Being the Change I Wish to See

Not as long as we can fight back, and we are fighting back.

I was afraid for the long-term existence of American democracy. We had our first election last November since the Citizens United case was decided by the Supreme Court in favor of the corporations. America is too close to being bought and sold and our government corrupted beyond our worst nightmares.

The obscenely rich and corporations claim to want a smaller government, but only if they are in charge. The Tea Party is the same way. They want the government to run their way, and no other. What they seem to want by their actions is a totalitarian America; a plutocratic corporatocracy that owns its legislators. Individual freedom would end when it infringed on corporations.

But it’s turning out to be a surprising time in American populism. Republicans keep forgetting they didn’t win the Senate and they don’t have the Presidency.

What is a threatened democracy to do? How do we save our elections and government from all the money that flooded into countless campaigns? How do we the people fix this?

We take to the streets. We become activists. We demand to be listened to, and we hold our elected officials accountable. Americans have once again found our populist voices, and we are using them loudly.

This is the Wisconsin State House full of protesters in March 2011:

We show the rich that dollars don’t vote, people do. When we mobilize the voters, we win even if we only have a fraction of the money the rich have. Senator Barbara Boxer was up against Carli Fiorina, the wealthy ex-HP CEO. Boxer won and spent far less than Fiorina. Governor Jerry Brown was up against Meg Whitman, formerly of eBay. She spent millions in personal wealth on her campaign, but she couldn’t buy her election either. Jerry Brown won.

Some states elected corporate shills, and the backlash has begun. The Republicans elected in Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio, to name a few, have over-stepped their mandates. They were elected to create jobs, but their policies are destroying jobs. The people in those states have been protesting in the streets for weeks over policies that strip public workers of their right to collective bargaining, among other rights. Those Republicans are giving tax breaks to the rich in their states, then cutting spending on average citizens, laying workers off, and raising their taxes to balance the state budgets.

The people of those states are outraged, and they are recalling elected officials and putting the rights taken from them on the ballots of the next election. Ballot initiatives and recall elections will bring large crowds to the polls. They always do.

The Republicans who took power in the House of Representatives are over-stepping their mandate as well. They campaigned on jobs but have yet to do one thing about creating jobs. Not that they work much themselves–the House is only in session two weeks out of every three. Their pay didn’t decrease by 1/3, but they work 1/3 less. Could you get away with that at your job or business?

They proposed a budget for 2012 that will raise taxes on the middle class and rip the safety net out from under seniors, the poor, and the disabled so they can give a huge, permanent tax cut to the wealthiest 2% of Americans. Why? Because their corporate overlords want what they paid for.

So much for economic growth and fiscal responsibility. If tax cuts worked so well, we should be rolling in prosperity after the past decade. But we’re not.

Let’s get one fact straight: the Republican Party is NOT the party of fiscal responsibility! See for yourself:

Ronald Reagan contributed more to the national debt than any other president in the past 35 years. He is followed by George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush (who was actually pretty reasonable). Bill Clinton balanced the budget and left a surplus to pay down the debt. Clinton contributed less to the debt than Jimmy Carter.

Many middle class Americans who voted for Tea Party candidates seem to be suffering from voters’ remorse. They wanted change, but not this kind of change.

It is clear that the Republican party of today is not able to lead us through these challenges. We must elect candidates who have our interests in the front of their minds and hearts. Those who voted for the GOP takeover in 2010 must change direction and vote these zealots out of office in 2012. Ideology doesn’t solve problems, real ideas and actions based on facts do.

We the people must act against the big money interests in the only way we have the power to do so–get out and vote, and get out the vote.

We have to learn more about the candidates than TV sound bites. We have to do our homework for real. We have to show up at the polls like we show up at work. It’s that important!

Do you vote?

