August 15, 2015

I hope Bravenak will be back soon.

This was a good read, and food for thought.

Some of my initial thoughts and reactions:

The Pacific Northwest is so overwhelmingly white that some jokingly refer to it as the Great White North. In a region where white people are so overwhelmingly the majority, racism becomes all the more difficult for the white majority to see.

Yes. I love my state for many reasons. Its whiteness is not one of them. My state was, quite frankly, founded in racism, passing exclusion laws and including exclusion in the first constitution. With that history, it's not surprising that, 150 years later, it's still very white. I'm not in Washington, but it still applies.

We should be listening if we are concerned about the crisis of racism in America because acting on that concern must begin with consideration of our own racism. And isn’t that the demand that angered folks the most?

THIS. I don't consider myself a racist. YET, I've spent an adult lifetime trying to be aware of my own biases in any area under discussion or action, and trying to make sure that I didn't allow those biases to blind me or limit me or dictate my reactions. I'm aware that I've got them, I know why, and I try to let that awareness regulate my thinking about things. So, while I don't consider myself to be a racist, I AM very aware of the racism that is so deeply embedded in the culture I was born into and raised up in, and I know that, consciously or subconsciously, I'm not pure. I'm willing to consider my own biases about race as well as anything else. Is that what the demand was? If so, wording it as "white supremacy" probably kicked that emotional response, always so ready to react before reason and logic, into gear. In reality, the world as we know it was built on a foundation of assumed white supremacy, whether we support that assumption or not.

People simply find it difficult to get past that immediate emotional response. Marketers know it, and build it in to their marketing strategies. Politicians know it, and build it into political speeches, ensuring that they never really have to get specific, and that people will be "inspired" by vague words with emotional triggers.

In this case, what WAS the goal of the two women? To get white liberals to stop, think, and listen? If so, then the method may not have been the most effective way to do so; triggering the limbic response instead of reason. It seems counter-intuitive to us, to think that the way to get us to stop, listen, and think, is to "shut us down." Yet, I can't deny that, while I thought I understood, BLM has been successful in getting me to examine those understandings and grow from there. Not the Seattle thing; I'd already started that process, and thought I was making progress. The NRN thing was successful in convincing me that I needed to do a better job of listening, and to see beyond what I thought I understood. Bravenak helped with that, too.

The trouble is, too many whites can’t seem to see that white progressive politics is identity politics, which means it is rooted in the white experience, just as much as is Black movement politics, Asian movement politics…all politics. The personal really is political, not just for women and people of color, but for everyone. And white is an identity forged of fear of the other and entitlement to race privilege.

This is something I need to spend some time with. I'm not really a fearful person, and while I'm aware of white privilege, I don't think I've ever, at least consciously, thought that I was entitled to it.

If you agree, then consider this. Maybe when white progressives see a man like Bernie Sanders, a courageous leftist undertaking the bodacious act of running for president as a self-proclaimed socialist, they identify with him not just as a progressive, but as a white man – as representative of them. Sanders, in this scenario, serves as a redeemer of white identity, lifting it above racist, reactionary, angry white conservatives who have so dominated our political culture.

By doing so, maybe Sanders is feeding not just a desire for vindication, but a sense of entitlement to recognition and respect that can’t be separated from whiteness without some winnowing. Maybe.

I know that this is not true for me, personally. The author clearly states that he's referring to white progressives as an aggregate, not individuals, so I don't need to take this statement personally. My identity, which shapes my politics, is less about race and more about gender, class, and a couple of other classifications. I'm not used to thinking about myself in terms of race, which is part of the author's point.

For many white progressives, getting right with this reality will mean having to figure out how to address race and class at the same time. I know a lot of folk find that a rough road to walk, but it might help to consider this: race is a form of class.

I get this.

