TalkingDonkeys

Online Distributed Action

2006-10-28T20:17:00.000-07:00

I'd want to highlight an online effort at distributed action.

It is an attempt to highlight and link to news stories from main stream news sources on Republicans prior to the election. Distributed blog attention and discussion of these news stories will bring them higher into various search engines results, and in theory help more people be more fully informed as they research their vote online.

Paul Rosenberg of My Left Wing, describes the effort this way: “Chris Bowers of MyDD has initiated a campaign to raise the visibility of solid, mainstream stories about GOP candidates that they’d rather not have people reading. He explained the concept in detail here…
It’s easy for you to join up. Go here, copy the source code and put it into a diary on your blog. … As an extra added bonus, you can click on the links yourself, and learn lots of juicy stuff.”

Here is the links to the mainstream press articles bloggers think everyone should check out prior to the election:

–AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl
–AZ-01: Rick Renzi
–AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth
–CA-04: John Doolittle
–CA-11: Richard Pombo
–CA-50: Brian Bilbray
–CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave
–CO-05: Doug Lamborn
–CO-07: Rick O’Donnell
–CT-04: Christopher Shays
–FL-13: Vernon Buchanan
–FL-16: Joe Negron
–FL-22: Clay Shaw
–ID-01: Bill Sali
–IL-06: Peter Roskam
–IL-10: Mark Kirk
–IL-14: Dennis Hastert
–IN-02: Chris Chocola
–IN-08: John Hostettler
–IA-01: Mike Whalen
–KS-02: Jim Ryun
–KY-03: Anne Northup
–KY-04: Geoff Davis
–MD-Sen: Michael Steele
–MN-01: Gil Gutknecht
–MN-06: Michele Bachmann
–MO-Sen: Jim Talent
–MT-Sen: Conrad Burns
–NV-03: Jon Porter
–NH-02: Charlie Bass
–NJ-07: Mike Ferguson
–NM-01: Heather Wilson
–NY-03: Peter King
–NY-20: John Sweeney
–NY-26: Tom Reynolds
–NY-29: Randy Kuhl
–NC-08: Robin Hayes
–NC-11: Charles Taylor
–OH-01: Steve Chabot
–OH-02: Jean Schmidt
–OH-15: Deborah Pryce
–OH-18: Joy Padgett
–PA-04: Melissa Hart
–PA-07: Curt Weldon
–PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick
–PA-10: Don Sherwood
–RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee
–TN-Sen: Bob Corker
–VA-Sen: George Allen
–VA-10: Frank Wolf
–WA-Sen: Mike McGavick
–WA-08: Dave Reichert

Back Alive with a quick link...

2006-10-05T17:14:00.000-07:00

I know I've been gone forever, but I have not forgotten this blog, but have been moving to DC actually...

Quick post, try out this tool to quickly volunteer time and knowledge to some of the Senate campaigns this blog supports... Promise more real posts soon.

You can add a badge like this to your blog here...

The Public Good: "seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you"

2006-07-11T23:27:00.000-07:00

The idea of working and praying for the Common Good, as expressed by the prophet Jeremiah...I'm particularly touched by the expression of the private good in the context of the larger common good -- as the city prospers, so will you...

"This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters....Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

Jeremiah 29:3-7

Bush and Congress Approvals Drop

2006-07-03T14:02:00.000-07:00

Obama's Speech Part I

2006-06-30T17:31:00.000-07:00

E.J. Dionne Jr reviews Obama's must read speech:

"Well, yes, Obama, the senator from Illinois who causes all kinds of Democrats to swoon, did indeed criticize "liberals who dismiss religion in the public square as inherently irrational or intolerant." But a purely electoral reading of Obama's speech to the Call to Renewal conference here misses the point of what may be the most important pronouncement by a Democrat on faith and politics since John F. Kennedy's Houston speech in 1960 declaring his independence from the Vatican. (You can decide on Obama's speech yourself: The text can be found at http://www.obama.senate.gov/speech .)

Here's what stands out. First, Obama offers the first faith testimony I have heard from any politician that speaks honestly about the uncertainties of belief. "Faith doesn't mean that you don't have doubts," Obama declared. "You need to come to church in the first place precisely because you are first of this world, not apart from it."

