So THAT's Where All the Hippies Went!

Last October I wrote a blog entry asking the question, Where have all the hippies gone?. On January 27, 2007 I received my answer. Hundreds of thousands marched on Washington to say NO to escalation in Iraq. This included bus loads of Iowans. We are asking congress to craft a budget that reflects our priorities, which do not include escalating the war in Iraq. Not one more dollar, not one more day, not one more death.

The video can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdNYbJQAZag .

Elizabeth Edwards on No Child Left Behind

On January 20th, 2007 several bloggers sat down with Elizabeth Edwards and asked her questions on a variety of topics. One of the most interesting conversations revolved around No Child Left Behind. Mrs. Edwards made several insightful comments.

Mrs. Edwards’ comments can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wE_AZrIi72o

ACTION ALERT – Help Lift Women and People of Color out of Poverty!

Call Your Senators about the Minimum Wage bill, S-02.

According to the Washington Post, inflation has depleted the value of the minimum wage to the lowest level in more than 50 years. The House passed a minimum wage bill on a vote of 315 – 116. Now the Senate is about to take up the bill. But some in the Senate want to add other provisions to the bill that would create extra breaks for businesses. Please call today to ask your Senator to pass a clean minimum wage bill with no other riders.

Currently, a minimum wage worker who works 40 hours a week every week of the year earns only $10,700 -- barely enough to keep a single person above the federal poverty line. And working 60 hours a week without taking any time off still isn’t enough to keep a family of three out of poverty.

According to the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights:

Women and people of color make up a disproportionate percentage of minimum wage earners: overall, 40 percent of minimum wage earners are people of color. In fact:

• 59 percent of minimum wage workers are women;
  
• 16 percent are African-American, though African-Americans make up only 11 percent of the workforce; and
  
• 19 percent are Hispanic, though Hispanics make up only 14 percent of the workforce.

Take action! Call your Senators today. Tell your Senators to support a “clean version” of the minimum wage bill.

How the Cookie Crumbles

As anyone who has read my postings know, I like to write about all kinds of issues, but every now and then someone says is so well that I can't improve on what they said. In the category of "I couldn't have said it better myself," click here to see an excellent explanation of how the federal budget works using Oreo Cookies as an example.

It's STILL the Economy, Stupid

From my kitchen table I watch the snow sticking to our porch screen, whiting out my usual view of the woods behind our house. I am waiting for the snow to stop so I can plow the driveway. It is mid-January in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and this is the first snow of any consequence, so plowing the driveway really isn’t such a burden. On some years by this time I was worried I was going to wear my snow blower out, but not this year.

My name is Tony. You can picture me as a middle-aged man, with a middle-management job, a mid-range income, and unfortunately middle-age spread, sitting at his kitchen table in the Midwest. I’m not an economist or a political pundit, just your average guy with a driveway full of snow. That’s my caveat for what is to follow. I’m going to give you the view from my seat at the kitchen table. Your view might be very different.

I started my political life as a Reagan Republican. I loved his "city set on a hill" vision of America. Keep in mind that when President Reagan took office, the biggest problem facing the nation was "stagflation," the wicked combination of a stagnant economy and uncontrolled inflation. Reagan's theory was to ignore the problem of inflation while stimulating the economy. President Reagan loved the phrase "a rising tide raises all boats." This began an economic boom that continued, with sustained attention and adjustments, for many years through several administrations.

On the other hand, if I could describe George W. Bush’s fiscal policies in a simple phrase it would be “a rising tide raises all yachts.” He has siphoned the tidewater from the open ocean of the economy and walled it up behind a dam of privilege where only the powerful benefit. But just like New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, that levee will eventually come crashing down, revealing all that has been hidden, in all of its repugnant splendor. The only choice we have is, do we want to wait until it all crashes on us at once, or do we want to begin a controlled reduction of the pressure from the imbalance in the economy?

