Yarnell Perkins

Weekend Revolution

2007-09-01T23:01:00.000-07:00

To anyone who says America has not yet achieved fascism, I say, “maybe, but at what point would you have found it reasonable and convenient to resist the Nazis? They did not begin with the Holocaust, you know.” All over the world, people mourn and rage at the U.S. government’s failure to respond to ordinary political pressure. The evil and nonsense just go on, and reasons for impeaching the entire Bush administration are too many to fit in this column. Smart or moral commentators damn or mourn our politics and ask “but what CAN we DO?”
Meanwhile, the Democratic Congress dithers then dithers some more. The leading Democratic presidential candidates assure us they are just as willing to go nuclear as the pro-torture folks. Destroying the Constitution enjoys bipartisan support, people are dying by the thousands, and Americans grow ever more fearful of their own government, not to mention their employers, bankers, and telephone companies.
Some advise street protests of millions marching through Washington, others the quiet of prayer or abandonment of hope. Quite a few seem to have fled the country. Some think just a few more letters to Congress will do the trick. Others think the solution is to elect Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel, or Ron Paul. Some people think Hillary Clinton is the answer. What has any of it accomplished? It has slowed the pro-torture crowd down a little, a mighty little. There are those who hint that a bloody revolution is now the only solution.
Revolution is now the only solution, but I am obsessed with making it bloodless. I am not a pacifist, but not a damned fool either. Regular readers may remember the Third Weekend Project, which was doomed from the start because I just threw the idea out there. It has been a year since I advocated a monthly boycott – no work for pay, no driving, no shopping – at least two days a month, preferably on the third weekend of each month. I hoped empty streets and malls would shake the corporations from their perches of power. Since that column, three people have let me know they are trying it. Including my husband and me, that makes five people. We five are not going to topple the corporate government.
Pledge to Impeach, however, proposes a well thought out general strike. Californian Anthony St. Martin did not just throw an idea out there. He founded Pledge to Impeach to do more than beg, write letters, and march. Some heavy-duty organizing and a realistic plan are needed, along with a serious promise of real consequences for our leaders’ failure to act. I have been urging anyone who will listen to go to www.pledgetoimpeach.org and sign the Pledge to participate in a 72-hour, three-day general strike if the following conditions apply:
1. Sufficient numbers of Americans have pledged to frighten Congress with the very idea of three days of no working, buying, or traveling; three days of most of us sitting inside our homes
2. Enough Americans have signed the pledge to offer some job security to the most vulnerable workers among us.
3. Congress refuses to act on impeaching Bush, Cheney, et al.
4. Organizers call the strike.
What are sufficient numbers? We have 4,000 pledges so far, not nearly enough. Who is willing to help? I am asking you, yeah, you, to help, but a list of those who have refused says a lot about how urgent our situation is. Although several labor organizations and impeachment groups are working with Pledge to Impeach, St. Martin says the following have been unwilling to help: most of the labor movement, Vote to Impeach, Move On, the Democratic Party and After Downing Street. He has been cold shouldered by the staffs of Dennis Kucinich, John Conyers and Barbara Boxer, and that is just the politicians and organizations my arthritic hands were quick enough to note during the interview. If St. Martin were some kind of shrill crank, I could understand the reaction, but he is a calm, smart, articulate straight-talker.
I suspect the problem with Pledge to Impeach is exactly that it is not merely radical, but also practical and well thought out. Things that just might work usually do scare people, especially powerful people. Maybe the problem is Pledge to Impeach is nonpartisan, that we understand both political parties, many religious organizations, the labor movement and even “Bush haters” have betrayed the American worker. Maybe the problem is Pledge to Impeach is not about left right black white brown straight gay Christian Muslim Jew. Maybe the problem is that Pledge to Impeach really is about right and wrong and the rule of law.