Photos by:
seasidepost
.yinan

Graph from:
MaddowBlog

Technorati Tags: 2010 election, 2012 election, Citizens United, corporatocracy, Corrupt Government, fiscal responsibility, Obscenely Rich, plutocracy, Politicians for Sale, Wisconsin

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I had to post this gem. This video is from the 1990 Castro Valley, CA, high school graduation ceremony. Rachel Maddow was 17 when she spoke.

Did you hear someone in the background at the end of the video say,

She’s going on to Stanford, and one day, she’s gonna do something wonderful

That person knew what she was talking about.

I particularly love the white socks, Birkenstocks and shorts under her gown; and the long hair and earrings. Even though she looks totally different today, her voice is unmistakable and her style is a rough version of the polished analyst and progressive pundit she has become.

Fighting closed-mindedness, changing the world, and making America progress are all things Rachel does today on MSNBC, which is seen all over the world.

While the adults and leaders of Castro Valley couldn’t say “condom” in 1990, today Rachel can’t say “masturbation” on her TV show out of total embarrassment. If she said it, they would likely have to go to commercial, and there would be a guest host when they returned. She would hit the floor red-faced and laughing hysterically to the point she could not go on.

I’m going to email her and ask her to discuss this contradiction with her 17-year-old self. By the time she gets back from Thanksgiving vacation, the above video will have gone viral, and I wonder how many other TRMS fans will also ask about this?

On a related tangent, a young lady who strikes me as just as impressive as young Rachel was, is Cadet-Sargent Katherine Miller, who recently resigned from West Point because of the military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. She felt continuing in the Army and staying in the closet compromised her integrity. Katie had been out in high school and had to go back into the closet to go to West Point. It was far harder than she imagined it would be, and she resigned publicly in protest to help end the policy. She is currently attending Yale on full scholarship until she graduates, or is able to return to West Point as an out lesbian and serve openly in the Army.

A Brief Rachel Maddow Biography

Rachel was a brilliant, serious child and taught herself to read by age 4. Her mom found her reading the newspaper one morning when she came into the kitchen to make breakfast. From a very young age, she asked difficult questions of all of her teachers.

In high school, Rachel was an impressive athlete in swimming, basketball, and volley ball while performing academically at the top of her class. She was looking at becoming a member of the U.S. Olympic Team, but injured her right shoulder severely and had to decide whether to have reconstructive surgery and take a year off for rehabilitation before trying out, or go on to college. She chose college.

After her athletic career-ending injury, Rachel joined Act-Up, an AIDS organization in San Francisco, before she graduated from high school. Since she could no longer play sports, she had lots of free time.

She attended college at Stanford University where she came out as a lesbian in her freshman year (after figuring out she is gay). She majored in public health policy and minored in ethics. She attended graduate school as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, where she earned a PhD in political science. She was the first openly gay student to win a Rhodes Scholarship. There were other gay Rhodes Scholars, but they didn’t come out until after they were awarded the scholarship. In between college and grad school, she worked for the ACLU.

When she returned to the U.S. she decided to move to rural western Massachusetts because she didn’t like the cold, and thought she would be miserable enough to get her writing done quickly. Instead, she found love. She met her life partner, Susan Mikula, while doing odd jobs and trying to write her doctoral dissertation. Susan and Rachel still live in Northampton when they are not in New York. Rachel went into local radio in Massachusetts on a dare, and then she had to take time off to finish writing her dissertation because it wasn’t getting done.

From local radio, Rachel accepted a job at Air America Radio and moved to New York City. She began guesting on various cable TV shows as a progressive political pundit. She was a regular on “The Situation with Tucker Carlson” on MSNBC. She signed an exclusive contract with MSNBC to be a contributor on that network and continued her show on Air America. On 9/8/2008, her show debuted on MSNBC, and it’s still going strong. Unfortunately, Air America Radio went out of business in February 2010, and Rachel’s radio show ended.

Happy Thanksgiving to all, and if Rachel addresses the condom v masturbation word usage problem, I will let you know.

Technorati Tags: 1990, Castro Valley California, high school graduation, Rachel Maddow

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