From here in Middle America there is a belief that there must be a middle way, not of soft-headed socialism or hard hearted capitalism, but of people-powered progressivism. I still believe that stimulating the general economy while rolling the extra tax revenue into social programs is the best way to resolve the disparity of wealth. If we can grow the economy in a way that the impact is felt at every financial stratum, we will provide hope for all the people of America, not just the privileged few. If we want to create hope where there is currently despair, wealth has to be circulated into the economy, not horded at the top. The purpose of wealth is to help others achieve some level of wealth. Obviously that’s not what we’ve been doing for the last six years.

Of course, as I’m writing this, I’m typing on my new laptop, sitting at my lovely kitchen table in middle-America, which is quite the seat of privilege. So, I could be wrong. Right now, instead of looking for a third way, I’ve got to go plow my driveway. I’ll see all of you in the living rooms and meeting rooms of Iowa as we try to work this way out together.

Four Questons For John Edwards

As a blogger I was lucky enough to be invited to sit in an intimate setting with John and Elizabeth Edwards and ask them some questions. I've uploaded a video of four questions I asked John Edwards along with his answers.

See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XN-Iiumg-3o

The issues we asked about included

1. What should we do about the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba?
   
2. Would you make the US a States Party of the International Criminal Court?
   
3. Would you sign the Kyoto Protocol, dealing with the causes of global warming?
   
4. Should there be parity between mental and physical health insurance?

Take a look at the video to see Senator Edwards’ responses.

Cedar Rapids Says NO to Escalation in Iraq (or Iran)

I am so very proud of the people of Cedar Rapids, IA. They came out to say NO to escalating the war in Iraq...or for that matter Iran. I am so very proud of these good people.

See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnU4Tl7orEY

Sip 'n' Spit

Have you ever seen a guy on a sitcom reading the paper while sipping coffee and then suddenly spray the coffee all over the place? Comedians call that a “sip and spit.” Well, this morning I did a sip and spit, 21st Century style.

I was searching Google News for articles about the pending legislation to allow the federal government to negotiate prescription drug prices for Medicare Part D. Just as I took a sip of my Starbucks, I spotted the name of the person who is leading the opposition to this common sense approach. As I was wiping the mocha from my monitor, I stared at the name of the leader of the opposition – Iowa’s own Senator Chuck Grassley. What in the world is my Senator doing opposing cheaper drugs?

Let’s start with this assumption. Reasonable people can disagree, so I’d like to give Senator Grassley the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming that Senator Grassley is in the pocket of “big pharma.” The article quotes Senator Grassley as saying “Federal price negotiations would unravel the whole structure of the Medicare drug benefit, which relies on competing private plans.” I’m not sure how Senator Grassley reached this conclusion. Is he saying that if we don’t let the drug companies have their way, they will collapse?

Interestingly, just below Senator Grassley’s quote in the article is this fact. “Families USA, a senior advocacy organization, released a study Tuesday that found that prices for the most commonly prescribed medications are an average 58 percent higher under Medicare prescription-drug plans than those paid by the Department of Veterans Affairs.” That is because the VA is allowed to negotiate prices, while Medicare is not. So, doesn’t that point to the fact that, when we allow our government to use its massive buying power to negotiate on our behalf, we win?

This just seems like common sense, doesn’t it? You don’t have to be Warren Buffett to figure out that the government has massive buying power. If Wal-Mart can use its buying power to negotiate $4 prescriptions, shouldn’t our government be allowed to do the same thing on our behalf? How can cheaper drugs for seniors be a bad thing? Why would our Senator oppose such a common sense approach?

You know, now that I think of it, there might be a second reason to “sip and spit.” Have you ever sipped sour milk? When you sip something repulsive, you just naturally sip and spit. Maybe Iowans should sip this idea that negotiating better drug prices for seniors is a bad thing, and then spit it right out. This is an idea that we just can’t swallow.

Why Oppose an Escalation in Iraq?

Last night President Bush announced his plans for what is being euphemistically called a troop “surge.” In military parlance it’s called an escalation. When faced with over 47,000 wounded and more than 3,000 dead, the president has decided to escalate – to pick up the pace. That seems to me to be heading the wrong direction.