Those issues have been around for generations. Black leaders have been fighting to end racial profiling, harassment, violence, and mass incarceration for decades. In fact, these demands have been made in explicit, detailed terms again and again at every level of government for as long as there has been an NAACP, the Urban League, and numerous other Black-led national policy advocates, and hundreds of local Black-led organizations active at the city and state level. Specific proposals have been presented, specific demands put on the policy making table and presented to the general public, repeatedly, and largely to no avail.

That Black leaders have been willing to rise above the humiliation of being patronized and tokenized while their issues have been ignored – that so many have stayed in the fight in the face of this – is nothing short of amazing. It is a demonstration of political maturity and determination from which all of us can take a lesson.

This I know. I learned it young. I was 11 or 12 when my mother took me to hear Angela Davis speak on this topic, and I remember being shocked. It was my first introduction to something that wasn't spoken about, until then, in my world. And what has changed since then? Not much.

Yet, as a Party, Democrats have done next to nothing to earn those votes except make the Party out to be the lesser of two evils.

What this amounts to is exploiting Black oppression. Yes, I know it’s not the intention, but the road to rally disruptions is paved with good intentions.

Interestingly, there are many, many white progressives who feel the same way: the party has not earned our votes except by being the lesser of two evils. And some of us think it's been oppressive to the left. So yes, I can really see this.

It's interesting that so many of us supporting Sanders are doing so for that very reason: we don't want a lesser evil.

I feel very strongly about this part:

We progressives may be growing as a portion of the electorate, but we are still underdogs in an uphill fight. We can’t afford to alienate our natural allies, and, have no doubt, people of color whose interests have been forged in the fires of racial injustice are natural allies of the progressive cause. We understand justice and have less to lose and more to win by laying it all on the line for progressive change.

Moreover, the discussion following that incident feels like it’s turned into a referendum on a whole movement

I won't turn Seattle into a referendum on BLM. I would ask the same of BLM and supporters: Don't turn Seattle into a referendum on Sanders supporters.

I am still saying: let's be united, not divided. If I don't get it, tell me in a way I'll understand. I'm still listening.

July 29, 2015

His colleagues?

You mean, Democrats in Congress?

They're going to cling to the party machine's status quo when it comes to endorsements.

Working with Sanders in Congress, though, is another story.

Sanders also has been able to work well with his colleagues. He's passed bipartisan legislation and forged strong relationships with members of both parties in nearly 25 years on Capitol Hill. But most of all, members say, even when Sanders is ideologically an outlier, he lets others know where he stands. He's not the type to suddenly stab a colleague in the back. And that's earned him respect both on and off the Hill.

Sanders has also passed an amendment to the Dodd-Frank bill that led to the first audit of the Federal Reserve. He and Sen. Robert Menendez secured funding in the 2008 stimulus bill for clean-energy initiatives. And he inserted language into the Affordable Care Act to increase funding for community health centers.

But as with Coburn, Sanders' willingness to stand up and say no has also helped him to score victories on Capitol Hill. Sanders highlights his battles to prevent Republicans from cutting Social Security benefits as well as "the complete decimation of the U.S. Postal Service."

Last year when we had the scandal at the VA, he was incredibly effective, engaged in getting the legislation passed, in getting it funded. Frankly, without him, I don't think we would have gotten it done because there was a lot of name-calling but there wasn't a lot of constructive, 'OK, here's the resources. ...' And he did it," Reed said. "And it was a great testament to his skill as a legislator."

Sanders has a system, said Sen. Sherrod Brown, who served with him in the House before both were elected to the Senate in 2006. "He would call them 'tripartite amendments' because we'd have him and he'd get a Republican, he'd get a Democrat and he'd pass things. He's good at building coalitions," Brown said.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2016-elections/bernie-sanders-is-a-loud-stubborn-socialist-republicans-like-him-anyway-20150727

July 27, 2015

Well, reading that article left me with questions

that have nothing to do with animals.

It's all about the power of "social media."

At this point, I'm not even sure what "social media" IS.

I mean, I know that there is twitter, and instagram, and other things. I don't know what they are, though, or what they do, or how people use them, or why people use them.

