What Kind Of World Are We Building?

This week, we take a look at the most vulnerable in our society. How does it define us as a people if we treat those who are powerless or without privilege with contempt? How are we made "great" by in turn making others "small"?

"The Doctor" from the BBC's Doctor Who hits the nail on the head with his above comment. How much value do Americans place on a human life? Even more unsettling, why have we allowed ourselves to become so mercenary? Why can't we show our fellow human beings compassion?

Your thoughts and feedback are required. Leave them in the comments below and share this blog with others to get the dialogue going. Start out by asking yourselves the following question:

What Kind of World Are We Building 
For Future Generations?
by C.A. Matthews 

The little revolutionary in the photo above was present at last January's Unity March. The day itself wasn't half cold, and the numbers of marchers were great and enthusiastic.  As this year's planned Unity March is coming together, I wonder what kind of a turnout can be expected. The weather will probably be colder and snowier than last year, but will the events of 2017 have an even greater dampening effect on the hearts and minds of progressive marchers and tempt them to stay home?

This beautiful photograph of a tiny marcher got me thinking about the new grandbaby in our family. My brother and sister-in-law have recently become grandparents. As I enjoy looking at photos of their little bundle of joy, a sadness comes over me. What sort of world are building for my great-nephew and his friends? Will there even be potable water or breathable air by the time he reaches adulthood? Will he and his friends curse us for the gutted and polluted planet we've left to them? Will they shake their heads at our selfish stupidity for burning fossil fuels until they ran out, wasting valuable time we could have used for transitioning to green energy systems?

If we allow nuclear brinkmanship to continue, will there even be a world left for anyone to worry about? I'm told I take a lot of things too seriously. But I have to ask myself over and over again, "How have we become so complacent and flippant about these potential horrors? What do we gain as a people by remaining silent? Why do we place so little value on human life itself?"

Our children are our future. Why are we okay with bankrupting their futures through our selfish and destructive behaviors? Why do some scream "Don't kill the babies!" outside of women's clinics, yet do little to nothing to take care of the needs of these children once they're brought into the world? Is it all some sort of horrible game to them, a game of who can yell the loudest but make the least amount of difference in the lives of the very young and vulnerable? Why is sentencing children to a life of poverty and hunger preferable to providing everyone with free access to birth control? Sister Joan Chittister, O.S.B., sums up the hypocrisy in the so-called "pro-life" movement in this statement:

 I do not believe that just because you're opposed to abortion, that that makes you pro-life. In fact, I think in many cases, your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. And why would I think that you don't? Because you don't want any tax money to go there. That's not pro-life. That's pro-birth. We need a much broader conversation on what the morality of pro-life is.

What does it say about a country that cannot provide even the bare minimum in health care for its little ones? It's bad enough we have an orange buffoon in the White House bragging about his "big nuclear button" like a spoiled toddler, but we can't deny we've also elected a legislative branch made up of members willing to accept millions in corporate cash from the health insurance industry and Big Pharma lobbyists while allowing our children to go without health care. Are Americans saying children aren't important in the scheme of things?

That's something to be real proud of, huh?

A recent U.N. survey gives the U.S. the lowest marks in the

modern world for how it addresses the needs of its most vulnerable populations.  Sorry, but we don't get any points for how good the top 1% have it at the expense of the remaining 99%. We are the laughingstock of the planet for giving wealthy corporations "welfare" instead of our own people who are homeless and hungry. 

I know I'm not laughing.

That's the kind of world we are building. How can some shout "We're making America Great Again!" while allowing it to fall into an abyss of greed? It makes no sense. If greed is our country's creed, we were never truly "great" in the first place.

I'm sorry to express such dark and depressing thoughts, but a very long, cold winter and a very dark, cold outlook for ordinary Americans has something to do with it. I'd like to help build a better world for my great-nephew to live in. I want our children to be loved, well-fed, well-taken care of (health care for all) and have a chance to make something of their lives without falling into massive college loan debt like their poor parents' have. Their parents' generation deserves a break, too.