St. Martin related how Senator Barbara Boxer’s staff attorney informed him that Congress could not reverse an executive order. The Senator’s lawyer then backpedaled and admitted that it was more a case of Congress being unwilling to do anything about government by executive order. This “focusing of extraordinary powers into the executive office is the number one, king-of-the-hill problem. It has dismantled our Republic,” St. Martin said.
He believes the current mess goes back to 1981, when President Reagan fired striking air-traffic controllers. “It started with union busting, because unions are all about recourse, and the federal government and the powers in general don’t like that,” he said, “When we lost power in the workplace, we immediately lost the power of representation in government...Now management owns our government and management owns us.”
But can his plan possibly work? Even St. Martin describes his efforts as, “shoveling shit against the tide.” Others have tried to organize general strikes, and they always failed, right? Actually, no. They have worked in many other countries, even in poor old America. Remember that general strike of immigrants this past spring? How many of them lost their jobs? Did they get our attention? The immigrants’ general strike was well organized and conceived, and it was a success. Can the American people do what Hispanic immigrants did?
What if you get fired? St. Martin said we will peaceably retaliate against any company that fires workers by blacklisting them and enforcing a one-month boycott per worker. So, fire 50 people, enjoy a 50-month boycott.
• I love the Pledge to Impeach plan and pledge because:
• It uses the power we retain, the only power corporations and their politicians understand: our money, time and attention.
• It does not want my money, just my time, commitment, and sacred honor.
• It does not ask me to use violence on my neighbors.
• Violence against us would be unlikely, because the plan calls for all strikers to remain in their homes. The pro-torture cowards would have to break into a lot of houses.
• It will not happen unless enough people sign up to make a difference.
With any luck, it will not happen at all. The mere threat of a general strike might be enough to get our so-called leaders to listen and lead.
Even if the strike does not trigger the impeachment of Bush, Cheney, et al, even if the corporate system does not falter, a massive general strike by the American people would tell a scared world how many of us do not approve of the people running our country. If we want to regain respect from the world for us, as a people, we have to go on strike.
The Third Weekend Project, silly as it might be, makes good practice for a general strike. Here are some helpful hints for using your Third Weekend to prepare:
• Go to www.pledgetoimpeach.org and sign the pledge, then volunteer to help organize. St. Martin does not seem to have the energy or the mental illness necessary to be the dictator of Pledge to Impeach. We need island communities of resisters to do the work and make the decisions. First decision: Start governing yourself again.
• Use your Third Weekends to take a walk and get to know your neighbors. Sign up your commonly decent neighbors for Pledge to Impeach.
• Don’t whine because you can’t go running out for a six pack. Becoming a nation of self-indulgent surrender monkeys helped get us into this mess.
• Plan how you will strike. Will you call in with the flu? Should you tell your boss you are mad as hell? Is there a chance he is mad as hell too and you should recruit him? Do you work in a truly critical occupation? Firefighters probably should not strike, but the secretaries at the rescue squad definitely should.
• Read the Constitution, or at least the Bill of Rights.
• Read some tax regulations and forms. Can you find a way to pay less tax to the pro-torture government? (Believe me, this one is HARD!)
• Pray. Pray. Then pray again.
• Ask yourself: Have I ever stopped speaking to a friend longer than I refused to shop at a store that cheated me? Can I grow up enough to be nicer to real people than I am to corporations?
• Use your Third Weekends to practice living like a real person again.

