Posts from — October 2008

A few articles of interest…

Van Jones, “Why They Win & Why We Lose” (Summer 1999)
The title is self-explanatory. The Right doesn’t keep winning because they have more guns and media than we do, though that’s part of it. They largely keep winning because the Left doesn’t have a winning strategy or attitude. Van touches on just some basic ways of thinking that plagues the Left and which we must overcome in order to win.

Zack Exley, “The New Organizers, Part 1: What’s Really Behind Obama’s Ground Game” (Oct. 8, 2008)
Obama’s campaign is a fricken machine! And the Left should be learning from it. If we are interested in building a new popular organizations, some of which include an electoral arm, the Obama campaign is a model we can learn from for being innovative and reaching out to new audiences.

George Lakoff, “Don’t Think of a Maverick! Could the Obama Campaign Be Improved?” (Sept. 11, 2008)
We need to be message warriors! Learn from George Lakoff as he points out where Obama, as a case study, is succeeding in winning hearts and minds - and also where he is failing (and why).

Matt Stoller, “Obama’s Consolidation of the Party” (May 7, 2008)
Unless something major happens that propels McCain to a comeback victory, Barack Obama will be the 44th President of the United States. What does that mean for the Left? Matt Stoller outlines how Obama has consolidated power within the Democratic Party, effectively creating a new tendency with him in charge. He’ll have the power to make policy, a fundraising base that will force Democratic candidates for House and Senate to come to him if they want to win, and all branches of Government behind him. Where will this help progressive forces in the U.S.? Where will it set us back?

My friend Jonathan McIntosh has produced a new video, perhaps his finest work I’ve seen to date, remixing the presidential debates with clips from “So You Think You Can Dance?”

The remix is called “So You Think You Can Be President?” I recommend it to everyone who wants a real critique (not to mention eight minutes of laughs) of Obama and McCain’s frighteningly similar positions on energy issues and increasing attacks against the Afghan people. Check it out!

Barack Obama is the first Democrat that’s figured out that a winning Democratic Party strategy needs to make use of the solid progressive majority that exists in almost every state in the Union. This includes the South.

Since the Reagan electoral victories of the 1980’s, Democratic candidates have used one of two strategies in their attempt to regain control of political power in the United States. Candidates like Bill Clinton successfully won the White House by moving to the right on issues such trade policies, dismantling social programs, and the economy. Candidates like Al Gore and John Kerry attempted to take the White House by winning in “blue states”, trying to flip “swing states”, and largely ignoring most of the rest of the country. Bill Clinton had to move to the right on economic and foreign policy issues. And in the most blunt and straightforward indictment of the Gore/Kerry electoral strategy, one analyst rightly said: “Democrats just don’t seem to be able to count.”

Even though the majority of the South identify as Democrats, their own party refuses to court their vote. In fact, has Bob Moser routinely points out, in order to win Southern Democrats, the Democratic Party would have to move left on economic issues, not right as many coastal Democrats often assume. In the Southland in particular, but also across the entire country, lies the opportunity for tremendous growth of the political Left.

The ideology of the Democratic Party has consistently prevented it from moving to the left on a wide range of issues. The Party is a center-right to moderate grouping with some slightly liberal leaders (though mostly on only a few issues each). It is thoroughly pro-capitalist and is organized is such a way so as to prevent any challengers from coming to power within the party.

The ideological commitments of the Party prevent it from building power in the central way a progressive political party can: by moving politically to the left and actually relating to people on the issues that matter to them.

The Left can gain tremendous ground by capitalizing on this fundamental weakness of the Democratic Party. In the coming decades, if Democratic strategists learn anything from the Obama campaign and the shifting demographics of the American Southland (especially the Southwest), they will begin to attempt to compete in so called “red states”. If a progressive political party actually started building power in the South, it could force the Democrats to move to the left on certain economic and military issues or risk being permanently irrelevant. Like all dilemma situations, this could lead to two positive outcomes for the Left: the Democrats could actually improve their positions (a win) OR a new progressive party or political bloc could gain ground and adherents in a new geographic location (which could happen either way, and also a win).

As revolutionaries serious about winning the struggle for political power in this country, we can learn a lot about what the Left would need to do in order to compete in the South by reading Bob Moser’s new book Blue Dixie: Awaking the South’s Democratic Majority. Much of the same advice Moser tells Democrats can be applied by progressive organizers interested in organizing a left alternative.

The stagnation of the American Left can be ended if we actually begin to map out our nation, region by region, state by state, community by community, figuring out where we can gain ground, on what issues, and how. When we start to think how we can strategically build a new world, we’ll actually start to get there. It seems simple enough, but its worth repeating often.