We can't continue to sit at home, trying to keep warm this winter. We're all needed in the streets, in the town halls, in the vaulted halls of our state houses and Congress, pressuring those in power by telling them we will not allow our children's future to be stolen by mostly older, super-rich, white males. We need to march, unite, call, write, and fight back against the immorality of our current culture.  Agreed, the stakes are high, but the end will be worth it.

After all, a child--a whole generation of children--is a terrible thing to waste.

Some related articles that might be of interest:

https://talkpoverty.org/2017/12/12/u-s-eliminate-child-poverty-cost-senate-tax-bill/

https://www.nationofchange.org/2018/01/05/f-35-jet-program-budget-exceeds-406-billion-yet-universal-healthcare-costly/

https://splinternews.com/time-to-make-life-hard-for-the-rich-1821384779

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/21228-americas-real-welfare-queens

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Ways you can help to build a better world this week...

From 314 Action:

EMERGENCY PETITION: Demand Congress PERMANENTLY fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program →

We need your immediate attention:

4.9 million children are about to lose their healthcare. 4.9 MILLION.

Congress refuses to permanently fund the critical Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

And unless they do something by the end of the month, states will have no choice but to cancel the healthcare of millions of kids.

This is a public health EMERGENCY.  So we’re gathering 25,000 signatures to demand Congress permanently fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program →

SIGN HERE: Tell Congress to fund Children’

Top medical groups -- including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Family Physicians -- say funding CHIP is absolutely imperative.

Healthcare that kids need and deserve hangs in the balance. It’s despicable that Congress would play politics with something as fragile as children’s lives.

That’s why we’re launching this petition to Congress. As pro-science activists committed to ending attacks on healthcare, it’s up to us to stand up for children everywhere and ensure they get the care they need.
 
If you’re with us, sign our petition right away and help us reach 25,000 signatures to SAVE children’s healthcare:

SIGN HERE → https://secure.314action.org/Fund-CHIP

Your help is needed,

314 Action

 ***

From Friends of the Earth:
 As families gathered to celebrate the holidays, Trump was busy making it easier for Big Oil to attack the environment.

Trump’s administration overturned regulations to protect communities from fracking. It weakened rules that were designed to prevent another Deepwater Horizon spill. And it announced that it will no longer hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for harming protected migratory birds -- all while Congress was standing by.

Meanwhile, Trump took to Twitter to mock climate change after a record-breaking year of hurricanes and wildfires. And EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is ramping up his efforts to destroy our protections for the air, water and climate.

2017 may have seemed like a long year. But Trump’s advisors say that 2018 is when he will really pursue his radical agenda. We need your Senators to stand up, not stand by, as Trump increases his attacks this year. As Senators return to Washington to start the new year, we need your help to push them to act! 

Tell Congress: Stop the Trump administration from letting polluters poison our communities!

Scott Pruitt is a climate denier who has spent his career suing the Environmental Protection Agency. Now that he’s leading that same agency, he’s spent his first year in office remaking it to the benefit of Big Oil.

Pruitt pushed out more than 700 agency staff and started monitoring the emails of anyone who expressed concerns with the agency’s direction. He took steps to gut the Clean Power Plan. And he is spending more time courting fossil fuel industry executives than holding them accountable for destroying our air, water and climate.

Together Trump and Pruitt pose the gravest threat to our environment and public health that we've ever seen. We need your help to fight back.

Tell your Senators to stand up to Trump’s attacks on our environmental protections!

Trump has stacked his government with anti-science extremists, billionaires and fossil fuel industry shills. Now, they’re using their positions to advance their corporate interests -- not the interests of the American people.

Trump is already poised to further gut our environmental protections in 2018. Congress could stand up and stop him, but instead, it’s standing by while he destroys our environment to help corporate polluters.

We need you to urge your Senators to do their jobs and stand up to Trump!

Tell your Senators: Stop Trump’s anti-science, anti-environmental agenda!