The President, when faced with the message from the American people that “stay the course,” was an unacceptable practice, was faced with two options. He could draw down the troops, or he could escalate the war. I don’t think the President quite understood what we meant. I say, support our troops. Bring them home now.

There are three reasons why I oppose the escalation of troops. First, the President has proven himself untrustworthy. Second, the President is asking us to NOT trust reliable experts. And third, we’ve already tried this strategy with tragic consequences.

In his speech, the president has said, in essence, “Trust me.” This is the president who said:

• Trust me. Iraq is linked to September 11th.
  
• Trust me. Iraq has weapons of mass destruction that are a clear and present danger to the US
  
• Trust me. We can do this war on the cheap with very few troops,
  
• Trust me. Armor only slows our troops down. We don’t need armor.
  
• Trust me. We will be greeted as liberators.
  
• Trust me. Your National Guard troops are needed for a short period of time.
  
• Trust me. Mission accomplished!

No, President Bush. Like the national debt, I’m afraid your “trust” account is badly overdrawn.

To trust President Bush, we have to NOT trust such experienced voices as the Generals on the ground, former Secretary of State Colin Powel and the entire bipartisan Iraq Study Group. In fact, General Abizaid stated before the Senate Armed Services Committee, "I met with every divisional commander, General Casey, the Corps commander, General Dempsey… And I said… if we were to bring in more American troops now, does it add considerably to our ability to achieve success in Iraq? And they all said no."

Keep in mind that this strategy has already been tried. Last summer we increased U.S. troops in Baghdad by 12,000. Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you already know the results – more injuries to US soldiers, more deaths, more civilian casualties and a strong upsurge in violence. The President and the military have had the opportunity to ask for more troops for several years.

In conclusion, I’d like to propose an alternative approach. If the President is looking for an escalation, he can escalate diplomacy. In a recent poll conducted by the University of Maryland, 82% of Democrats and 72% of Republicans said we should directly engage with Syria and Iran to establish a political solution in Iraq, as was unanimously recommended by the bipartisan Iraq Study Group. Otherwise, what he can expect is an escalation in protests from the American people.

Here are ten actions you can take today to oppose the escalation of the war in Iraq:

1. TODAY - Attend a rally to stop the escalation in Iraq. You can look at Moveon.org or AmericaSaysNo.org to find a local rally. Can’t find one? Create one!
   
2. Call, email and text message all of your friends and encourage them to attend a rally.
   
3. Call your Senators and Congressman/Congresswoman and express your concern over the plan to escalate the war in Iraq. Call 202-224-3121.
   
4. Join Tom Vilsack’s campaign to Communities Opposed to Escalating the War Resolution. After you sign the pledge, you’ll be given instructions on how to pass a resolution in your home town, county and state.
   
5. Use the power of the pen (or word-processor)! Write a letter to the editor at your local paper. It’s best to actually print it out and carry it in. If not, most newspapers will accept an email, but not as an attachment. Or you can blog for peace. Hey, you read this, didn’t you? Why not write your own blog? If you would rather speak than write, call in to local radio shows to oppose the escalation of the war in Iraq.
   
6. Go big or stay home – literally. Join in the March for Peace. See http://www.unitedforpeace.org. The government brought the troops home from Vietnam, after we took to the streets in massive numbers. It's time to take to the streets today. On January 26th I’m going to be on a bus headed for DC. What are you going to be doing?
   
7. Sign the Mandate for Peace.
   
8. Jump on a train that is already moving! Join your local peace and activist groups. There are general activists groups. For example, John Edwards has formed One Corps. Moveon.org has set up Operation Democracy. There are also specific groups that deal with Human Rights, such as Amnesty International or Civil Liberties, such as the ACLU. And there are groups specifically devoted to peace activism such as United for Peace & Justice, Gold Star Families for Peace or Code Pink.
   
