Extracting the Poetry from Power and Politics

There are some writers and journalists who have the ability to extract the essential character of events and express it in one paragraph.  Chris Hedges is one such writer:

The final days of empire give ample employment and power to the feckless, the insane and the idiotic. These politicians and court propagandists, hired to be the public faces on the sinking ship, mask the real work of the crew, which is systematically robbing the passengers as the vessel goes down.

Read the rest here: The Folly of Empire.

And another poetic observer, George Monbiot, alerts us to the threat of an empire poised to take it all for free through the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership:

They want it; they’re getting it. New intellectual property laws that they have long demanded, but which sovereign governments have so far resisted – not least because of the mass mobilisation against the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act in the US(11) – are back on the table, but this time largely inaccessible to public protest.

Read Elite Insurgency here.

But the question that comes to me, time and time again, is what can be done, and more importantly what will I do about it?  The most eloquent answer comes from âpihtawikosisân and you will find her wisdom in what a revolution looks like:- here.

Ten Tips on How to Save the World

photo from NASA/Wikimedia

I’ve used popular jargon for the title, because, as you’ll notice below, this is not political science, or any science at all. This is a riposte against the endless hours of brutal entertainment that suggests only might makes right. To save the world might be a heroic endeavour but I don’t believe it requires a Napoleonic campaign. It does, however, require the engagement of an alert mind and open heart. 

The instructions are simple. Learn from the bees, use your caring mind to gaze at the world, reclaim your power, reclaim your nature, hold onto curiosity, celebrate your creativity, give up blaming, live from a place of love, acknowledge your political self, and honour your spirit.

1. Learn from the bees.

Marilyn Hamilton, CEO of Integral City, told a children’s story not long ago, that is easy to remember.  Three key strategies enable bee hives to survive, which can teach us how to sustain the human hive  – take care of you, take care of others, take care of this place. Our ancestors learned how to do this but sophisticated social systems have alienated us from our own capacity to manage the hive. However, world crises shows we must re-engage in the process now.  

2. Use your caring mind to gaze at the world.

Look closely at the operating system, or the ‘apparatus’ as Simone Weil put it. Read ideas and opinions wherever you can find them. Ask yourself who benefits? Expand your gaze beyond your own immediate interests. Prepare to be disturbed but not defeated.

2. Reclaim power.

Power and all its parts: politics, wealth, language, science, economics, institutional religion, is not evil. What is evil is the way institutions have been corrupted from their original purpose – to serve civil society – into clubs of privilege. Good leadership is the conduit of responsible power which demonstrates humility, vulnerability, and serves the greater good.  Good leaders spend their powers to affirm and highlight the power in all. Infinite power is not a zero sum game, it is natural, inclusive and intelligent.

3. Reclaim our nature.

We are resourceful workers and stakeholders in our society. We are not a resource or a job description. We are not left, right, conservative or liberal – we are organic, politically mobile beings.  Labels are assigned to influence and control masses. We have courage, fear, anger, love and wisdom but they are not commodities, they are strengths that emerge and hide. The deadliest weapon of oppression is that which turns humanity and all of nature into a thing, a resource.

 

4. Hold onto Curiosity.

This is what keeps us exploring, examining, interrogating the conditions we live under or in. As long as curiosity is alive we shall never be content with serving an oppressive and corrupt social order.  

5. Celebrate your Creativity.

Music, theatre, farmers’ markets, poetry, gardens, maps, new political parties, conversations –  are the means of expressing and sharing our humanity.  Art is the what, where, how and who of our species as it yearns and evolves.

6. Give up blaming.

Blaming is not problem solving and the problem is not what other people do.  To solve problems we need to re-engage our power to care creatively, with curiosity and love.

8. Live from a place of Love

Love breaks apart the structures of false hierarchies. It demands attention to suffering and violence, and calls for healing. It insists on life as the source of knowledge.  Love is what drives great minds to take courageous stands outside of their particular disciplines for the greater good. Love is the openness to pain that makes injustice, corruption, cynicism and oppression unbearable.

9. Life is political.

You are an integral, intelligent, reflective part of a larger organism. Whether we survive as a species depends on protecting our earthly home from a system that enables a few egos to hold this planet ransom for the sake of temporary profit. There is no escape from politics. Its apparatus has been built on a grandiose delusion that refuses to see the natural world as sacred, and ourselves dependent upon its health. To be apolitical is to be a doctor standing at the bed of a dying patient, refusing to be involved because the disease is dirty. To dismiss the world stage and our part in it is to lobotomize the future.

10. Honour the spirit

The spirit is our energy. It imparts our intentions before we see them. It allows us to dream and care for the world beyond our own life span.  Imagination and love is the immortal  legacy we leave for our great-grandchildren.

These are just my thoughts.  What are yours?  What would you list as the top ten tips on saving the world?