Standing with you,
Ben Schreiber,
Senior political strategist,
Friends of the Earth

 ***

Donald Trump is at it again. On Tuesday night Trump took to Twitter to threaten North Korea and, by consequence, most likely the rest of the world, with nuclear annihilation:

This rhetoric is extremely dangerous. This is not how the person controlling our nuclear arsenal should speak -- we don’t know how the North Koreans or our allies will perceive Trump’s reckless tweet, and it undermines the diplomatic efforts being made by our own State Department.
 
We should all be extremely worried and concerned about what the President will do next. It is time to act.

Urge your Members of Congress to take steps to prevent Trump from launching a nuclear war. 

Right now, two members of Congress, Rep. Ted Lieu and Sen. Ed Markey, have introduced legislation to prevent the U.S. president from launching a nuclear war without a declaration of war by Congress. While the President would still be able to defend from an attack against America, he or she could no longer launch the deadliest weapons ever invented just because they wanted to.

We can not overstate the destruction of a nuclear war, and we are closer to that horror today than we have ever been since the Cuban Missile Crisis. We owe it to ourselves and to future generations to take action now to step back from the brink of nuclear war.

No one person - and definitely not someone as erratic and reckless as Donald Trump - should ever be able to single-handedly start such a deadly war. Please sign today.

Thank you for working for peace,
Erica, Ben, Amy, and the Win Without War team

 ***

In June the Trump administration took Yellowstone-area grizzly bears off the list of animals protected by the Endangered Species Act. But there's been a big problem with the legality of that decision that's at last being addressed — and it could save these bears from dying in cruel, state-sponsored trophy hunts.

Tell the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to act on this evidence and reverse its earlier decision to stop protecting grizzlies.

The Service is asking the public to weigh in on the legality of its delisting rule because of a recent case in the D.C. Court of Appeals. The D.C. court rightly voided a rule stripping protections from Great Lakes wolves because of the harm that rule would cause other recovering wolf populations. The flaws are identical to those in the grizzly bear rule.

Take a minute to tell the Service it can't paper over these legal flaws and must restore protection to Yellowstone's grizzlies.  

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EMERGENCY: In a matter of days, the House will vote on whether to turn the internet into a massive spying tool for the Trump administration. This is not a drill: Click here to demand Congress close the "backdoor search loophole" in S. 139.

We’re only just days into the new year but already, Congress is moving to turn the internet into a giant spying tool for Trump to snoop on Americans.

And both Republicans – and some Democrats – are on board with this.

Call Congress right now, and tell them to vote to close the "backdoor search loophole" in S. 139 that would let Trump use the internet to spy on Americans.

This is not a drill. Last year, Congress had a deadline to re-authorize Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act that uses the internet as a massive spy tool to snoop on Americans without a warrant or probable cause. Activists just like you signed petitions and called Congress to block this and push for strong reforms to protect our privacy from the prying eyes of government.

Now Trump-aligned Republicans – and some turncoat Democrats – want to force this through in the new year. There’s a not a lot of time to fight back. We need to use our voices now and tell Congress not to turn the internet into a giant spy tool for an unstable Trump administration.

Call Congress right now, and tell them to vote to close the "backdoor search loophole" in S. 139 that would let Trump use the internet to spy on Americans.

Thanks for taking action,

Reuben and the team at Demand Progress

"Don't waste any time mourning. Organize!"

 Now is the Time

words & photos by Cindy A. Matthews

"Don't waste any time mourning. Organize!"

These are the last words of labor organizer Joe Hill. They've been quoted by the Green Party's Jill Stein and many others this past week. Now more than ever, they're words worth heeding.

What do they mean? They mean there's no time to lose, people! Get back out there and work hard for the political revolution. It's not going to be handed to us on a silver platter. We're going to have to sweat for it.

On this week's blog we'll gain insight on how progressives should deal with the aftermath of a Trump victory, but the photographic images will come from the latest Dakota Access Pipeline protest I attended in downtown Toledo, Ohio, at 1 Government Center. It was an extremely windy evening, but that didn't prevent 40+ activists from participating. We held up signs, chanted "Water is life!" and talked with passers-by--including a couple of very nice police officers. 
  
