’s important to recognize that the bailout is a redistribution of wealth, from the tax payers to the wealthy. It is the same redistribution of wealth that happens when public resources and services are privatized, directing our tax dollars into the bank accounts of private corporations, rather than back into the hands of our citizens. The OWS chant doesn’t ask for a corporate handout (is that an oxymoron?) or a government bailout for the people. The People’s Bailout, the Rolling Jubillee, comes from the people directly. I remember Bush senior talking about “a thousand points of light” and thinking what an asshole. But that was a time when those thousand points responded (when they actually did respond) more out of sympathy, pity, charity. The thousands of points of light I witness in Occupy are coming from empathy. Many in the movement have experienced or are experiencing the same suffering that they are responding to directly, and progressively more and more folks throughout the country are having similar personal experiences that move them to take action. The “safety net” is no longer keeping them safe and in its place they are seeking to build communities of trust and mutual aid. Within these communities they can be who they want to be and do the work they want to do. The adversity they face is simultaneously an opportunity for greater solidarity, for deeper connection. Occupy Sandy is a wonderful example of this dynamic.

From Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin’s book Your Money or Your Life:

And they call this making a living? Think about it. How many people have you seen who are more alive at the end of the work day than they were at the beginning? Do we come home from our “making a living” activity with more life? Do we bound through the door, refreshed and energized, ready for a great evening with the family? Where’s all the life we supposedly made at work? For many of us, isn’t the truth closer to “making a dying”? Aren’t we killing ourselves–our health, our relationships, our sense of joy and wonder–for our jobs? We are sacrificing our lives for money–but it’s happening so slowly that we barely notice. Graying temples and thickening middles along with dubious signs of progress like a corner office, a private secretary or tenure are the only landmarks of the passage of time. Eventually we may have all the comforts and even luxuries we could ever want, but inertia itself keeps us locked into the nine-to-five pattern. After all, if we didn’t work, what would we do with our time? The dreams we had of finding meaning and fulfillment through our jobs have faded into the reality of professional politics, burnout, boredom and intense competition.

My political advisor astutely suggested that I look into what is being done in other countries to address the dignity of coal workers AND the continued existence of life on this planet. Due to the storm I have not been able to research this point, but I will certainly look into it and post my findings when I have my phone and internet back up and running. This post is dedicated to him on his birthday.
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Still haven’t gotten around to the research above, but came across a related article today that I really enjoyed - read it here 

Are you listening?

As the wind gusts outside I find myself experiencing a peculiar kind of fatigue. Over the last couple days we’ve made a few trips round the neighborhood stocking up on supplies to prepare for this year’s big storm. The panic driven consumer frenzy that surrounds these storms always has me shaking my head. It’s only common sense to get prepared with a storm on its way, but I can’t help but note how this consumer reflex is becoming our response to everything. On the surface this consumption looks like preparedness, but is it really? Like so many other things in our culture, isn’t this just another way to cope with a situation we feel powerless to control? It reminds me of our current health care model: wait till it breaks, then attempt to fix it. If it’s too late to actually fix it (which it is more often than not) - medicate it so that the symptoms are at least tolerable. Today I heard one of “our” Senators explaining all of the different ways that people would be compensated for damages they suffer from the storm. There were even programs to cover lost business revenue. Here again, we respond to damage after the fact, accepting the outcome as inevitable rather than addressing the underlying cause. Perhaps the Senator is just trying to make us feel more secure, explaining that the government has our back when times are tough. Hey this is what you pay your taxes for right? This is one of those moments when we recognize the benefits of having a safety net, when something REALLY BIG happens and we can all feel... um... safe. So then what is my fatigue about? Buying emergency supplies wasn’t all that stressful. Yes, the lines were loooooong, but we are lucky enough to have food to buy. I have a roof over my head that will in all likelihood withstand the wind. I am fortunate to live in an area high enough to avoid the flooding. I’ve got the electricity to write this blog entry...

But I can’t shake this feeling. I’m tired. I’m tired and honestly, I’m a bit frightened. I’m tired of people not listening. A historic storm by all accounts, days before a presidential election, large enough to threaten the entire Atlantic coast - I feel like I’m living in some sort of Bizarro World vacuum. I want a bit more from “my” politicians than an explanation of how I can get compensation for damage done. Three debates and not one mention of climate change? Campaign ads airing between hurricane updates? Katrina. Irene. Sandy. She's raising her voice. How loud does she have to get before you listen?

Binders full of women - a debate stage full of men.

Today I am reading Romney’s “binders full of women” quote everywhere. While the issue brought up is clearly more substantive than Big Bird, does it really surprise anyone? I read article after article leading up to last night’s debate bemoaning the president not bringing up women in the first debate, and prioritizing the importance for both candidates to play specifically to women voters in the second. Well it would seem that Romney fulfilled expectations putting his foot firmly in his mouth last night saying, “We’re going to have to have employers in the new economy, in the economy I’m going to bring to play, that are going to be so anxious to get good workers they’re going to be anxious to hire women.” I imagine Ryan might say that Romney was “obviously inarticulate” in making this point, if he himself was capable of recognizing the problem with it. Perhaps Mitt is simply trying to say that employers are going to be anxious to hire good workers and women are good workers, but the statement comes off sounding like it says that employers are going to be “so anxious to get good workers” that they will even hire women.

