Original Writings

In Defense of Priorities

December 20, 2004 - 5:14pm

Using animals for food and clothing causes suffering, is bad for human health, is bad for the environment and is a huge public safety risk. Protecting other sentient creatures from humans is to protect the weak from the strong and to expand the definition of 'us'. So why isn't animal rights more frequently identified as a core progressive value? Why do so many sites that deal with progressive issues not include an animal rights category? - From Salon Table Talk

The moderator of that discussion proceeded to point her finger at us first, and then about 5 other progressive sites as example of unconcious organizations that do "not have an animal rights category". As a result, II feel warrented to tear her position to shreds. Normally, I would have settled the matter at her forum, but since Salon only allows "premiums" to chat, I'm forced to shout from here. (BTW, see the "add new subject" button to your top left?)

Lets start with suffering: As we speak, our brave soldiers, who've sworn to protect our lives, are getting their hands and legs blown off, only to be herded to some ship in the middle of the person gulf so no one can see what BUSH did to them. As Rumsfeld said, death and disfigurement have a tendency to give war a negative connotation. Sure, "our" president wears his cute little yellow ribbon, and waves a little flag for the cameras; but that is a photo-op. As to the extent our president supports our troops in action, he basically tells our soldiers to fuck off, take their 10 thousand dollars, and wheel themselves to the nearest homeless shelter within 5 years. Forgive me for forgetting about the horrible conditions that our cattle are suffering.

Catch the Red Bat: How Democrats Will Win

December 6, 2004 - 2:33pm
Tonight, I wandered through many progressive news outlits, blogs, and campaign websites looking for answers on how we can win... and I have a confession: I'm on the verge of losing my mind. Over here, I read another de-construction of Lakoff's "nurturing" theme, and over there I read another call to "brand" our political cause; however, I'll be frank about my opinion: Lakoff, Brand Democrat, and all other efforts to repackage our message will lose. Now, my reader might be wondering, "what evidence do you have to say that?" Good question reader, let me explain:

George Lakoff has given us a much needed gift. During the fall of late 2003, he introduced many of us to the concept of cognitive frames; he educated us on how Republican think tanks had used framing to capture the congress in 94, and eventually the White House in 00' and 04'. However, there are two pink elephants in regards to Lakoff's theory:

  1. While he cracked the code to the Republican "strict father" frame, his "nurturant family" frame lacks vitality and substance. For a cognitive linguist, one would have expected a better word for our frame than "nurture" -- a positivelty pink word that evokes images of lactating nipples, infants, and pregnant women. Don't misread that criticism, I'm simply saying that an overtly femine frame is disagreeable considering we need male votes as well as female votes.
  2. The strict father frame developed by Republican think tanks took decades to pull off. They started with Reagan (about two years before I was born), and now, 24 years later, it is giving the Republicans their full returns. First off, we don't have 24 years to allow our seeds to grow in the public mind. Second off, the idea of crafting unified messages arose in an era of TV-age politics. Our success, if it is ever possible, is not going to come through televised sound bytes. We need to be thinking ahead of the Republicans: let them have there talk radio, and fox news. Let's get to work on using the next generation of communcation tools (hey guess what: we're using the prototypes of those tools right now)

Now in regards to "branding democrats". For Christ's sake: first off, 'Democrat' is a brand that is associated with losing. Second off, lets stop look at voters as consumers, or demographs. There is no lower form of looking at human beings than as mere demographs of religion, sex, race, age, and income. Perhaps we might begin by respecting our voters as being something more than empty consumer vessals; mere brains that deserve a good washing by method of incessent televised advertising. So, I have a frame, its simple, its too the point, and it will work.

The Progressive Blog Alliance Mission Statement

December 1, 2004 - 2:28pm

The PBA is an emergent, self-organized network of independent activists, journalists, and writers. We do not exclusively identify ourselves with a single nation, but rather our world society as a whole. We recognize that on a fundamental level, we are all one.

We demand our members to show complete intolerance for oppression, bigotry, ignorance, violence, corruption, and exploitation. We may choose to deny membership to individuals who support certain politicians; for example, George W. Bush. However, we will never require our members to subscribe to any list of creeds, tenets, or dogmas. We are not a political cult. Progressive libertarians are just as welcome as progressive socialists.