The officers really wanted to know what all was going on at Standing Rock. They thought President Obama had stopped the pipeline a while back, since that's all they heard on the mainstream news channels. They said they didn't realize the pipeline is to go under the Missouri River and threaten the water supply of millions if and when it should leak.

Now is the time to take Joe Hill's remarks to heart. The  conversation we had with the two police officers demonstrates how the majority of our fellow citizens need more information about what is happening in North Dakota and elsewhere that threatens their health and the health of the planet.  They need to know who in power is fighting for them and who is exploiting them. They need uncensored information to make wiser electoral decisions next time at the polls. Where will they receive this unbiased information? You are their source for that much needed information.

So, grab some friends, pick a cause, make some plans and some signs and get out there and inform the public. Forget about the presidential election--it's over! To quote Joe Hill:

"Don't waste any time mourning. Organize!" 

*** 

              "It's Time"

Green Party US Senate Candidate

 Joseph DeMares's Statement on the 2016 Election

This has been a hard election for all of us. I know in my household the personal, financial and health costs of mounting a statewide election for a year and a half on a tiny budget have been severe, and I thank my family for helping me make this effort. 

Perhaps the deepest loss in this election is the loss of civility, the loss of friends and family who disagree politically. Our country is more divided than it has been since I was a child in the 1960's, at a time when we desperately need to come together to tackle society-threatening problems like global warming and income inequality. One of the main causes of this division is our corporate dominated media. By carefully censoring what information we see, it gives us a distorted picture of ourselves and our neighbors. 

According to the (Ohio) Secretary of State, I received 1.6% of the vote for a total of 85,000 votes. This doesn't sound like much until you realize that 9 out of 10 Ohioans went into the polls not even knowing that there was a Green Party candidate for US Senate. I was locked out of the three hour-long televised debates, and the public television stations refused to play even my two minute candidate statement. The television, radio, and newspapers assiduously ignored the Green Party for a year and a half. That makes the 1.6% I received nothing short of miraculous, and I thank my volunteers from all over the state who were out knocking on doors, hanging banners and passing out fliers for that 1.6%. 

I was honored to be included in candidates' nights all over the state, and pleased to be included in some voters' guides put out by groups like the League of Women Voters. To the extent that true democracy exists in Ohio, we were present and we did well. To the extent that money and the corporate media control who governs the country, we were excluded. In the last days before the election, I received literally thousands of Facebook messages, phone calls, and tweets from people who had just found out about my candidacy and were overjoyed that they could vote for someone outside of the two party system. It is an indictment of our system that most Ohioans never knew they had that opportunity.

So, we find ourselves after the election a deeply divided country with the bonds between friends, family and neighbor torn or strained, and we are faced with a decision. Do we deepen those divisions or do we work to strengthen our connections with each other? The threats to our nation are still there. Threats like global warming will not go away simply because we elected a president who denies them. In the coming years, as crops fail, cities sink, and the climate runs away we will need each other. We can't afford to put off ending the fossil fuel economy simply because Jill Stein lost. We cannot give up. Things look desperate right now, but we can't let that drive us to desperation.

The Green Party made some gains in this election. Jill Stein got almost three times the votes that she received in 2012. The Ohio Green Party has almost doubled in size, and we now have Greens in every county in the state. There are new county committees forming where we have never had an organization before. So, there is hope for the future. We need to take that hope and turn it into a Green reality. Thank you to all who have helped us get this far. Let's keep going. It's time.

***

Mariana offers us a different perspective on the recent election. We should all stop complaining and start looking for the "silver lining" in a Trump presidency, all the while not forgetting to Act. Wake up. Organize.

photo by Zaire Daniels

The Silver Lining

by Mariana Alvarez

  

I know what people think about Trump. But I have also been carefully listening to his speeches instead of just following the media hype on the stupid things he says (racist, sexist, etc.). Yes, he's a crazy bigot, we all know this, but we have to look for the silver lining. Is he really the worst that could have happened to this country? Is there no reason to celebrate a Hillary loss? What will Trump’s presidency mean for the progressive movement?