As of Today

Yesterday I attended a memorial service for a man who was, and still is, loved among family, friends, and members of the congregation he helped to build.

From the time he knew his death was approaching to the planning of the memorial and the actual celebration of his life, the lives of about thirty people were consumed into creating this event.  People who held off sleep, housekeeping and other rituals of their life to think about, write, communicate, select, travel, arrange chairs and tables, cater, and clean up afterwards.  For the closest members of the family, including the man whose life was celebrated, the effort was extraordinary.  In a way it took whole life times across generations to come to this. Learning, striving, struggle, fear and joy, and ultimately the conclusion of this celebration was proof of the abundance of love.

As I think about the interdependent web in which I live, I see the same elements, the many celebrations of life, the art of living.  These include the skills of planning a dinner with love, cleaning the house and washing the dishes – all to celebrate the joy of food with company. I see the theatre festival built on thousands of hours of learning how to  write, stage, advertise, to garner an army of volunteers with lifetime training in their craft.  I see generations of scientific study and the institutions of learning that have endured centuries of change to produce the best doctors, lawyers, engineers and teachers, to sustain a functional civil society.

Our own children who have branched out to develop their own lives, struggle to nurture their own families which include their closest friends.  I think about their constant focus on researching and caring which all began with two egos who fell in love and decided to invest in life itself. I look on all these things and think – what a wonderful world! What wonderful surprising creatures we are. 

From the blessings of my life I have learned that building community requires me to listen to others whether I agree with them or not, to share my honest thoughts with them, to help others by working with their needs instead of giving advice, to co-operate, to do no harm, to find common ground and to celebrate their successes.  The energy I have learned to use in community is shared leadership.  

Then I turn on the radio and learn about another politicianwho won an election, not on nurturing the values most of us use every day, but on a campaign of fear and intolerance.  If I am to believe he was fairly elected how is it the voters give themselves wholeheartedly to life yet vote against the energies that nurture it?

How is it that we see power working in our lives when we work together, and yet we select the voices of intolerance, cruelty and bigotry as if the only power we have is to vote against those who are different.   How is it that we don’t get it when we are oppressed by transnational corporations, the 1%, the power elite – yet   we are outraged that those with less than us, may need help?

This is the gap in our understanding of how our power works.  It’s easy to gain more influence by funding movements built on fear and hate if power is already centralized in a system of values that keeps the masses unaware of their own value, their capacity to organize and to create the communities they want.

How do we teach people who celebrate life that the power they have can be good, as long as they don’t abuse it?  I guess that first we have to learn we are part of one family -  the whole interdependent web of existence.

Who Will Stand With the Innocents?

By Sam Hamill

"Fifty years ago, I found myself in the war-ravaged former nation of Okinawa, where some of the fiercest battles of the Pacific War had taken place, and where I began to learn of the true atrocities of the atomic bombing of Japan. I also heard there from fellow Marines first-hand accounts of the race wars in my own country, about lynchings, about Bull Conner’s dogs set on nonviolent civil rights marchers, stories I had known only from brief news accounts. I learned about how the impoverished people of Vietnam had driven out the imperialist French and now faced a growing American presence as they struggled toward their own democratic self-rule. President Eisenhower had spoken of our need “to protect our investments in tin and tungsten.”"

Read more ...

Writing for Peace - a message from Sam Hamill

Syria

Syria - orthographic by L'Americain

Last night I watched the news.  Images of children burned in what was reported as a chemical weapon attack.  The image of Bashar Al-Assad speaking in his own language, apparently claiming he did not use these weapons. A report from British Prime Minister David Cameron saying that the House of Commons does not support military action in Syria. Representatives of the UN unable to find out conclusively that the Al-Assad regime used these weapons. The White House threatening to take action but unwilling to say how much.

After all the news coverage on this issue I cannot decide what is true and what is propaganda.  There are two things I can perceive however. One, is that the turmoil in the Middle East is overwhelming and families of all faiths are suffering unimaginably and will continue to suffer even after the violence stops. Two, is that no-one is winning except the military industrial complex.

As I think about this I am reminded of all the wars that have happened over the centuries and conclude ordinary citizens never benefit.  War never grants or promises freedom to the people.  The ruling elite may win or lose but those who are beneath them always lose.  They lose a sense of peace, loved ones and limbs. Whenever rulers decide we must go to war, it is for their gain, their purse, their territory, while it is the soldiers, the wives, the husbands and the children who are asked to sacrifice their lives.

How can we know any military intervention is a just intervention when the truth is only available after the conflict is over and the facts become the subject of history? How can we respond thoughtfully and ethically?

Mulcair's Reply to Proroguing Parliament Letter in which NDP was cc'd

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Mulcair

Thank you for your past email. I really appreciate hearing your feedback and comments - please know that I do take your input seriously as it helps to inform my work.