We do not represent any particular ideology. By "ideology" we firstly mean political opinions which are based upon the assumptions and biases of philosophers living between the 17th and 19th century; and in turn using their antiquanted manifestos and treatises as the lenses through which one judges the world. But secondly -- and this is far more important -- we mean those systems of thought which squelch one's individuality; while at the same time shrinking one's possible range of thought. The majority of ideologies were designed to turn followers into unthinking, obedient drones, all of whom quack the same slogans. The PBA is bound by its common principles, not its ideological labels.

On American Nationalism

November 26, 2004 - 3:56pm
Where as the majority of nationalisms are founded upon a belief in ethnic or cultural superiority; the American Nationalist believes in the superiority of our political ideal. This would make sense, as we feel a great deal of pride in our nation's cultural and ethnic diversity. America is the great "melting pot", so the cliche goes... Thus, George W. Bush's claim that Bin Laden attacked us because he "hated freedom", provides the prototypical example of

The Living Web

November 15, 2004 - 3:42pm
Those who attempt to predict the future generally fall under one of four categories: Technologists, Spiritualists, Futurists, and Historians. The Technologists are opitimized by people like Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs. Technologists are interested in buzzwords, and “killer apps”; they don’t so much predict the future, as much as they attempt to invent it. They enjoy making far reaching claims such as “by 2012, the Home Entertainment Center will be fully controlled by the Personal Computer.” So here at the beginning I tell the reader not to worry: I’m no technologist.Then there are the Spiritualists. Their predictions are usually based upon an eclectic mixture of metaphysical energies that are focused through crystals, and directed towards the third eye of a psychic. The psychic has a “vision” which provides an astrologer with a “key” to read the stars. The astrologer then reports his findings to a guru who in turn informs the public of “the approaching age of Aquarius”. I never went to wizard school, so I’m not qualified to give such predictions.The more scientific cousins of the spiritualists are the futurists. When the futurists aren’t attending their weekly Klingon classe, or preparing their Borg costume for the next Star Trek Convention; they will be found creating technologically advanced nowhere lands. However, this group has lost considerable authority since the building of space needles at world fairs went out of style.

Bringing Light to a World in Darkness

November 3, 2004 - 3:33pm
There is no political movement whose goals are more admirable, necessary, or virtuous than that of the Progressives. We fight the forces of war, ignorance, and greed with all of our hearts; many of us even understand that the survival of civilization, and perhaps humanity itself, may rest upon our shoulders during the next 100 years. And for better or worse, it will be up to us: we who, against all odds, are willing to fight for a better world. Unlike the generations before us, we will not allow ourselves to be content in handing our children a world shaped by ignorance and collective irresponsibility. Most every progressive understands this, on one level or another -- though most fail to remind each other of it often enough.

The life of a progressive is mostly one of suffering. The reason being that our minds are cursed with an unrelenting conflict between outer realities and our own inner ideals. Everyday, we endure wars between our limitless imaginations ,and our knowledge and acceptance of a tragedy which surrounds all of us; some call it "the real world". It is a ghastly affliction. But it happens to be who we are.
Most of us have tried, at one time or another, to run from our powerful spirits and minds. We've tried alcohol, drugs, sex, and a few have even resorted to suicide. Tragically, it's no suprise that such a dark world compells the brightest of its spirits to surrender and willingly extinguish their flames.

A lot has been said about bloggers, and the blogosphere; some call it a fad, others call it a revolution -- I think both positions start from the wrong place. A blogger is nothing more than a person who writes their thoughts for others to read. Period. To speak of bloggers or blogs as a whole is as foolish as speaking of books and authors as a whole.

A Call To Arms

October 5, 2004 - 4:53pm

Magnificent isn’t it? Over to the bottom left we have a blogroll with a picture of armed ruffians sitting atop a dead elephant. At this point in time, our less than two week old alliance finds itself at cross roads. Our first option, is to do what all alliances have traditionally done: watch the roll grow – like a plant – until it becomes a massive bean stock of discombobulated links. Give it a little time, and we’ll probably grow tired of it wasting the space it requires on our template. The alliances members will slowly begin to erase their blogrolls out of complete lack of interest. Eventually, the Progressive blog Alliance -- like the Liberal coalition, and its even lamer liberal webring compatriots – will wither into yet another wasteland that falls under our philosophy's name.