To begin, Trump's foreign policy is revolutionary. He wants to bring America back to the manufacturing age, mining and small business age. He wants to stop outsourcing jobs (i.e., stop American corporations from invading other countries for cheap slave labor). He wants to bring back small businesses and skilled trades and small farmers. He wants to cancel all international trade agreements that force the cheap flow of natural resources from third world countries into the US. (He wants the US to exploit its own resources instead of colonizing other countries. Finally!)  He wants third world countries to lose dependency on the US. This is all a good thing. It’s a good thing for the world, and its a good thing for the USA. 

Do you really want to continue to live on your knees to big corporations and bankers? Do you really want your career to depend on big monopolies and their profit? What if the American people take back their economy?

Yes, Trump's against immigration, but, if he keeps his promises, moving away from violent neo-liberalism will reduce the amount of people that need to move to the US in search of jobs in the first place. Why? Because the US will stop causing poverty in other countries. If Monsanto, Walmart, Nike, Verizon, the steel industry, etc., stop invading other countries for land, resources and cheap labor this will change up the global game. If American corporations stop invading small farmers’ lands in other countries, this will be a great thing for the world. This type of colonialism is the cause of the high level of immigration into the US in the first place. 

The US has always been sticking its nose into foreign politics and economies. The US wants the third world to become its source of labor and resources so that America can keep on getting richer. This is not what the USA was meant to be by our founding fathers. Yes, diversity and immigration is a wonderful thing, but not when it is fueled by a violent, colonizing, neo-liberal force of power held by the 1% of this country.

Others: "Oh, but Trump is going to cause WWIII!"

My response: You think Hillary wasn't going to do that? She's a warmonger. She's super neo-liberal and supports US intervention in every country. She wants war with Russia. She doesn’t care about minorities unless it means keeping them here to provide labor for big corporations. Look at how many countries she bombed as Secretary of State. She kills innocent women, children and men every day. That is not coming from a place of love and morality. It’s coming from a place of greed. 

photo by Zaire Daniels

Hillary is all rhetoric. She makes you think Trump represents racism and everything we need to be against, when in reality she cares just as little about minorities’ lives. She just wants to protect big business’ interests. That’s all. Trump is against a lot of neo-liberal policies. He's against NAFTA and a whole bunch of other international trade agreements. This is good news for the rest of the world. Maybe the US will finally begin to focus in on itself and get its dirty paws out of the natural resources of other countries and stop messing up with their politics.

And hey, maybe those that can should just move out of the USA. Maybe it’s not such a bad thing. There are thousands upon thousands of immigrants in the US living horrible, difficult lives away from their family members across the globe, working long hours for ridiculous wages, living here just because its the only choice they have to survive. The US is no longer a melting pot. Only a place for immigrants to be pushed out of their countries to become slaves to big business. Trump isn't against immigrants with education and money. "Educated" immigrants will get to keep their good jobs and money. Don’t worry about that. He wants business. What he doesn’t want is Latino/Asian/Black farmers and construction workers and bathroom cleaners and slaves of big corporations. He wants to stop that type of immigration. But funny enough, the US has been causing that type of immigration in the first place.
 

photo by Anthony Curi

Yes, poor families will feel the burn. It'll be hard. I know because I am part of a poor Latinx family. I know because my mom cleans houses for a living. I know because I don’t have health insurance and have to pay a fee for Obamacare for not having any. I know because we live paycheck to paycheck. It’s not good news for us directly, but what if we the poor immigrants (many of whom haven't seen our families in years) can return to our countries, finally find jobs there and are no longer be forced to immigrate for the so-called "American (neo-liberal) Dream" (a.k.a. slave labor machine)?

In short, of course both parties are scared of Trump! He is against a lot of policies that protect money interests. What will the 1% in the US do if they can no longer exploit the planet for profit at the rate they have been doing?

