I Hate Democrats

Following from that title, let me be clear:  for every Dem I despise, there’s a Republican to match him (or her).  Likewise, for every motion made by a Dem that I like, there’s an equal one done by some GOP operative.  But lets take a quick look at what the Dems, on the national stage, are up to:

• Max Bacus (D-Montana):  We ‘can’t afford the unmitigated effects of fighting climate change’.  Yes, that’s right, it’s too expensive to have an energy/transportation/industrial system that doesn’t rape and pillage the planet.  Score one for Nineteenth Century thinking.
• Patrick Leahy (D- Vermont):  Talks a dam tough game, and quite honestly, has come through solid on a few things for us Vermonters… but when it comes to the USA PATRIOT ACT, or holding the Bush Administration accountable for any number of their crimes (domestic or international), well, let’s just say score one for Orwell’s 1984.
• Harry Reid (D-Nevada):  While so many out in liberal la-la land are excited that Reid has decided to force through “a public option”, the fact of the matter is that, no matter what any polls show or what the public opinion is, nothing that’s going to hit the Senate floor will be good enough and health care (and the cost of health insurance) (hell, the very idea of having health “insurance”) will continue to cripple working people, be they lower or middle class.  Listen, this is just the issue of the moment- health care ties into so many important things right now.  It’s time to take a page from the Revolutionary playbook: it’s estimated that, at best, 25-33% of the public supported becoming independent from England at the time of the American Revolution; but those guys went forward with it anyway… and you know what? no one questions their wisdom now- no one, ever, anywhere, suggests it was a bad idea because it wasn’t supported by a majority of the people at the time.  Once Americans have full-blown, never see a bill, maybe your taxes go up a little (if you make a decent living or better to begin with), health care, I’d give ‘em 10 months at best to forget entirely what their original opinion on socialized medicine was.  When it comes to health care in America, score one for Eighteenth Century England.
• Barack Obama (D- United States):  October has been the deadliest month for American troops in Afghanistan- ever.  Score one for electing a “socialist”.

I could go on of course- there are thousands of elected Democrats all over the country.  But that would be exhausting, and I’m tired as it is.  Plus, I may feel obligated to do the same for Republicans (just to be fair) which just well might take a lifetime.  But my point is simple: don’t rely on politicians (liberal, conservative, “independent”, whatever) to make the world right.  We’ve got to do it ourselves.  It’s always been that way, for all of human history.  My favorite bumper sticker is still an axiom that I adhere to every waking moment: “comfort the disturbed, and disturb the comfortable”.

Welcome Back Link-Dump

As I try-out my writing wheels (haven’t done this for a while) forgive me if I ease myself in.  So for your consideration, a few things around the interwebs that have caught my eye:

• For starters, a really great piece contemplating- and naming- the manner in which class (or, better yet, “class war”) determines who is going to fight U.S. wars and who, well, doesn’t have to even think about it.  Even better: the author reminds us of the Helots, a class of people in ancient Sparta who were more or less owned “by the public” and used as warriors and soldiers to fight and conquest and pillage on behalf of the elite of their day; and then the author goes on to suggest that today’s “all-volunteer military” represent a sort-of class-based version of the Helots.
• Somewhere back in time there I had come across, read, and meant to post here about a pretty good piece written from the libertarian left to the libertarian right (as embodied by the “Tea Party” protests).  Of course, I never got that up, as my postings this past summer have been mostly limited to occasional youtube video’s and endless “geez, sorry I haven’t written anything lately” diaries.  But now that same piece has been made available as a pdf for printing out the pamphlet yourself, which was an excellent reminder to me to direct your attention to the thing.  I won’t say I’m with it 100%, but I think it’s well done, and definitely in a better direction than 97% of what “anarchists” put out, either on the web or in print.
• But speaking of the dribble anarchists put out there: another exception to that 97% I just mentioned in this piece, noting that the Nobel Prize in Economics not only was just awarded to a woman for the first time, but that her work largely validates and confirms what anarchists have been saying all along.  Specifically, Elinor Ostrom was awarded the Nobel in Economics for her work challenging the notion that common property (“the commons”) is poorly managed and should either be regulated by central authorities or privatized.  Ostrom’s findings- again, which just won her a Nobel prize in Economics- have been that when certain common sense principles are applied (for one, that everyone involved knows the parameters of usage) collective management of resources is much more efficient and beneficial to the population- and planet- as a whole.