9. Create a photo petition. See the instructions here.
   
10. Support a candidate who supports peace. Two declared presidential candidates have come out in favor of bringing our troops home - Tom Vilsack and John Edwards. You can contribute to their campaigns. You can volunteer to work for them. You can hold rallies in your home to support them. If you contact the campaigns, they will give you plenty to do to work toward peace.

Your Only Choice is the Role you will Play

Wow. I hope my thoughts are coherent as I write this. My blood is pumping with adrenaline. Something very, very strange just happened, and I want to share it right away, but I’m still shaking and I want to make sure my description is rational.

I have a neighbor, whom I barely know. They are a charming young couple with a precocious three-year-old. The man’s name is Jim and I never can remember the wife’s name. The three-year-old is Madison. She’s one of those not-quit-chubby-but-hasn’t-yet-grown-taller toddlers. She’s got chocolate brown hair that falls perfectly in a Dorothy Hamill cut. She is constantly smiling her baby-teeth smile at my wife and me as we pass in the hall of our apartment building, especially if we have our dog with us. This is a child that loves life and is full of more energy than any 10 mortals deserve. At least that’s my impression from our 5 second encounters. I don’t really know them, but I know who they are. Do you know what I mean?

The couple doesn’t get out much and so I guess today they decided to hire a babysitter and to go out, perhaps to a matinee movie. I only know this because I heard someone being walked around their apartment being given specific instructions about who to call in case of an emergency and his cell phone number and her cell phone number and what to do if she gets their voice mail and that they would call her right back if they miss the call because they might have their phones on vibrate and… you get the picture. They don’t get out much.

We can hear the neighbors a bit better than either of us wishes and so I heard the bath running not too long after the parents left. I heard the usual “bath time” followed by tiny feet running and squealing as Madison decided it was not bath time after all. This is almost a comforting rhythm for me. Bath runs. Madison runs. Parents chase and laugh. Madison gets a bath. But there was something different. The baby sitter wasn’t laughing.

The more Madison ran, the more the babysitter tried to sound authoritarian. “Madison, you come here right now!” Pause. “Madison, I mean it.” Longer pause. “One…two…Madison you come back here!” I laughed quietly to myself. This babysitter had a lot to learn about the use of power and authority. Madison was running this show and she knew it.

After a couple of minutes, I heard a sound I wasn’t expecting. It was the sound of Madison being spanked. Now, let me say that I believe there may be times for a spanking, so it’s not the spanking itself that disturbed me so. It was the length to which it was carried on…by a babysitter…in anger. I could feel my face flushing. Like I said, I don’t really know this couple that well, and it’s not my child, and, I didn’t hire the babysitter…but I’m babbling. Let’s just say I thought about telling the parents when they came home.

Now I was interested in what was going on next door. Madison was very upset. She had not seen this coming. From her perspective it was normal behavior to run before the bath, but this beating must have seemed unfair, unprovoked and, quite frankly, completely new. I don’t think Madison had ever been spanked before for any reason. And she was livid.

The sound moving from the far end of the apartment until the sitter and Madison arrived in the bathroom sounded like quite the struggle. I could tell that Madison was being dragged forcibly toward the still-running bathtub. She was howling and the sitter was barking out threats of further beatings. But this was nothing compared to what happened when they finally arrived in the bathroom.

Through our thin walls I heard the baby sitter undressing the sobbing child. Madison was beginning to calm. The sitter was beginning to calm. But when the sitter lifted Madison into the tub, Madison screamed at a pitch that caused me to leap out of my chair. “Hot” she screamed. “HOT!”

“Oh, it’s not that hot,” I heard the sitter say while struggling to hold Madison down while simultaneously switching off the hot water and switching on the cold.

“HOT!” insisted Madison and she screamed again.

Now, let me interrupt this story with two questions.

1. How are you feeling right now?


If you’ve been reading this story with anything more than a passing interest, I’m sure you’re like me – heart pounding, blood pressure up, anxious to resolve this. I realize that, with Madison suspended in this situation, it’s hard to think of anything else, but for one moment, let’s pretend that you’re me, that you’re in this situation. You’re standing five feet away from this screaming child with a thin wall in between. This brings us to our second question.


