Blog 27
April
27,2017
Refuse Silence
Overload
will do it. After weeks of “executive
orders” most of which do little or nothing and what is about to happen,
doesn’t, and facts that are not facts are repeated over and over, it is easy to
think, “enough is enough”. I am going to
the beach, which I have done recently. But
still, a resurgence is bubbling up, and I can feel the Spring rush. I am brought back into the fray, when I hand
out a red card to a Spanish speaking member of my community, and we have a
conversation that we would otherwise never have had like yesterday, with three
hospital workers who wanted to tell me about a raid in San Jose where some
people knew to keep their doors closed and others did not know. Ths last group was taken away. Many people have kept going. Indivisible reports that 250,000 people went
to 400 Town Meetings and confronted their representatives over the spring
recess. And in fact the ACA didn’t
pass(although they are creeping up on it again), we have no wall, the Moslem
ban has been stopped and the promised tax disaster is still underwraps.
The Science
March was particularly heartening.
People who had never marched before came out to insist that science
matters and without it we are doomed. http://www.npr.org/2017/04/22/525250799/out-of-the-lab-and-into-the-streets-science-community-marches-for-science.
“GREENFIELDBOYCE: There were surprisingly few white lab coats,
mostly looks like normal people, although there were people in lab coats. One
woman I met is Carol Trosset. She's a field biologist, and she came from
Minnesota for what she said was her first political event ever.
CAROL TROSSET: My sign says without data, you're just another
person with an opinion.
GREENFIELDBOYCE: And so why did you decide to come all the way
from Minnesota to this event?
TROSSET: Because science is how we know things, and if we don't
pay attention to whether we know things or just think them, then we're going to
make lots of terrible mistakes.”
And then there were the poets: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/21/books/review/american-poets-refusing-to-go-gentle-rage-against-the-right.html?_r=0
The poet Jane Hirshfield has never thought of herself as an
agitator. A self-described “genuine introvert,” Ms. Hirshfield likes to spend
her days gardening, hiking and writing verses about nature, impermanence and
interconnectedness.
But a couple of months ago, to her own surprise, she emailed the
organizers of the March for Science in Washington and urged them to make poetry
part of the protest. At the rally on Saturday, Ms Hirshfield will read her new
poem “On the Fifth Day,” which addresses
climate change denial and the Trump administration’s dismantling of
environmental regulations.
“I’ve never done anything like that before,” Ms. Hirshfield
said. “I don’t even give dinner parties.”
Overload can lead to
silence one of the most dangerous opponents of freedom and democracy. This week “This America Life” examined fake
news in Russia and its longterm effects: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/614/the-other-mr-president.
Prologue:
“Since Russia meddled in our election, there's been concern that
the fake news and disinformation that's so prevalent there could be taking hold
in this country. But is that hyperbole? This week we look at what it's actually
like to live in the confusing information landscape that is Putin's Russia.”
In Part 1 quoting a
piece from the Guardian http://reprints.longform.org/putin-conspiracy-banned-story-anderson the story looks at
bombings in Russia in 1999 which many believe brought Putin to power.
In 1999, following four
deadly bombing attacks on apartment buildings in Moscow it was believe by some,
it was the government not terrorists as claimed by the government, which sponsored
these attacks. It was his response to
these “terrorist” attacks that many thought brought Putin to power. All who questioned the government’s
version of what had happened were silenced. In 2009 when people were
interviewed about this event most people interviewed either didn’t believe that the government
would do something like that, or didn’t care as if it was true or not true their
lives had nothing to do with what the government did. By 2009, challenging the
government seemed to be no longer an option.
So where are we headed?
Will overload, confusion, and misinformation take over our ability to
discern fact from fiction? Or will we
continue to Rise Up and challenge those
who are attempting to put us to sleep and keep us in silence.
Wise Words
Charles Blow
Excerpt:
I worried that modern
shortsightedness would prevent resisters from seeing the long game, that the
exhaustion of constant outrage would numb them to unrelenting assault.
But, to my great delight, my worry
was unfounded. Not only is the movement still strong, it appears to be getting
stronger. People have found a salve for their sadness: exuberant agitation. Far
from growing limp, the Trump resistance is stiffening and strengthening.
As John Cassidy put it this month
in a progress report on the resistance in The New Yorker: “Indeed, what is striking is
how many people Trump has mobilized who previously didn’t pay very much
attention to what happens in Washington. He has politicized many formerly
apolitical people; ultimately, this may be among his biggest achievements as
president.”
These comments came specifically in reference to the throngs of
resisters showing up at lawmakers’ town hall events, sometimes in record
numbers. They are passionate, vocal and confrontational. They are not bowing
down; they are holding their representatives accountable and giving a very
visual reinforcement to the threat that defending Trump or supporting his
agenda will be punished at the ballot box.
Jane Hirschfield
The Fifth Day
On the fifth day
the scientists who studied the rivers
were forbidden to speak
or to study the rivers.
The scientists who studied the air
were told not to speak of the air,
and the ones who worked for the farmers
were silenced,
and the ones who worked for the bees.
Someone, from deep in the Badlands,
began posting facts.
The facts were told not to speak
and were taken away.
The facts, surprised to be taken, were silent.
Now it was only the rivers
that spoke of the rivers,
and only the wind that spoke of its bees,
while the unpausing factual buds of the fruit trees
continued to move toward their fruit.
The silence spoke loudly of silence,
and the rivers kept speaking,
of rivers, of boulders and air.
Bound to gravity, earless and tongueless,
the untested rivers kept speaking.
Bus drivers, shelf stockers,
code writers, machinists, accountants,
lab techs, cellists kept speaking.
They spoke, the fifth day,
of silence.
Action: Decide where you want to focus your energies. Take care of
yourselves. Work with others. Reach out
to people in your commuity who are already organizied and can use your help.
Call your MOC. Remind them to stand firm in support of the ACA.
The
Budget: Now that your MoCs are
back in Washington this week, they have to pass a stopgap funding bill, known
as a “CR” (Continuing
Resolution), to fund the government past April 28. But with his 100-day
report card looming on that same day, Trump is desperate for any legislative
win he can get—so much so that his cronies in Congress may be willing to risk a
government shutdown by including unpopular policy
riders in the funding bill,
such as:
- Defunding
of ACA cost-sharing subsidies (CSRs) that millions of Americans rely on to
keep coverage affordable
- Defunding
Planned Parenthood and other family planning initiatives
- Additional
funding for Trump’s mass deportation force, including his border wall,
detention facilities, and more ICE agents
- Restricting
federal funding for cities that take up sanctuary policies
- Defunding
the EPA and other climate protection programs
Ask
your MoC not to risk a shutdown and to oppose
any of these policy riders in any funding bill.
March April 29, March for Climate Change
March May 1st with immigrants and workers. https://reformimmigrationforamerica.org/rise-up/?link_id=2&can_id=2fffe46e87f2dd752ea6ac392f716e73&source=email-weekly-indivisible-actions-whats-next-after-recess-4&email_referrer=weekly-indivisible-actions-whats-next-after-recess-4&email_subject=weekly-indivisible-actions-whats-next-after-recess
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