Tag: politics

Donald Trump and the state of things

I think Facebook is a terrible venue to discuss politics, and I do my best to avoid it. There is no space for nuance or rumination. I can’t recall a single mind I’ve seen changed from a comment thread or meme. Discussing politics on Facebook turns the real problems we face into theater, and treating our politics as if it were theater leaves us with politicians like Donald Trump.

All that said, the recent actions of this administration worry me. Policy that makes selfish action easier for individuals and corporations hurts everyone. I intend to do what I can to make it harder to ignore the rights of racial and sexual minorities, the economically disadvantaged, and in the case of climate change the rights of humanity as a whole.

I’m available if you need help.

Things I Have Done

On June 4th, the Middletown City Council unanimously passed a resolution condemning Citizens United, and calling for electoral reform. Peter, Nishi and myself had been working on this cause for months, and we got it passed in time to coincide with a national movement doing the same. The resolution reads as follows:

Whereas, the Citizen’s United v. Federal Election Commission, Buckley v. Valero and SpeechNow v. FEC legal decisions have changed the national landscape on how elections are financed, and

Whereas, the Supreme Court ‘s Citizen’s United decision has led to a flood of money from individuals, corporations and special interest groups being used for political purposes, and

Whereas, Super Political Action Committee’s (“Super PACs”) now enjoy unlimited spending from wealthy individuals and corporations, and

Whereas, outside spending by Super PAC’s, corporations, special interest groups and others totaled over $900 M or 2.5 times as much as spent during the same period in 2008 and six (6) times as much as in 2004, and

Whereas, huge sums of money are now being decried as securing elections to ensure allegiance to a specific political agenda, and

Whereas, the influence of excessive and anonymous money in political campaigns can lead to corruption, limit political discourse, subject the citizenry to unlimited and extensive “spin” which shadows the facts for any political campaign.

Whereas a coalition of groups throughout the United States are working to pass over 100 new local resolutions during Resolutions Week in June calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United, challenge corporate power and eliminate unlimited campaign spending.

Now Therefore Be It Resolved by The Common Council of the City of Middletown that:

We join in the efforts of groups and organizations throughout the Unites States to remove the overt influence of money on our political system and stand with other communities across America to protect our democratic system by supporting public funding of elections, reducing the unnecessary time required to select candidates and conduct elections and make any and all political spending to be open and transparent.

Be It Further Resolved that

We hereby instruct our State and Federal Government Representatives to end the influence of money in politics by enacting resolutions, legislation and constitutional amendments to advance these principles.

I’ve been working on Dawn quite a bit as well, and though I’m far behind where I thought I would be, I’m about 50% done. I haven’t gotten anything done on the bus, and I’m really behind on projects in general. SomDay went unobserved for the first time since its inception. But the money keeps rolling in, which will allow me to get around to these things sooner or later.
Mostly later.

Election Roundup

So Obama won the presidential election – cool. But other things happened as well. In California, they decided against same sex marriage (prop 8), but decided that farm animals should be treated humanely – at least up to the point when they are slaughtered and eaten (prop 2). Good job, California.

In a mostly coincidental vote, the FCC decided that we can use white space that is just sitting around empty of data. Thankfully that decision was not left up to the good voters of this country, who would have likely shot it down out of fear that it would disrupt Oprah.

And the Obama advocates’ zealous support for their savior didn’t let me down. Yes, I think Obama is the best viable candidate and I’m glad he won. Yes, I realize that this is a historic election. But his supporters scare me. Thankfully, the Onion is there.

Misdistractions

Obama’s Speech
Hillary’s Speech
I just finished watching both of them, and all I can say is that they’re both absolutely terrifying. Not Obama or Hillary, but their supporters. People are supporting their candidates with such conviction that you would think that candidate personally saved their life. Is universal healthcare really so exciting? I just don’t think that universal healthcare, or gas prices, or even the war in Iraq are the most pressing issues our country is facing today. They’re a step in the right direction, but none address the source of these problems – how we treat other people. People are at odds with each other over things that don’t matter. Love for other people – complete strangers – can solve all these problems. We should work on that.

Change Congress Together

Change Congress I hope you saw my post a little while back with the video Lawrence Lessig made about the Change Congress project (change-congress.org). If you haven’t seen it yet, go watch it. If you have seen it, I hope you’ve signed up on their site.

We need a change in Congress. We need members of Congress to care about what their constituency care about. I know I don’t contact my congresscritter because I’m almost certain it won’t make a difference. The few times I have contacted them, I’ve either heard nothing, or received a letter detailing their stance on the subject, and why they won’t change it. We need straightforward bills that won’t be sabotaged by earmarks snuck into otherwise useful legislation. We need Congresscritters to stop taking money from lobbyists and PACs, and start relying on public financing. The people’s voice is the one that matters.

Vote

Vote on Tuesday by Tea Leaf Green
[audio:http://www.archive.org/download/tlg2008-02-03.mk4v.flac16/tlg2008-02-03s01t02_64kb.mp3]

Due to a combination of laziness (I’m still an independent) and classes (from 0930 to 2100) I won’t be voting in the primaries. I hope you do/did.

I was a bit conflicted as to how I should vote. Of all the candidates, the one who I really want to vote for is Ron Paul, but I know he has no chance of winning the nomination, and with the front-runners as close as they are, I figured I should choose between feasible candidates. In which case I would have gone for Obama. This is all moot, of course, but I feel like explaining it anyway.

So I guess that’s about it. We’ll see how it all unfolds tonight.