Well Shit…

Dear god, I’m so sorry.   I’ve been the worst blogger.  It happens, I guess.  What I don’t understand, though, so who keeps coming here, as my site visits are not only holding steady (albeit lower than the average of when I was writing consistently) but today, somehow, I have a record number of visits.  ?

But I’m ready, now, to start writing again.  Beginning this weekend, I’ll be posting on a somewhat regular basis.  I promise.

Bernie’s OK

From the My Senator can beat-up your Senator Department:  Apparently Sen Bernie Sanders showed up Friday night in Burlington at the Roxy Theatre to do a little Q & A with the movie-goers after Michael Moore’s new film Capitalism: A Love Story.  And apparently said Q & A included Bernie’s opinion of the movie: “… it was pretty damn good…”

I’m not so sure there’s too many people in Washington willing to admit to having seen a Moore film, let alone this one (or any movie with a title like that), let alone giving it such praise, let alone turning a showing into an opportunity to engage regular people.  Having Bernie is, on the whole, way fucking cooler than having pretty much any other politician out there representing us.  Cheers.

Ukraine’s Got More Talent

Check this video out.  Artist Kseniya Simonova just won what is the Ukrainian version of the popular TV show “America’s Got Talent”, and let me tell you, comparing this video to what shows up on the U.S. version, I’d say Ukraine’s not only got way more talent, but a much, much more sophisticated (i.e., educated) public.  Something like this would never win jack shit on American television.  Simonova uses a giant light box, dramatic music, and sand to creative an absolutely great moving piece of art interpreting the German invasion of Ukraine in WWII.  As an added bonus, I’m pretty sure that song that starts around 7:00 is a classical version of Metalica’s Nothing Else Matters.

A Sign Of What’s To Come For Whole Foods In Vermont?

With behemoth health foods retailer Whole Foods marching ahead with plans for an out of scale (and, with the existence of so many local food co-ops, localy-based retailers, and yes, direct-from-the-farm markets, we could say wholly redundant and un-necessary) South Burlington location, faux-progressive and CEO John Mackey may well be getting a bit concerned.  That’s because Vermonters in Pittsburgh to protest the G20 meetings have chosen to target a Whole Foods retailer there as part of their protest against the corporate elite’s pro-profit and anti-sustainability agenda.

A group of Vermont farmers and students blocked the entrance of a Pittsburgh Whole Foods around 10:00 Friday morning.  They then build a raised-garden bed, complete with growing plants and vegetables, under their banners which read “Whole
Communities Not Whole Foods for ½ the people” and “ A Whole Lot of $$$$ GREEN $$$$$” as well as “Grow Gardens Not Corporations”.

From the activist’s press release:

One person joining them from Pittsburgh said “I’ve have watched Whole Foods
come in and cater to wealthier folks from outside this neighborhood with its
corporate green image while selling products that not only don’t contribute
to a local or sustainable food system but are totally unaffordable to most
folks that live here.”

Jean Marie Pearce left her farm in the Northeast Kingdom to participate in planting the garden.  “We need to realize that Whole Foods is about growing profits not sustainability and the G20 is about growing capitalism not a healthy world.  I want a world where food is grown for everyone, not the GDP for 20 countries!  Examples like the dairy farm crisis right now prove the need for more inclusion around these policies.  We can’t protect or control our economy when it is run by 20 people and their corporate friends.”

Once these Vermont activists return from Pittsburgh, we can only imagine what they have in-store for the developers who hope to build a Whole Foods in South Burlington.  It’s a safe bet that Whole Foods and those developers are working on trying to imagine that very thing right this moment.