Another option is to only admit bloggers that meet certain standards of “reputation”, who are “sufficiently progressive”. I violently oppose that option. For one, such a system unnecessarily encourages factions and disagreements among us. Furthermore, as we our a politically charged outfit, we’d be required to agree on the meaning of political terminology. And how is that supposed to happen? Am I supposed to send out an e-mail asking you to anonymously answer the question: “what is a progressive”? If I did, most of you would probably just wonder what I hoped to gain from assigning the alliance an essay question.

Remember, we are progressives and leftists! We must remain forward thinking, open-minded, and – above all – willing to fight in the interests of the underdogs. It often amazes me that someone can feel so strongly about creating a just, equal, and free society, yet act as stingy as a freakin’ hard-core libertarian when it comes to giving someone a link. We must differentiate ourselves from the snobby attitudes of the liberal coalition (who, I suppose deamed me unfit to join their ranks), and alliance of free blogs. Both of those organizations maintain a perpetual attitude of, “this blogger isn’t established enough”, or “what sort of link/traffic benefits can I expect by allowing them to join the alliance?”

I on the otherhand, believe there is a greater reward in giving someone who shares our world view a helping hand as they climb up the slippery and overcrowded ladder of the blogosphere. I would gain more satisfaction from that, than winning additional rounds of blogosphere link-realpolitik . I say let members join with 0 links from 0 sources. Perhaps our support might encourage them! Perhaps they might have something to say if they thought people were listening. If you doubt my optimism, take a look at the first post that you ever wrote. Furthermore, think of the long term benefits of presenting ourselves in such stark contrast to the rest of the sphere? Remember, our philosophy requires our actions to be consistant with our words.

So I’ve gone ahead and made a few decisions.

Introducing the Split Vote System

October 1, 2004 - 3:26pm
"[American legislatures] should be an exact portrait, in miniature, of the people at large, as it should think, feel, reason, and act like them." -John AdamsIn a recent Elway Poll, 42 percent of Americans felt that they were either represented in our government "poorly" or "not at all". The cause of such sentiments is fairly straight forward: almost half of Americans are in fact not represented in our government. Our ancient voting system is designed to only ensure representation for a majority of voters in a particular geographic area. Most Americans have become so accustomed to our system of voting that they its just "the way democracy works". They are mistaken.Our congressional elections use what electoral engineers call the single-member district plurality system.However, most everyone else prefers to use the more succulent name, "the winner takes all system". We are all familiar with the drawbacks of this system. Whether you are a Democrat who lives in Alabama, or a Republican who lives in Massachusetts, you are above all an American who is without a voice in Government. The good news is that there are alternatives to the winner-takes-all-system. In fact, most democratic countries have already replaced our antique system with newer system: proportional representation.

The Error of the Electoral Collegiophiles

September 30, 2004 - 4:12pm
George F. Will recently asserted that the electoral college, like the constitution, "was not devised by, and should not be revised by, simple-minded majoritarians." Indeed, the electoral college was a brilliant 18th century solution to clusters of 18th century problems.There were three good reasons that the constitutional convention rejected the idea of direct elections for the presidency. First off, there was no method of communication that could sufficiently educate voters about presidential candidates. Secondly, our framers worried that the masses had neither the education, nor the refinement required to make prudent decisions. Thirdly, the implementation of national elections would have upset the balance of power among states. For example, direct presidential elections would cause the south to lose most of its political power. Under the electoral college, slaves couldn't vote, but could be still counted as 3/5 man when deciding the number of Representatives and electors for states.

Delusions of War

September 26, 2004 - 4:47pm

The very idea of a "just war" strikes me as oxymoronic. I'll conceed that wars are occassionaly fought out of absolute necessity. However, I remain unconvinced that necessity equals justice. The truth is: If you truly believe that all people are born equal, than you can never refer to a war as "just". Amongst the American public, I've identified roughly three different view points on war. These three views are not intended to be a label to pidgeon hole to others.

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