2. What would you do? Here are some choices:

1. Collaborate with the babysitter and help her victimize Madison.


2. Run next door and jump into the tub with Madison so that you are also victim.


3. Bang on the wall and shout at the babysitter, hoping to disrupt the situation.


4. Dial 9-1-1, run to the neighboring apartment door, kick in the door, run to the bathroom and snatch up the child.


5. Not bother with the phone or door, but jump straight through the wall.


6. Go down to Starbucks and try the new Mint Mocha Frappuccino your friends are raving about.

In any situation in which someone is being victimized, there are only six roles you and I can play.

• Perpetuator
  
• Collaborator
  
• Victim
  
• Bystander
  
• Resistor
  
• Rescuer

This is the total extent of our choices. Whether we welcome our role or not, simply by being aware of the situation means we have taken on one of these roles. The only good news here is that we have a choice as to which role we will play.

Obviously, the babysitter is the perpetuator and Madison is the victim (or perhaps the resistor). But what about us? What is our role here? Are we going to be a collaborator, bystander, resistor or rescuer? If you’re like me, there are only one or two choices that fit my values. I can resist, or I can rescue. Nothing else matches my image of myself.

Use this same model to think about what happened during the holocaust. As six million Jews were systematically stripped of their rights, swept up into ghettoes and concentration camps, and eventually murdered, what role did their neighbors play? They did not ask for a role, but by virtue of the public humiliation of the Jews, they had no choice to but to take on one of the roles named above. Sure there were some who were resistors and rescuers, but the truth is, the vast majority of the neighbors of the Jews who were murdered, were simply bystanders.

Historian Ian Kershaw, who has deeply studied the holocaust, said “The road to Auschwitz was built by hate, but paved with indifference.” As the most infamous genocide of all time was taking place, most people who were aware played the role of the bystander - millions of times, millions of choices and millions upon millions of bystanders. As Edmund Burke is supposed to have said, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” The cost of indifference is incalculable.

As you read the news reports about men tortured or shackled in the euphemistically phrased “stress positions,” for hours on end, sleep deprived, and kept at extreme temperatures…some guilty, some innocent, and yet none of them charged…when you read about men being held without charge in Guantanamo Bay for five years or more, without hope of reprieve, unable to face their accusers in court…when you are aware of all of this, how do you feel? Are you unblinking and unmoved?

As you read the story of Madison, you are moved to…what? Outrage? Anger? Action? I tell you one fictitious story about one fictitious little girl, and you’re ready to leap out of your chair. You hear hundreds of reports of men being treated in the most heinous and inhumane ways, and what is your reaction? More importantly, what is your role? Are you a bystander, or are you willing to be a resistor or even a rescuer? Are you ready to take direct action, such as signing petitions, writing letters or participating in protests? Or is it OK with you to be a bystander? Again, you get to choose one of the roles, but these roles are your only choices.

What is it about the plight of men being held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, or being tortured in secret CIA prisons…what is it about men who are flown by our government to Syria or Egypt or other countries to be tortured on our behalf that does not move you? Is it because our government has told us that these men are “bad men” or that they are “terrorists,” and yet they have never been tried or found guilty of anything?

Did you know that of the more than 700 men who have come through Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, only 10 have ever been formally charged with any crime and none have been given a trial to determine whether or not the charges are true? Did you know that a few hundred men have been released from Guantanamo Bay, and turned over to their home countries for “further prosecution,” and yet the vast majority of those released from Guantanamo Bay are never prosecuted, but released from custody? Why? It seems there’s no reason to hold these people since it was never shown that they were in any way connected to Qaeda or terrorism.

In closing, let’s look at the words of Elie Wiesel, a holocaust survivor who gave a speech at the Whitehouse in 1999. As he looked back at the violence of the century just ending, he remarked:

"So much violence, so much indifference. What is indifference? Etymologically, the word means 'no difference.' A strange and unnatural state in which the lines blur between light and darkness, dusk and dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil."