I know I have a twitter account I opened way back when, that I never used because I didn't find a point, and that I don't even remember how to get into it.

I know that the idea of checking, and posting to, multiple sites, short little blips about what I'm doing or thinking, sounds like a time sucker and I know that I'm not really interested in getting bombed with stuff from everybody else. I tag about 75% of my emails as spam so that they don't keep landing in my box, and delete about 90% of the rest without even reading them. Having MORE stuff to wade through sounds like a nightmare.

And I don't get the "following" part, either...what it means, what it does, what it means in the way of time spent.

I have a sorta okay/hate relationship with fb, limiting my # of friends mostly to those I don't see and talk to in person on a regular basis, and to some groups.

Social media is this big powerful thing that I don't get at all.

July 21, 2015

You know, I was hoping for some healing this primary season.

I expected things to get contentious and ugly. I've been here for other primaries. Frankly, '04 was a walk in the park compared to '08, and that's saying something.

In '08, I didn't support either of the two main candidates; not a surprise, since I'm not a neo-liberal. I WAS, though, appalled at the way the primary race devolved into factions along gender and race lines.

In my mind, Democrats are supposed to be champions of all the 99%, including all the sub-groups that fight for social and economic justice for their own groups and others. That Democrats would choose a side and campaign against one of those sub groups, try to rank another higher...I found that to be hypocritical, to say the least. And humiliating, distasteful, and, frankly, hope killing. But then, I'm a defiant idealist.

This time around, I knew there would be some ugly, bloody infighting if the coronation was challenged.

I didn't expect that we'd STILL be fighting about race, though. I didn't see it coming.

I should have. I understand why PoC are up in arms. At least, as a white woman, I think I do, because I've been trying to listen. As another DUer said recently, I think that's what we should all be doing just that; listening, and looking at the perspective of others.

I trust PoC, who are not a monolithic group, to know their issues, to think, and to make reasoned choices.

I also would like to continue listening, and hope that some will continue to communicate to any with open ears and minds. Be patient with me. Explain to me what I'm not getting. I'm not your enemy, and want to stand with you against the real enemy when needed.

I THINK I'm hearing that PoC want racial justice to be a top priority, not only a facet of economic justice. Because while racial injustice has always been with us, it feels like (to this white woman) those injustices have begun to increase again, to be more public, to be legitimized by tptb.

I THINK that some of what I'm hearing is not just a demand for justice, but the anger and bitterness fueling that demand. I think I'm hearing that there is a growing determination not to push injustices under the rug, ever again. I support that.

I think that many people are hearing, and tasting, the anger and bitterness more than the demand for justice. So I think we should do a better job listening and hearing and understanding.

I can do that. I will do that. I hope, as well, that some can do the same when listening to people bewildered by the anger, and that responses will draw people in, to join in dialogue and solidarity, rather than pushing people away.

July 8, 2015

I've never had a hero, political or otherwise.

I simply don't subscribe to the concept of heroes.

I also know that Sanders is quite pragmatic when it comes to making progress. The difference is that he sees each small step forward for what it is: one step, not the finish line.

He's been making deals all along. Here's just one of many:

Just before Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders excoriated Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s record to a cheering crowd of 10,000 at a Madison arena on Wednesday night, Walker’s staff tweeted: “Thousands of veterans suffered in VA scandal yet @BernieSanders downplayed it & attacked those who exposed it.”
The tweet, to say the least, was misleading. The Vermont senator and self-described democratic socialist, now seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, has long supported our veterans—even if he doesn’t support all our wars. And in 2014 he accomplished the last thing you might expect from a candidate whose campaign brand is firebrand: He negotiated a major bipartisan agreement with two conservatives to deal with the veterans health care crisis.

.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

From the moment the long-gathering scandal broke into public view in April 2014, it took Congress less than four months to produce a new law—a split second by Capitol Hill standards. That it happened at all, and so fast, was a testament to the determination of Sanders and his partners to surmount the red-blue divide in American politics. It speaks volumes in particular about Sanders, who pushes for a single-payer government health system in every speech, that the law introduced a private-care option for veterans.