Unglamorous patriots

2007-07-01T17:38:00.000-07:00

I started to name my reality show “Who’s the Best Environmentalist?” but some of the imaginary contestants refused to be called environmentalists. One smacked me, another threatened to sue, and a third called me a racist. Then I got sidetracked and started thinking about how it is that those who call themselves patriots and those who hate the very word both think that patriotism is about who is most enthusiastic about nuking the Middle East … and so forth.
Just as a thought experiment, just as a game – not as anything serious, you understand – what if we thought, and said, that patriotism is about whose actions best show love for our land and people? Love, as in actually being willing to be uncomfortable sometimes for the sake of the well being of that land and people? Wouldn’t that be an interesting concept? For a reality show, I mean. So I decided to call my show “American Patriot” and hope the TV executives get it, but let me try it out on you before I approach them.
There are next to no rules. Contestants are nominated by anyone who cares to make a nomination. Then the viewers vote on the contents of the contestants’ patriotic characters. Here, in no particular order, is my collection of strictly imaginary contestants. Feel free to add your own.
Elbert Snore is a former vice president of the United States. His awarding-winning slide show, Vexing Verities, recently won several awards for publicizing the threat presented to the human race by climate change. Meanwhile, his enormous house has been running up astronomical electric bills.
Mordred Payne is currently vice president of the United States. Having made a ton of money in the defense and construction industries, he now invokes the right to torture to protect those industries. He does, however, own somewhere out west an energy-efficient solar house. When I called him an environmentalist, he threatened to sue me, mentioned that was not the worst he could do and insisted his solar house was a matter of national security in case of widespread systems failure.
Bob Straw and Jack Haye are best friends and professors at the University of Tennessee. You can find them at least once a month – if not more often – at a certain downtown bar drinking fancy beer and comparing technical notes on Professor Straw’s hybrid car and Professor Haye’s solar panels. If they drink too much, sometimes they get into shouting matches with Professor Donald Rivers, who finds their position on biofuels absurd given a technical point that I’m currently trying to wrap my mind around.
Rachel Carter and Malkia Moore are business partners in a spa, which uses only organic products. They also buy lots of carbon offsets and both are strict vegans. Both are slowly getting rich and are stunningly beautiful. They annoy the blue heck out of me, but maybe you find them as likable as I think I ought to.
Bill Menefee rides his bicycle everywhere he goes. His job commute features an interstate connection at a major thoroughfare, followed by a winding road with no shoulders where blonds in Expeditions go 60 mph through curves while chatting on cell phones about what they will buy at the mall. When I tried to congratulate Mr. Menefee on his bravery, endurance, and environmentalism, he shouted that I was a racist because only white people are environmentalists. Then he rode on.
Millie Fentworth refers to herself as a moderate environmentalist, explaining that she is anxious no one think her some kind of nut. She believes the paper-shredding service she hired for her office makes discarded printer cartridges harmless because “they grind it up all very fine and then it’s safe.” She asks that you vote for her in consideration of her effort hiring the paper-shredding service.
Sally Smith lives in a trailer park in Jefferson County and drives 60 miles round trip every day to a Knox County factory where, after ten years as a temp, she earns $9 an hour. With this job she single-handedly supports three children. After Katrina, gasoline hit Ms. Smith’s pocketbook pretty hard. So she asked her trailer-park neighbor and sister in permanent temping to carpool with her. They are considering adding a third woman to the pool. Ms. Smith slapped me when I called her an environmentalist because environmentalists are dirty hippies who object to the chemicals used at the permanent-temp factory.
Linda Little can be seen one Saturday every month driving a broken-down old heap as she runs errands. Her childhood was complicated considerably by the death of her uninsured cousin. The woods where the two of them once played were sold off to pay expenses from uninsured cancer and death. The trees were taken to chip mills. Not long after that, a teenage Ms. Little overheard a remark about wood chips being shipped overseas to become Japanese toilet paper.
Ms. Little entered adulthood obsessed with trees, money in general and with the insurance, medical, timber, paper and legal industries in particular. She must run errands only once a month, must buy the least expensive recycled toilet paper and must plan her route just so to spend the least amount of money on gas. This maximizes her savings and allows her to use as little gasoline and as few trees as she can figure out how. All this both comforts and reinforces her grief.
Michael Zimmerman has lived in a nursing home since he was two years old. His physical problems cause him to shake and tremble. He insists on feeding himself, and he makes quite a mess. He has a serious speech impediment and has never learned to read. Long ago, when institutions still showed 16 mm educational movies, Michael saw a film on ecology which concluded with assorted hints on what he could do to help. Ever since, he has been driving his care givers nuts with what the staff call “Mike’s napkin issue.” He refuses to have more than one paper napkin set in front of him at a time. If they give him the bunch of paper napkins they want to give him, he refuses to eat and instead sits and rocks and trembles until they submit. Michael is very lucky they do not drug and force feed him.
Advanced players of American Patriot may need some time to think about their vote. Which is more helpful, loving, and patriotic -- to be one big person doing one or two fashionable things, or to be one of many little people doing lots of unglamorous things?