My only concern is Trump’s domestic racism. This is bad news for the Black Lives Matters movement and for immigrants. But keep in mind that Trump hasn’t brought in new racism into our country. He has just uncovered the racism that has always been there. The war against us will be more explicit now. This just means we have a clearer target now. We have to stick together, more than ever. Instead of losing hope, let’s look at the opportunities this has opened up for us.

For example, I think these results show that people are tired of the status quo (and I was seriously more fearful of the status quo under Clinton more than anything). A Trump win may actually be good for third parties. It is our chance to start a bigger movement. Wall Street could possibly be crumbling! (Unless this is all just a sick game and Trump is actually on their side, but let's ignore that possibility for now.) Trump is all about getting big money interests out of politics. (At least that’s what he says.) He has taken the power out of the Clinton’s hands. 

Let’s use this chaotic time to grow even bigger. Let’s mobilize. Let’s stick together, make the Green Party grow. Make a movement based on love and peace. Support our indigenous people fighting against the DAPL. Support the Black Lives Matter movement. Support the people getting organized in your localities.  

Act. Wake up. Organize. Stop sitting on your ass. 

It's funny how the people lecturing me about Trump have never even volunteered for a political movement and are those who just believe everything the news feeds them. Stop the ignorance and start getting connected to local groups trying to make a change. Research the Green Party. Fight for the country you want!

This is an opportunity. If you just take this as a loss and give up, what's that going to do? You gotta look at the silver lining. The better question is: What are you going to do?

Bio: Mariana Alvarez is a 27-year old immigrant from Colombia to the United States and currently resides in Florida with her mom. As part of her activism, she has traveled and lived in various poor communities around the world in an attempt to better understand today’s global geopolitics and social movements.

 

***

From Brand New Congress, ways to help the 2018 election outcome turn out a whole lot better for our country:
 
Dear Friends,

We weren’t hoping for this, but we’re ready. For the past several months, Brand New Congress’s full time staff and volunteers have been recruiting a new generation of leaders to run for Congress in 2018. The candidates are amazing women, men and people from every American community -- uniquely equipped to defeat Trumpism by healing our divided nation and rebuilding our economy. They are the gems out of thousands of nominations we’ve received from you, and your small donations have made our work possible. Thank you!

When we started reaching out to these potential candidates, they thought we were crazy. They are not politicians; they are working people who keep America going every day. But both yesterday and today, we have woken up to emails and phone calls. Trump’s victory has convinced many of them the time is now.

But some of these folks are asking us very specific questions -- questions about you. “Haven’t people lost faith in this entire country now? Haven’t they given up?”

This is very real. We need you to show our candidates that you will never give up. Add your name to our pledge to elect a Brand New Congress in 2018.

When we get to 100,000 names, we will announce our first batch of draftees: http://BrandNewCongress.org

Please share this with everyone you know who is heartsick about where our country is right now and wondering what they can do to fix it.

A lot of people are asking why did Trump win? In the end it was because people’s incomes and access to jobs have been disappearing for 40 years and a lot of people -- including many who voted for Obama in 2008 and 2012 -- either cast a protest vote against the establishment that let it happen or deserted the two party system. Eight million people who voted for a major party in 2012 did not in 2016.

Trump’s power will be short lived -- but only if we organize to put a way forward in front of Americans. If history is any guide, when Trump fails to turn around the economy, he will seek to rally his supporters to the campaign promises he was most passionate about: targeting undocumented workers, targeting Muslims and “bombing the s*** out of” various countries. We have to take this country back for the people -- all the people!

When the labor organizer Joe Hill was sentenced to death in 1915, his immortal words to the movement were, “Don't waste any time mourning. Organize!”

Let’s organize!

Yours for the revolution,

The Brand New Congress Working Group
Alex, Corbin, Haley, Issy, Mary, Nasim, Saikat, Zack 

Got the message? ORGANIZE! 

And let us know what you are doing in your community.

Please send us your photos, event news, blogs, poems, etc. to thebernieblog2016@gmail.com

Thank you and Power to the People!