.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

But Sanders is not an ideologue in the mold of a Michele Bachmann or a Ron Paul, both of whom made far more headlines than laws during their years in the House. He is not averse to compromise or incremental progress, and he works within the system to make that happen. In January, for instance, he and Sen. Patty Murray were the lead writers of a letter asking Obama to update overtime standards in order to make more people eligible for overtime pay. Obama announced such an update a few days ago.

July 8, 2015

I've never had a hero, political or otherwise.

I simply don't subscribe to the concept of heroes.

I also know that Sanders is quite pragmatic when it comes to making progress. The difference is that he sees each small step forward for what it is: one step, not the finish line.

He's been making deals all along. Here's just one of many:

Just before Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders excoriated Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s record to a cheering crowd of 10,000 at a Madison arena on Wednesday night, Walker’s staff tweeted: “Thousands of veterans suffered in VA scandal yet @BernieSanders downplayed it & attacked those who exposed it.”
The tweet, to say the least, was misleading. The Vermont senator and self-described democratic socialist, now seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, has long supported our veterans—even if he doesn’t support all our wars. And in 2014 he accomplished the last thing you might expect from a candidate whose campaign brand is firebrand: He negotiated a major bipartisan agreement with two conservatives to deal with the veterans health care crisis.

.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

From the moment the long-gathering scandal broke into public view in April 2014, it took Congress less than four months to produce a new law—a split second by Capitol Hill standards. That it happened at all, and so fast, was a testament to the determination of Sanders and his partners to surmount the red-blue divide in American politics. It speaks volumes in particular about Sanders, who pushes for a single-payer government health system in every speech, that the law introduced a private-care option for veterans.

.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

But Sanders is not an ideologue in the mold of a Michele Bachmann or a Ron Paul, both of whom made far more headlines than laws during their years in the House. He is not averse to compromise or incremental progress, and he works within the system to make that happen. In January, for instance, he and Sen. Patty Murray were the lead writers of a letter asking Obama to update overtime standards in order to make more people eligible for overtime pay. Obama announced such an update a few days ago.

June 30, 2015

Am I the only DUer who remembers,

back before DU 3, when DU self-identified as a "left-wing" discussion board?

Now DUers think it's okay to attack, marginalize, and disenfranchise the left.

THAT'S what neoliberalism gets us.

June 25, 2015

Bernie Sanders and guns

For the record, I have never owned a gun. I've never wanted to. I DID once, back in the 1980s, shoot at some tin cans because some people I knew thought I would have fun. I didn't. What I did, at that time, was go back without them to clean up the mess they left out in the desert.

That said, I live rurally, and am surrounded by a culture that uses guns. Many of my students and their families fill their freezers for the winter by hunting. Their hunting trips are family traditions; they all go, even if only a few of them are doing the actual hunting. I spend a lot of time creating independent studies for hunters every fall. It's a different world, and a different take, from urban and suburban areas. Vermont is the most rural state in the U.S., and Sanders' position about guns reflects that constituency, as it should.

This is what he said recently:

In the wake of last week's Charleston, S.C., church shootings, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders explained his competing concerns between gun rights and gun safety.

"I think guns and gun control is an issue that needs to be discussed," Sanders told NPR's David Greene in an interview airing on Thursday's Morning Edition. "Let me add to that, I think that urban America has got to respect what rural America is about, where 99 percent of the people in my state who hunt are law abiding people."

In the wake of the shooting deaths of nine African-Americans at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, many Democratic politicians have renewed calls to tighten gun-control measures. Sanders said he's open to a conversation about what to do next on gun-control measures and would go along with stricter background checks, for example. But he noted in the interview that those measures alone wouldn't solve the problem of gun violence in America.