So Obama gets points for Lilly Ledbetter, defending Planned Parenthood, and he has two daughters he wants to make sure “have the same opportunities that anybody’s sons have.” He sounds like he cares. And maybe he is being sincere, but watching two women (who are running for the same office) being manhandled and arrested by a bunch of burly officers outside the debate gives me pause. The Obama campaign is not simply complicit here, it is the Democrats and Republicans acting in concert through the false flag of the Commission on Presidential Debates that have excluded these women’s voices from the debates. The “Nonpartisan” Candidate Selection Criteria For 2012 General Election Debate Participation, Adopted on October 20, 2011, sets forth three specific “nonpartisan” criteria for selecting candidates to participate in the 2012 general election presidential debates: (1) constitutional eligibility, (2) ballot access, and (3) electoral support. Though I personally believe both the second and third criteria need redress, the candidacy of Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala actually meets criteria one and two. The third criteria, however, is a self-validating circle of nonsense:

INDICATORS OF ELECTORAL SUPPORT

The CPD's third criterion requires that the candidate have a level of support of at least 15% (fifteen percent) of the national electorate as determined by five selected national public opinion polling organizations, using the average of those organizations' most recent publicly-reported results at the time of the determination. 

"Electoral support” is simply not the same thing as “indicators of electoral support," in the same way that “votes” are not “opinion polls.” Under these criteria, a candidate needs to have enough support to be selected to debate to get enough support to be selected to debate... nonsense. A debate is at its heart about finding out where the candidates stand on the issues that matter to us; and five selected national polling organizations, the CPD, and the two parties that run it should not be allowed to determine which voices we get to hear and which get to go to jail for showing and speaking up.

One other thing stands out to me about the debate and it’s critique: I’m seeing some very talented people that I respect taking Romney to task for his comment, “Government does not create jobs. Government does not create jobs.” But why not also take Obama to task for saying, “I think a lot of this campaign, maybe over the last four years, has been devoted to this notion that I think government creates jobs, that that somehow is the answer. That’s not what I believe.” I wrote a bit in an earlier post about mobilizing the American people to support legislation that they actually want, rather than simply adopting Republican talking points in some kind of hopeless crusade to out Republican the Republicans. When Obama declares “I believe that the free enterprise system is the greatest engine of prosperity the world’s ever known. I believe in self-reliance and individual initiative and risk takers being rewarded,” and tempers this with his fair shot, fair share, play by the same rules refrain; is he offering us the necessary vision to move beyond this win/lose competitive paradigm, or is he simply strengthening it? With the concepts of independence and competition so central to our core identity as Americans, is it even possible to address “fairness” without it being viewed as an affront to those very same ideas? If you insist on fairness aren’t you just making excuses for your own lack of success? Perhaps you are just too lazy, or unwilling (to work harder), or maybe you’re just not smart (educated) enough. Are we truly “free” if we cannot freely choose not to participate in this game?
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Mark Halperin at Time Magazine posted the leaked Memorandum of Understanding between the Obama and Romney campaigns Monday, a 21 page legal document delineating the rules governing 2012 presidential and vice presidential debates. I read it this morning. And then I made a cup of coffee to try to wake myself back up. It did of course contain specifics regarding who gets to debate, the topics that will be “debated,” and the format of the debate (as I wrote in an earlier post); of the many restrictions here are a few that set off some bells for me:

1. (d) The parties agree that they will not (1) issue any challenges for additional debates, (2) appear at any other debate or adversarial forums except as agreed to by the parties, or (3) accept any television or radio air time offers that involve a debate format or otherwise involve the simultaneous appearance of more than one candidate.

So not only does the agreement restrict who can debate, but it also restricts the two candidates to only debating one another, and only in these CPD sanctioned debates.

3. Participants
If one or more candidates from the campaigns other than the two (2) signatories are invited to participate pursuant to those Selection Criteria, those candidates shall be included in the debates, if those candidates accept the terms of this agreement.

This effectively says IF you meet the criteria to be invited to debate that you still have to agree to the terms of the agreement (that your party had no hand in writing) IF you want to be included in the debate.

5. (e) The candidates may not ask each other direct questions during any of the four debates.

Ah well - rules are made to be broken.

7. Additional Rules Applicable to the October 16 Debate...

Too much here to re-type, but here is my summary: Audience members submit their questions to the moderator prior to the start of the debate. Moderator approves all questions to be posed and “eliminates” any questions she (and she alone) deems “inappropriate.” If any audience member poses a question or makes a statement that is in any material way different than the question that they submitted for review, they get cut off by the moderator and the Commission can cut off their microphone. All audience members describe themselves as likely voters. The audience is selected by Gallup Organization, but the campaigns have the final say on the “methodology” used for selection.

9. (a) (viii) All members of the debate audience will be instructed by the moderator before the debate goes on the air and by the moderator after the debate goes on the air not to applaud, speak, or otherwise participate in the debate by any means other than silent observation, except as provided by the agreed upon rules of the October 16 town hall debate. The moderator shall also state that, should an audience member fail to comply with this requirement, he or she will be will be subject to removal from the audience and from the facility. 

10. (a) ... Each campaign shall be entitled to receive directly from the Commission one-third of the available tickets (excluding those allocated to the participating audience in the October 16 debate), with the remaining one-third going to the Comission.

Basically, what we have here is some sort of facsimile of democracy in action, with all of the inconvenient randomness, diversity, and unscripted participation stripped out. And you are more than likely not invited.
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An additional note: beyond the specifics relating to distribution of tickets, section 10. (c) of the memorandum specifies seating arrangements, in order to “insure that supporters of each candidate do not sit in a block and are interspersed with supporters for the other candidate and interspersed with tickets distributed by the Commission.” Notable here is that there is no specific allotment for supporters of a different candidate entirely, or neither candidate, or those who have simply not decided (it is a debate after all). Perhaps folks in these categories can sit anywhere they like? If not, they could always sit outside in the street, or better yet, in a jail cell...

MIC CHECK!!!