January 2010 archive

Jan 31 2010

Land and Liberty

  On January 29, 1911, a small band of 18 revolutionaries marched into Mexicali and seized the town, practically without firing a shot. Thus began one of the most unusual and controversial episodes in Mexican history.

 These revolutionaries were not the typical warlords that Mexico was used to seeing. These revolutionaries had American volunteers, but not the sort of filibusters that Baja California was already very familiar with. In fact, this revolutionary movement had little in common with anything Mexico had experienced before or since.

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 These revolutionaries weren’t interested in just overthrowing the corrupt and repressive government, they wanted to overthrow society as well.

Jan 31 2010

3rd party musings — a whole new ballgame

Haven’t been writing much lately.  Since Massachusetts, I’ve been doing a lot of looking and listening, trying to get a handle on this clearly transforming moment.  I’ve been in a dialogue with the good folks at Corrente and was pressed on the merits of the Full Court Press criteria for primarying a congressperson, compared to the principles of the Justice Party.  My quick reply was that the 5 points are to tactically determine whether a Democrat is a worthy primary target, while the Justice Party principles serve as general principles for an entire party, which the FCP is not.

That said, it started me thinking.  I’ve been over the 3rd party arguments pro-and-con for years, many of them dragging along unchanged since 1976.  But then I realized that some of the people I’ve been talking with are progressive Democrats and some are independents and some are both.  Yet we are all saying remarkably similar things.  I’m not regarded as a sellout for pushing Democratic primaries, and they are not wild-eyed radicals.  There is a new realism among independents, including at least respect for the Full Court Press, and Democrats are no longer all saying my party right or wrong, remember how bad the Republicans are.

A New Look

I think the times they are a’changing, and 3rd party politics needs a new look.  Three changes:

Jan 31 2010

Quiet Revolution

One thing I am always impressed about on Docudharma is how we not only talk about how to change the political system that currently exists but how to upend it using disruptive politics, technologies and techniques.

We talk about restoring the centrality of community to our lives.  It is this concept of community which, many of us feel, will provide a needed bulwark against the depredation of corporate feudalists and looters.

The social aspect of community, and what Americans are lacking in that regard, is well established and has been for a long time.

It’s not my favorite genre of music, but the best example of exactly what I think of as wrong in terms of American community or lack thereof goes like this:

And, if you think about it this way, the fact that our culture is sick and overrun with parasitism begins to make sense if you think about it in an organic way.

For decades, we have had a monoculture of American expectations .. what Americans are supposed to do, how Americans are supposed to live.

But one thing you learn about in Biology 101, is that monocultures die out.  Why do they die out?  Because they are far more vulnerable to predation by parasites.  Any given parasite can more easily infect and destroy a population if that population is the same than if there are many different and varied populations.

Jan 31 2010

Peru’s Natural Disaster

urubamba river flood 2010

The Urubamba River In Flood

This year’s rains have come to Peru.  And the rains have been extremely heavy.  The result has been a washout of crops in the Sacred Valley, which runs from Cusco to Machu Picchu, mudslides that have destroyed houses and other buildings, and flooding.  Peru Rail’s tracks from Cusco to Aguascalientes have been washed out or buried under boulders.  And the bridges across the Urubamba River at Pisac, Ollantaytambo, and Urubamba have all been washed out.

Jan 31 2010

Wassap!!!

Sorry for wasting space, but i’ve been off line for so long I just needed to shout out to some old school homeboys and homegirls. I miss you all.  

Jan 30 2010

Weekend News Digest

Weekend News Digest is an Open Thread

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Haiti faces long, difficult road to recovery

By Patricia Zengerle, Reuters

Sat Jan 30, 10:52 am ET

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Haiti’s leaders can point to progress since a powerful earthquake devastated the country but just surviving the first weeks’ chaos, hunger and overwhelming loss may be the easiest part of a long recovery.

Since the January 12 catastrophe killed up to 200,000 people and left around 1 million homeless in the nation of 9 million, authorities and aid workers have cleared tens of thousands of bodies from the rubble, provided water supplies for makeshift refugee camps and developed a system of food distribution.

Some police are back in the streets, schools in unaffected areas will open on Monday, communications are working and some businesses have reopened their doors.

Jan 30 2010

Limited “humanitarian parole” for earthquaked Haitians.

The concept of “humanitarian parole” strikes me as emblematically American, albeit excessively witty.   Does it mean that a person is emancipated and discharged of being Human or Haitian?  Parole certainly suggests, if not exactly prior guilt, e.g., Original sin, at least some form of previous incarceration or imprisonment.  Most likely, it means that Haitians are provisionally granted the status of humans on the grounds that their captors have humanitarian sentiments towards the beasts.  Who knows.  Like I said, excessively witty.

In any case, it seems few Haitians are granted this esteemed status.

MIAMI – The United States has suspended its medical evacuations of critically injured Haitian earthquake victims until a dispute over who will pay for their care is settled, military officials said Friday…

Only 34 people have been given humanitarian parole for medical reasons, said Matthew Chandler, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security. The National Disaster Medical System, if activated, would cover the costs of caring for patients regardless of their legal status.

I hope they at least have ankle bracelets.

Jan 30 2010

Using Craigslist to find LOTS of candidates for FCP

Democracy Now had a program segment called “The Citizens’ Candidate”-Grassroots Effort Uses Craigslist to Find Candidate For Utah House Seat

Utah Citizen’s Movement website is here.

If Craigslist works for UCM, why not the Full Court Press?

Jan 30 2010

The Super Bowl is Saved!

Whew!

I know this will be hard for ya to believe, but those liberal eggheads at CBS came to their senses yesterday and rejected an ad from ManCrunch.com to appear during the Super Bowl.  What a relief for America!  Can you imagine exposin’ the fresh-faced youngsters of America to  disgusting garbage as to which is demonstrated in the following manner?

(Note: the following video should not be viewed by anyone under any circumstances. It’s got somethin’ icky that is expressly forbidden in the Book of Leviticus.)

Jan 30 2010

Open Arch

Photobucket

Jan 30 2010

Open Letter From…?

Posted to YouTube January 11, 2010 by user BitchSlap

Does any of what’s in this video sound familiar?



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXnnMQtJVG8

Jan 30 2010

Nothing has changed, it’s still the same

Everybody knows there’s nothing doing

Everything is closed, it’s like a ruin

Everyone you see is half asleep

And you’re on your own, you’re in the street

After a while you start to smile

now you feel cool

Then you decide to take a walk by the old school

Nothing has changed it’s still the same

I’ve got nothing to say but it’s O.K.

Good morning, Good morning

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