First, regarding prorogation, Parliament is the one place where the federal government has to respond to questions - and now Mr. Harper has even shut that down. Since the Duffy-Wallin senate expense scandal exploded in May, the prime minister showed up to Question Period only 5 times. It is quite clear that Stephen Harper and his Conservatives are again doing whatever they can to run away from accountability.

Canadians deserve better.

I am proud of all that the NDP team has accomplished this Parliamentary session - we worked really hard right up to the end to ensure that we got some meaningful results for Canadians. I'd like to take this opportunity to share some of this work with you.

One of our most significant victories was the House of Commons' adoption of our landmark motion on transparency - a very detailed plan that would open up MP expenses and create an independent body to replace the secretive Board of Internal Economy. New Democrats know that MP spending should be open and transparent and MPs should be accountable to the taxpayers who pay their salaries! You can read the full text of the NDP motion here:
http://www.ndp.ca/news/ndp-proposes-independent-oversight-mp-expenses.

We held the Conservatives to account with our solid work in Question Period - day after day we grilled them on the Senate scandals and the missing 90 thousand dollar cheque. We launched a campaign to abolish the Senate - I invite you to join the over 20,000 Canadians who signed our petition:
http://rolluptheredcarpet.ca. This summer we will take our campaign to communities across the country to gather more support for putting an end to the unelected, unaccountable, scandal-ridden Senate.

We relentlessly pushed the Harper government on jobs and growth - asking over 100 questions in Question Period about their job-killing economic agenda! We fought their harmful changes to EI and seniors' pensions, their reckless cuts to our food inspection, border and search and rescue services. We stood up for the safety and well-being of Canadians while the Conservatives chose different priorities - putting your safety at risk while allowing tax-payer dollars to fund their Senate cronies. When they moved to sell-off Canada's interests through secret trade deals we countered them at every turn. When they tried to push down wages for Canadians by allowing foreign workers to work for less, we forced them to reverse their plans.

And, I was so impressed with our NDP MPs on the Standing Committee of Citizenship and Immigration who held together a filibuster to stop the Conservatives and their destructive legislation that would deprive Canadians of their rights as citizens.

I fought hard to strengthen the Parliamentary Budget Officer and to help hold the government to account for their economic and budgetary decisions. This is especially important since the Conservatives can't account for $3.1 billion from their last budget! Unfortunately, Conservative MPs used their majority to kill my proposed legislation, Bill C-476.

New Democrats are pushing back on all of the Conservatives' damaging policies, gross mismanagement and irresponsible cuts to social services. You can count on us to continue to be the fiercest opposition the Harper Conservatives have ever seen! We're showing Canadians that we are a government in waiting with the experience and ability it takes to defeat the Conservatives in 2015. What's more, the vision of the NDP relies on the idea that economic growth must always be accompanied by an improvement in our quality of life for all. Collectively, we have the right to aspire to a better future for our children and grandchildren.

All the best for an enjoyable summer. I hope to see many of you as I visit communities across the country.

Sincerely,


Thomas Mulcair, M.P. (Outremont)
Leader of the Official Opposition
New Democratic Party of Canada

(posted with permission from Tom Mulcair)

Proroguing Parliament - open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Photo by Montrealais

Rt. Honourable Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Prime Minister of Canada

80 Wellington Street

Ottawa, ON

K1A 0A2

Dear Prime Minister

I write to you today because I am really concerned about what is happening in Canada. 

Since coming to Canada in 1965 I have learned a great deal about civil society. It is the spirit of caring that has enabled me to move beyond cynicism and apathy, and that spirit which also makes me really concerned about our future.

Every day I meet well informed Canadian citizens who love this country, who work hard to do their job to the best of their ability, who spend hours contributing to community, for the greater good. Among friends, colleagues and acquaintances I have observed an ethic of citizenship and social responsibility which has inspired me to think beyond my own self interest. Or better yet, to see that my self interest is located in the interest of all.

For people to be the best they can be, they need a society which inspires and acknowledges this spirit of care and concern for our fellow citizens. But many events of late indicate that Canada as a nation no longer exists. What we could so easily believe if we allow ourselves to be influenced by mainstream media news, is that this land is merely a petro state or an opportunity for foreign profit. When we as individuals and as a society believe the only thing that matters is the economy then we cease to care for life itself.

When you call for parliament to be prorogued for the third time, I wonder if you are acting as an employee of a large corporation rather than the prime protector of our nation. It allows cynicism to grow just as the events around Lac-Mégantic, the shooting of Sammy Yatim, the senate scandal and so many other news headlines, make us wonder what happened to the ethic of good government. Where are the standards we thought were realized through centuries of struggle towards human rights, and our responsibilities in a democratic society? Where are our philosophers, our healers, our teachers in parliament?

I believe they are there in Ottawa and in the Canadian conscience – but these voices must be allowed, must be heard. Please do NOT prorogue parliament in September.

yours sincerely

Janet Vickers