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{1} “Many people are seized by one and the same affect with great consistency. All his senses are so strongly affected by one object that he believes this object is present even if it is not. If this happens while the person is awake, the person is believed to be insane. But if the greedy person thinks only of money and possessions, the ambitious one only of fame, one does not think of them being insane, but only as annoying; generally, one has contempt for them. But factually, greediness, ambition, and so forth, are forms of insanity, although usually one does not think of them as 'illness'.”
Spinoza
Yesterday one of my friends visited me. I've known him since childhood, when he was friends with my older brothers, and me with his younger brother. He is a giant specimen of humanity, who worked on the Mississippi as a teen, and then in construction. His face is mapped with the scars of countless bar fights, and upon appearance alone, I suspect most people would imagine him to be a “redneck.”
Age has mellowed him, as it does so many of us. Now retired, he said that he has spent the last month watching news programs about national politics. His favorite shows, he said, are “Keith and Rachel on MSNBC.” Because of their influence, he recently registered to vote; it will be the first time he has done so since Ronald Reagan was elected.
Those who do not know my friend would be surprised to hear him accurately quote Thomas Jefferson and other “Founding Fathers.” He is concerned by the aggressive ignorance being spouted by Tea Party members, from Sharon Angle and Christine O'Donnell, to some of our local politicians. He said that he had seen me on the news on an area television station recently, from the Sidney Town Board meeting, discussing the Town Supervisor's attempts to force the excavation of Muslim graves. He had first become aware of this when Keith Olbermann reported on it.
I asked him if that was why he had registered to vote? No, he told me, it was mainly because of the reports of teens and young adults killing themselves, because of the shit they take from a society that rejects them for their sexuality. Eleven years ago, his son was riding with his girlfriend while on Christmas break after their first semester of college. She hit some black ice, and they were both killed. My friend said that he doesn't want any parent to go through the hell he did; and more, he didn't want any kid to suffer because of some self-righteous, power-hungry adult.
Those who judge other human beings on their sexuality are indeed ill. And every politician, from some jackass school board member recently in the news, to those in the Tea Party, the republican party – and yes, from the Democratic Party – who seek the power of office by courting those opposed to human rights and social equality need to be voted out of office. The same goes for those who try to benefit by appealing to racism, sexism, and any form of religious hate.
{2} “As the generations pass they grow worse. A time will come when they grow so wicked that they will worship power; might will be right to them and reverence for the good will cease to be. At last, when no man is angry anymore at wrongdoings or feels shame in the presence of the miserable, Zeus will destroy them, too. And yet even then something might be done, if only the common people would rise up and put down rulers that oppress them.”
Greek myth from the Iron Age
After my friend left, I spent some time reading through the Democratic Underground, before engaging in some “phone work” for a few democratic candidates from New York. In part, I was looking back at a few threads from earlier in the week. I find the discussions about the group dynamics here interesting, as well as various threads about specific issues. In years past, I think that there was a much higher percentage of actual progressive democrats here. I liked that, not because it served as an echo chamber for the democratic left, but instead because there were far more discussions that had the potential to organize and bring about action.
In one of the threads I was re-reading yesterday, I noted another more recent forum participant saying that investing energy here is not activism. A good friend noted that, for example, I had posted a link to an internet petition calling for the removal from office of that Tea Party Sidney Town Supervisor. The other person responded that he did not think such petitions were meaningful. I suppose in the hands of some people, they would not be. However, considering that Amendment 1 specifically speaks to the importance of citizens petitioning their elected representatives, I can say without any risk of being incorrect that, in the right hands, they can be extremely meaningful.
The Constitution is something that average citizens should be more familiar with. We are witnessing a time when Tea Party “leaders” are speaking openly about an armed revolution, should they lose in the upcoming elections. By no coincidence, advocating this is actually discussed in the Constitution: it is treason, the only crime addressed in the Constitution. However, the highly aroused Tea Partiers are clearly unfamiliar with the document. Their inbred cousins, who spend years posting on the Free Republic internet forum, are equally ignorant about issues of democracy.
I believe that this forum approaches its greatest potential when it is used by the democratic left as a resource for discussions on local, state, and national political/social issues. There are benefits from just relaxing and blowing off steam from time to time. But it is also a good source of information, including on things ranging from the news that the corporate media does not report, to ideas about organizing at the grass roots level and exercising our Constitutional rights.
Most people here are certainly going to get out and vote on Tuesday. That is important. Perhaps more important at this time is what the democratic left will do in the early period before the next election cycle. We need to do the ground work necessary to insure that not only are our voices heard – and I'm not interested in communications with conservative democrats – and that actual liberal and progressive candidates have the ability to throw their hats into the ring.
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