Wildcat Milk-Dumping

I have two separate but equally effective proposals to make that will drastically and surely make Vermont a much, much better place for all of us.  OK, not for all of us, ’cause there are a handful of people that gain from the backwards, nonsensical world that Governor Douglas and his corporate stooges have built and continue to weasel us towards.  These status-quo capitalists, as many of us are now familiar, have a simple program of claiming corporate greed and profiteering as “freedom” and simultaneously decrying the collective action of the people to take care of ourselves- for ourselves as well as our most vulnerable and downtrodden neighbors- as anti-freedom, socialistic (which somehow means “bad”) coming-of-the-anti-christ evil.  But for the vast majority of us, these two suggestions would be net positives.  As a result of my first proposal, farming on the scale that fits the Vermont landscape and social climate (i.e., relatively “small scale” farming, at least as compared to the big ag of the Midwest and California) would be a sustainable enterprise, as far and the financial field of view is concerned.  Dairy farms would no longer be servants to out of control processing conglomerates who make record profits while the farms who supply their milk fold or file for bankruptcy at the steady pace of ‘taps’ on the funeral drum.  As a result of my second proposal, the social services and safety net which takes care of our most needy friends and family, which as well provides and nurtures a great many of the finer aspects of life in Vermont which we’ve come to enjoy (not to mention the ordinary aspects of life, like going to the DMV), would be not only saved from the pillaging efforts of the Douglas Administration, but would possibly even thrive and grow to be better, more efficient, and more outstanding.

My first suggestion is for the diary farmers of Vermont to dump obscene quantities of milk into Lake champlain.  Seriously.  French dairy farmers, facing conditions quite similar to Vermont dairy farmers, recently decided to dump obscene amounts of milk into a well-known, public and touristy waterway, and not only did their action garner international attention (I read about it in the Times-Argus) but I’d be willing to bet that it helps lead to a resolution of their grievance.  Elsewhere in France, as well as in the Netherlands and Germany, dairy farmers have been on strike- refusing to deliver their milk- in protest of the low amount they’re being paid (bellow the cost of production) and while some have chosen to collectively dump their milk (cows have to be milked, whether you’re on strike or not) in high-profile places, others still throughout Europe have been donating their milk to neighbors and the needy, while yet others have taken the direct action of raiding grocery stores and giving their product away free to shoppers.

And I promise that if Vermont’s dairy farmers did the same, their woes (and ours, in fact) would be largely over.

OK, these actions won’t end all of society’s ills.  But between mega-conglomerate producers like Dean Foods and the political elites who must put the best face of “taking care of the little guy” forward in order to keep their jobs, to the myriad of economic interests wrapped-up in not only dairy farming but agriculture in general, I assure you that the powers that be will act quickly to ensure that Vermont dairy farmers get whatever it is they demand in order to stop dumping (or giving away for free) their milk.  This will greatly effect the rest of us (who don’t milk cows for a living): for starters, the continued existence of dairy farmers throughout Vermont ensures the survival of open space and preservation of our majestic hillsides and valleys.  The environment (and “environmentalists”, who I guess are defined as people who like having a clean, healthy place to live) would obviously benefit as the micro-ecological zones of Vermont would continue to allow for an abundance of wildlife both big and small to flourish free of the cancer of mindless development.  This, of course, effects our incredibly important (like it or not) (and I don’t) tourist industry and the billions of dollars which we live off because people from somewhere else want to see our wilderness and farm-scapes and rolling hills, etc.  Which, of course, keeps many of us employed in restaurants and hotels, and ski resorts and building condos, etc, etc.  Plus, the rest of the Vermont farming community (who aren’t in the traditional dairy business) would be expected to be inspired, excited by the power of the diary farmer’s victory and perhaps even begin taking collective action for their needs and conditions- suddenly the whole State could be in an uproar about food security and availability and affordability and sustainability!  It would be Scott Nearing’s goddamn utopia around here!

A bit more seriously though, the economic as well as social interests in Vermont which would not be willing to stand for such bad PR- to say nothing of the heated political climate- would act quickly to ensure, in whatever way they can, that our dairy farmers get paid a fair, livable wage for their milk.  Everyone, except for the processing conglomerates and the political hacks like Douglas who support their free-market hubaloo, would win.