The article goes on to say,

For left-leaning senators from largely rural, pro-gun states — like Vermont — it can be tough to strike a balance talking about guns. Sanders has had a mixed voting record on guns. He voted to end the "gun-show loophole" and in favor of the 2013 universal background check bill and assault-weapons ban following Sandy Hook Elementary school massacre that left 20 children dead. But, previously, Sanders voted to allow guns on Amtrak and against the Brady bill.

http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/06/24/417180805/bernie-sanders-walks-a-fine-line-on-gun-control

I agree that "it can be tough to strike a balance talking about guns." I believe that Sanders is correct in trying to strike that balance, and in supporting his rural constituents. I also see that this is one issue that many progressives will disagree with him on. I think that's okay; it's never happened, at least in my 55 years, that I've found a politician I agree with every single issue on. Sanders, frankly, comes as close as any and closer than almost all. That said, I disagree with his votes on the Brady Bill and to allow guns on Amtrak.

I do not believe that, as POTUS, he would stand in the way of stronger gun control legislation presented to him by Congress. He's just said, as quoted above, that he is open to the conversation.

June 22, 2015

sigh

I don't remember the dogpile you refer to. Not that it didn't happen, but since, before there was no other choice, Clinton and Obama were tied for last place at the bottom of my primary rankings, I wasn't in the middle of that fight. Neither was I in the middle when they were the only two left standing. I didn't really have much to fight about, since I didn't support either one of them. I didn't bother to pay attention to the convention that summer, or the ge campaign. I had no "dog" in that hunt.

In the later primaries, I did lean HRC, simply because the constant mantra of Obama being "not dlc" was so aggravating, as his neo-liberal positions were on open display for all to witness.

Frankly, I found the devolution of the Democratic Party during the '08 primaries to be a public humiliation. Here was the party that was supposed to stand for the underdogs dividing along the lines of race and gender. THAT NEVER SHOULD HAVE HAPPENED. Supporting one candidate over another? Fine. Trying to postulate that issues of race were more important than issues of gender, or vice versa? Discpicable hypocricy, imo, reducing the issues to campaign talking points instead of real world problems.

When my primary rolled around in late May, it was all over but the shouting, so I cast a protest vote for HRC.

I haven't seen a dogpile at this point, either. But then, I don't read most threads about HRC. Again, she's at the bottom of my list, and I have a better candidate to focus my attention on. I HAVE seen legitimate criticism from her own party, and I expect Republicans to spew all kinds of shit, which, even though she's not getting my vote, I'll defend. Most of that shit, though, would come in the GE should she be nominated.

I'm a woman. I'm not angry when HRC is called on her neo-liberal policies. I won't be rising to defend her from those. I won't be supporting her. I save my angry energy for neo-liberals, neo-conservatives, and all those who support the erosion of social and economic justice.

June 22, 2015

Yes.

I think it's a reaction to threat; I've experienced it myself, although not about guns.

I think anytime we think that someone is threatening our autonomy we react defensively, and, in more extreme cases, offensively. It triggers an amygdala hijack.

It happens to all of us; when our emotions are engaged, reason is often short-circuited. Political and religious propaganda of all types take full advantage of this phenomenon.

People who live in fear and hate are particularly susceptible to this kind of manipulation. Which doesn't, of course, excuse acts of hate. I think hate is a mental illness, which is why I won't use the word lightly, and I do my best not to engage in hate.

Those obsessed with guns live in a state of fear and insecurity, and their guns can't cure them of that.

It might be a good conversation to talk about the purpose of, and a reasonable interpretation of, the 2nd amendment.

What was the original purpose? Does that purpose still apply, or is there another reasonable purpose?

"Arms" have evolved; what kind of "arms" fulfill the original OR evolved purpose of the 2nd amendment, and in what context?

I don't really have any answers. I've never owned a gun. I've been more concerned with other rights.

LWolf

I hope Bravenak will be back soon.

His colleagues?

Well, reading that article left me with questions

You know, I was hoping for some healing this primary season.

I've never had a hero, political or otherwise.

I've never had a hero, political or otherwise.

Am I the only DUer who remembers,

Bernie Sanders and guns

sigh

Yes.

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