Friday I posted about the movie Saw, while waiting on a bench for my theatre to empty. I was waiting to see the movie Quarantine. All the trailers I had seen for it presented it as a horror/suspense movie about a building that is quarantined due to some outbreak happening inside, which the Government later covered up.

While I was at Hofstra University for the debates this past Wednesday, I was in the audience for the Brian Lehrer Show. One of the guests on the show was talking about his book, which focused on paranoia and conspiracies, and how the occurrence of both greatly increases in the U.S. as totalitarian in the U.S. increases. If this is true, I think its very possible that that’s what this film is catering to.

Quarantine ended up being an extremely strange movie. It was filmed similar to the Blair Witch Project, but in this case it was through the lens of a reporter and cameraman who were following around two firefighters. There’s a 10 minute introduction where they are just doing interviews around the firehouse. They then receive a call and go to the building where the main story begins.

They enter the building, go up a few flights of stairs, and slowly enter the apartment where the incident is occurring in. The apartment is dark (the entire building seems to be only dimly lit). Since it is filmed to appear as if the only surviving record is the cameraman’s video, the film is somewhat shaky.

Inside the apartment, there is a woman, in the dark, who isn’t speaking at all. She’s standing in the dark with her hands hanging at her side. After a few minutes of the police and firemen trying to talk to her, and her not responding, the woman lunges as one of them, biting one of their necks. They quickly leave the apartment, running downstairs.

By the time they get to the bottom floor, the front door is locked. As they try to leave, authorities on a megaphone tell them not to panic and that people will be in to let them out soon. All the doors are locked. Some windows are soon guarded by soldiers with machine guns and snipers. Inside, the characters are attacked one by one - by infected humans and dogs.

A veterinarian suspects that its some form of rabies. But he doesn’t understand how people are becoming infected so quickly or how it is making them so violent. He ominously adds that there is no cure for rabies: its 100% fatal once you are infected.

The police officer notifies them that the CDC is coming, and that everyone will be able to leave soon. Everyone in the building just needs to get a blood test to make sure they aren’t infected. The veterinarian doesn’t understand how this is possible. The only way to test for rabies is a brain sample.

Eventually agents from the CDC come. They are dressed in white hazmat suits. They go into the backroom where some of the infected victims are unconscious. They lock everyone else out while they do their tests. The reporter and camera man enter into the next room in order to look through a hole in the wall. They see the CDC agent drilling into one of the victims’ heads to get a brain sample.

Soon after one of the CDC agents tells the remaining characters that they followed the infection from a dog at a local veterinarian whose owner lived in their building. That is the only explanation the Government gives throughout the entire movie.

The film has zero conflict resolution. Everyone dies - everyone. You never find out what the disease / virus / bacteria is. The Government isn’t held responsible for locking everyone in the building, nor are you introduced to any Government agents at the end who explain what happened. Once the reporter, cameraman, and firefighters enter the building, they (and you watching on their camera), never leave. You are locked in by the Government with the infection inside.

The film reminded me a lot about the U.S. Government’s “war on terrorism”. You have an intangible enemy which is never seen, never explained, and never caught. You have a government which will do literally anything to supress the “threat” (all of which they are never held accountable for). You have a government which provides little, if any, explaination for their actions or what’s going on in the world. And while you have an intense distrust of authority, you are instead lead to a feelings of paranoia and helplessness.

It wasn’t a particularly good movie. It was a good for a few jumps and screams, though I wouldn’t recommend the movie, except if you really enjoy human suffering, or perhaps if you want to make the connections to what’s going on in our world.

Posted by mobile phone:
I’m sitting in my local movie theater waiting to see a movie. Beside me is a ten foot wide, eight foot tall advertisement for the movie “Saw V”. A good friend often points out that in order to live in our perverted society, we must block out most of the suffering and day-to-day “normalcy” of life. It is only when something shakes us from our hypnoctic slumber do we begin to see how perverted the world we live in really is. I don’t often notice most of the horrible things that are considered “normal” in our society - I’ve learned to block most of them out.

The Saw series is different. I get sick to my stomach every time I see an ad for the new film or hear a reference to it. A month and a half ago a schoolmate of mine, Kevin, was brutally murdered in Chelsea, NY. His unremorseful killer watched the movie Saw before leaving Kevin’s apartment.

That’s how fucked up our system is. It fucks us all up, feeds us perverted propaganda, pushed us all over the edge, and then does’t provide us with the healthcare we need to keep us all sane members of society. And it takes a death - or some other powerful shift in consciousness - to see how every aspect of our institutions and social relations is designed to maintain the death system.