Our children will look back at this time in history. What will your role be? As you choose, remember that there is a very high price to be paid for indifference.

Are you ready to be an Activist?

Picture it - You're sitting in a living room of someone's house talking about...talking. Talking (more like complaining) about how things are wrong, bad, and sad. The furniture is covered in a stiff clear plastic and you keep sliding down the cushion of the sofa. Little doilies with rings of coffee stains cover any surface that is not wrapped in plastic.

The people around you are talking about how unfair the world is, and how we’re all doomed. “It’s not like the old days,” says one lethargic man in a torn t-shirt. He takes a swipe at the 14 hairs he is trying to use to cover the top of his head. “By god, we used to have a great country. Now it’s all gone to hell in a hand basket.”

OK, that’s enough torture. But before we leave this scene, let me ask you, what does that make you feel like? Dry? Bored? Feel like jumping up and running away?

Now, let's replace that picture with a different picture. Let's picture ourselves in a meeting, no let's think of it as a rally, or an event, not just a meeting. We're taking massive action. We're making posters for an upcoming event, or making phone calls to rally the troops. We're talking to the press instead of talking to ourselves. We're making a direct impact on someone's life, like the life of a family that is down on their luck. We're not TALKING about doing something - we're actually doing something. Now how does that make you feel?

That's the difference between a movement and a club. I don’t know about you, but the last thing I need is one more club meeting to go to. I have not time, or interest in wasting my time with a group of stuck-in-the-mud do-nothings. A club sits still and talks. A movement, you guessed it, moves!

The question we get to ask ourselves is, what kind of activist do we want to be? Do we want to be a member of a club or part of a movement? Are we ready to make an immediate and real impact, or are we satisfied with watching from the outside and complaining. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to move!

So, if you’re ready to move, here are five suggestions for you.

1. If you haven’t signed up for a local chapter of One Corps, do so today. This is where John Edwards' organization for putting boots on the ground.


2. Once you join, there’s a link on the right-hand side for you to invite your friends. Here’s one case when many of your friends will appreciate some Spam. I don’t know if you’ve ever volunteered before or not, but volunteering is addictive. You could change a friend’s life by connecting him or her with fellow activists.


3. Be more than a passive observer in your local One Corps group. Make suggestions for activities like a food drive. Here’s a crazy idea. Hook up with a local comedy club (or local bar). Let people come to the club and do 3 minutes of stand-up comedy if they donate cans to the One Corps food drive. It will help the club to get people in the door on a slow night, it will help the local food bank, and it will help get out the word about your local One Corps group. Oh! Here’s a good name for it. Are you ready for this? “Laugh your cans off!” No? Well, anyway, this is just one example. The point is to be active in your local chapter and get others on your team to be active.


4. Schedule a movie night. Brave New Theaters has a wide selection of movies that you can screen along with tools to help you invite people. Here in Cedar Rapids, IA we’re going to screen the movie Money Talks to open a discussion about the cost of health care.


5. C-O-N-N-E-C-T. Just in case you haven’t heard, you are Time Magazine’s Person of the Year, that is if you are one of the millions of people who participate in Blogs (you’re reading this, aren’t you?), Meetup, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, etc. If you haven’t set up an account on any of these services, do it today! And then link back from there to your One Corps group. It is incredibly easy. Also look at local non-profits who might be aligned the same way you are and who would want to connect with you and One Corps. Examples might be churches, Amnesty International, Moveon.org, etc. There are also other new tools on the web specifically designed to help you connect with other activists such as http://www.volunteermatch.org/ or http://www.idealist.org. The more you connect, the more you can grow the impact of your local One Corps group, and the more you can change the world. And after all, isn’t that why you’re here?

OK. So, what do you say? Do you want to be a club, or are you ready to be a movement! Get active today and see how many other people you can challenge to also get active.

Warm Regards,

Tony Loyd
Click here to see my One Corps group
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Cedar Rapids John Edwards Meetup