Posted by mobile phone:
Its interesting to watch McCain’s desperate attempt to fight his way up his impossibly steep hill to the White House. An entire early section of the debate focused on the tone and tactics of the two campaigns. McCain focused on lies against Obama’s character, while saying his campaign was focused on the issues. Classic strategy when you’re desperate: ignore the issues and attack the person. Here’s the catch: it doesn’t work. I guess Frank Luntz has taken this campaign off.

Posted by mobile phone:
I’m here at Hofstra University for the last of the 2008 Presidential Debates. I’ve been doing PowerVote organizing today, mostly talking to students in front of the ‘clean (sic) coal’ table about dirty energy (especially all forms of coal) and the necessity of a clean energy future.

Now I’m sitting in one of the debate watching parties in Hofstra’s student center cafeteria. There are a few hundred students here. Theres a lot of excitement in the air. More blogging to come in a few…

Posted by mobile phone:
I went to my local cell phone store today to upgrade my phone. As I was waiting for my new phone to be set up, I was reading through their pamphlet on cell phone insurance. Under the section on ‘exclusions’ from coverage included - I kid you not - ‘undeclared, nuclear, or civil war; and rebellion, revolt, revolution, or government actions taken to surpress any of the above.’

So be forewarned! In the event of civil war, nuclear holocaust, or revolution (do rightwing revolutions count?), you’re going to have to buy a new phone. Mindboggling…

I’ve been wanting to read “Winning Your Election the Wellstone Way” for a while.

From the people who wrote the book on running progressive electoral campaigns:

“We’ve put together all our campaign know-how into a practical, hands-on guide for progressive grassroots candidates and their campaigns on how to win.  This latest offering was written by Jeff Blodgett and Bill Lofy with Erik Peterson, Sujata Tejwani, Ben Goldfarb and others at Wellstone Action.”

I wrote this post a few months ago. I’m reposting it. Seriously though. If you want to win a new world, read The Art of War by Sun Tzu. And study strategy. Study your opponent. Study the art of winning.

“It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle.” - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

The Art of War, written in the 6th century BC by Sun Tzu (Master Sun), is a 13 chapter Chinese treatise on military warfare and strategy. When read metaphorically, its a brilliant addition to those studying political strategy, and especially for those seeking fundamental social transformation.

Steve Bucknum posted an article called “George Lakoff vs. Sun Tzu” two years ago on BlueOregon where he recommended the ancient text to those interested in building progressive political power. Referring to text in the context of Oregon he said:

“Study of the ‘Nine Terrains’ (a chapter in the ‘Art of War’) is a good metaphor for having political strength in one part of the State, but not others — and how to maximize our strength and minimize the power of the other side. (If we attack their homelands, and cause them to defend their base, then they will not have enough strength left to attack our base. — Makes you want to spend more time/effort/money in Eastern Oregon!) There is a lot of good advice for strategy in these works — ‘When you are committed to employing your forces, feign inactivity. When your objective is nearby, make it appear as if distant; when far away, create the illusion of being nearby.’ These works have stood the test of thousands of years, in fact that some of it has risen to the level of ‘common sense’ in that we have heard parts before.”

Its a short book too, depending on the version & translation you get, the actual text is about 60-75 pages - and well worth every page. The translation I have can be bought here.

SEAC Election Guide: We’re excited to inform all our members of two great new pamphlets by SEAC and RAN. The first pamphlet, edited by SEAC National Council Member Dave Shukla and designed by Slim Lopez is called “Now and After: SEAC’s Guide to Student Organizing Around the 2008 Elections“. The guide explores why engaging with the 2008 elections and our current political moment is so vital to the success of building movements into the next year. Essays over topics ranging from analyzing our political moment, to advocating that we organize heavily to prepare for the first hundred days of the next presidential administration and congress, to why the climate movement needs to win economic democracy in order to achieve justice and equity.

RAN NVDA Pamphlet: Secondly, the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) has produced an amazing pamphlet on Nonviolent Direct Action called “Get Some Action: Taking Our Place in the History of U.S. Social Movements“, written by Joshua Kahn Russell, a RAN staff member and SEAC National Council Member. Like Dave and Slim’s pamphlet, it stresses the importance of the climate crisis and taking bold action at this point in history in order to advert catastrophe. Drawing from the rich history of movements for social justice and their strategic application of NVDA, it outlines the basics of this method, its history, and why its a vital tactic in winning the fight against climate change, dirty energy corporations, and environmental injustice. Josh can be reached at josh(at)ran.org

At 11:30 this morning, in another blow to the rightwing’s power, the Connecticut Supreme Court struck down a law banning same-sex marriage, ruling the state had “failed to establish adequate reason to justify the statutory ban.” Connecticut joins California and Massachusetts, becoming the third state in the nation to establish marriage equality for same-sex couples. Like in the two other states, out-of-state couples will be allowed to marry in Connecticut. You can read the decision here: ELIZABETH KERRIGAN ET AL. v. COMMISSIONER OF PUBLIC HEALTH ET AL. (PDF File)

The Advocate reports:

“Oral arguments for the case took place in May of 2007. “Separate institutions for different classes of citizens are now unheard of anywhere in American jurisprudence,” GLAD senior attorney Ben Klein told the high court.  “Our history has taught us that separation serves no other purpose than to mark a class of citizens as inferior.””

“You take the blue pill, the story ends, you wake up in your bed, and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you just how deep the rabbit hole goes.” - Morpheus offering Neo the choice in The Matrix

In the movie The Matrix, Redpills are those whose minds have been freed from the Matrix. When you take a red pill, those who are waging a war against those who run the system (the “machines”), unplug you from that virtual world and allow you to see the truth for the first time in your life. You might have known that “something” was wrong with the world around you, but you never made the deeper connections as to how the whole system actually operated. And you certainly didn’t see an alternative to the world around you or any way to change it.

As organizers for social change, we are constantly faced with the question “what will be the ‘redpill’ for large numbers of people?” What will be the final piece of evidence, story on TV, book, event, or personal experience that finally makes someone start to radicalize? Its different for every single person. Some people radicalize due to personal experiences. Some people radicalize from education. Some people radicalize because of empathy for others and perceived wrongs going on around them. We can’t possibly know when a person is willing to step down the rabbit hole, but we can provide them with lots of opportunities to do so. Those opportunities need to be predicated on efforts that will actually make them more likely to take us up on our offer.

In The Matrix, one of the main characters, Morpheus offers Neo the choice between the two pills. But before Morpheus offered Neo the choice to be freed (we’d call it a “radicalizing experience”), Neo was selected for this opportunity because he was a computer hacker. He was actively seeking out “answers” and wanted to know more about the Matrix (a.ka. “the system” in our terms). If Neo hadn’t previously been a hacker - someone who didn’t exactly follow all the rules or buy into the official story of how things worked in the world - he quite possibly could have taken the blue pill and called it a night. A hacker is an example of one such person who might take the red pill. It doesn’t ensure they will, but it does increase the likelihood.

Whatever keeps people in line (i.e. prevents them from taking red pills), is called “hegemony”. Its the collected set of laws, processes, rules, regulations, and norms which keep people from making the connections needed to see themselves as people capable of leading free lives. How do you determine what are some of the major barriers to people changing their minds? Well, you can usually start by thinking of things that annoy the Right.

Rightwing positions which seem irrational or absurd are usually quite intentional. They are rational in that conservatives hold those positions for a reason. They know that their power is based on people following certain rules, without which other areas of their power would be challenged. When conservatives say that drugs, divorce, separation of church and state, free speech, free press, reproductive freedom, socialized programs, and gays will lead to the downfall of “Western civilization[sic]” they aren’t just serious, they’re quite right. They mean that the form of society in which they are on top will cease to exist if these things happen in increasing numbers.That’s because freedom is, well, addictive. Once you get some, you’re gonna want a lot more!

They only care about our sex lives insofar as keeping us (especially young people) scared of sex & sexuality will keep us obedient and allow them to maintain their power. They understand that drugs, and sex, and good education, and cooperative workplaces, and grassroots citizen media will lead people to take the “red pill” and free their minds. Its why they are against it.

Its also why those of us on the left need to take cultural issues seriously. Sure sex education, same-sex marriage, and  reproductive freedom are all moral issues. But they are also cultural issues that maintain the dominant hegemony. Its our job to break that hegemony. Leading campaigns against backwards laws, opening youth centers and alternative schools, and educating young people about our vision of the future should all be at the top of our priorities list. The Right will push back on these things without a doubt. We should respond to this push-back with an article alternative worldview, rooted in progressive values. If we are strategic in our efforts, we will win battles and expose the hypocrisy of the Right while we do.

In particular, revolutionary education necessarily includes (among other things):

• Sex and health education;
• Accurate information about drugs and alcohol;
• Diversity education so people shed stereotypes about other races, cultures, genders, classes, and sexualities;
• Time and places for young people to form real community;
• Information and experiences that show how solidarity, equity, diversity, and self-management are the most morally-just and efficient ways to organize society;
• Information about how the world really works, alternatives to the current institutions of society, and ideas about how they can create change.

The Left needs to take battles around culture very seriously. If we do, people will start to beg us to show them just how deep the rabbit hole goes. I guarantee it.