In an interview yesterday, Obama didn't back away. "By definition, faith admits doubt," he said. "Otherwise, it isn't faith. . . . If we don't sometimes feel hopeless, then we're really insulating ourselves from the world around us."

On the matter of church-state separation, Obama doesn't propose some contrived balancing act but embraces religion's need for independence from government. In a direct challenge to "conservative leaders," he argued that "they need to understand the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy, but the robustness of our religious practice."

"Folks tend to forget," he continued, "that during our founding, it wasn't the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment," but "persecuted minorities" such as Baptists "who didn't want the established churches to impose their views."

Like most liberals who are religious, Obama finds a powerful demand for social justice embedded in the great faith traditions. He took a swipe at those who would repeal the estate tax, saying this entailed "a trillion dollars being taken out of social programs to go to a handful of folks who don't need and weren't even asking for it."

But he insisted that social improvement also requires individual transformation. When a gang member "shoots indiscriminately into a crowd . . . there's a hole in that young man's heart -- a hole that the government alone cannot fix." Contraception can reduce teen pregnancy rates, but so can "faith and guidance" which "help fortify a young woman's sense of self, a young man's sense of responsibility and a sense of reverence that all young people should have for the act of sexual intimacy."

And if you think this sounds preachy, Obama has an answer: "Our fear of getting 'preachy' may also lead us to discount the role that values and culture play in some of our most urgent social problems."

Obama's talk will inevitably be read as a road map for Democrats struggling to speak authentically to people of faith. It's certainly that, but it would be better read as a suggestion that both parties begin to think differently about the power of faith.

"No matter how religious they may or may not be," Obama said, "people are tired of seeing faith used as a tool of attack. They don't want faith used to belittle or to divide. They're tired of hearing folks deliver more screed than sermon."

I think I hear some rousing "Amens!" out there -- from Republicans no less than from Democrats."

Donate Now: Key Fundraising Date for 2006 Elections this Friday

2006-06-28T07:42:00.000-07:00

Good advise from MyDD:

"These are the final days where fundraising totals matter to the overall narrative. The Q2 fundraising deadline ends at midnight on Friday. That is only 75 hours away. The next quarter will end on September 30th, and the reports on that quarter won't be out until mid-October. Buy then, all targeting and media attention will already be in place. That makes this the final deadline where totals will signal to the media and to the political establishment that a candidate is for real. To make that national difference, you need to donate now."

My actblue donation page is here...

And the netroots listing of candidates is here...

Do what you can!

Technorati Tags: 2006 fundraising

"Why We Should Care"

2006-05-29T11:43:00.000-07:00

From Alberto J. Mora, the retired Navy general counsel last year, who wrote a memo to the Pentagon 2 years prior to Abu Ghraib warning against US violation of national and international agreements of torture and detainee abuse:

"Our forefathers, who permanently defined our civic values, drafted our Constitution inspired by the belief that law could not create but only recognize certain inalienable rights granted by God -- to every person, not just citizens, and not just here but everywhere. Those rights form a shield that protects core human dignity. Because this is so, the Eighth Amendment prohibits cruel punishment. The constitutional jurisprudence of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments outlaws cruel treatment that shocks the conscience. The Geneva Conventions forbid the application of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment to all captives, as do all of the major human rights treaties adopted and ratified by our country during the last century.

Despite this, there was abuse. Not all were mistreated, but some were. For those mistreated, history will ultimately judge what the precise quantum of abuse inflicted was -- whether it was torture or some lesser cruelty -- and whether it resulted from official commission or omission, or occurred despite every reasonable effort to prevent the abuse. Whatever the ultimate historical judgment, it is established fact that documents justifying and authorizing the abusive treatment of detainees during interrogation were approved and distributed. These authorizations rested on three beliefs: that no law prohibited the application of cruelty; that no law should be adopted that would do so; and that our government could choose to apply the cruelty -- or not -- as a matter of policy depending on the dictates of perceived military necessity.

The fact that we adopted this policy demonstrates that this war has tested more than our nation's ability to defend itself. It has tested our response to our fears and the measure of our courage. It has tested our commitment to our most fundamental values and our constitutional principles.

In this war, we have come to a crossroads... Will we continue to regard the protection and promotion of human dignity as the essence of our national character and purpose, or will we bargain away human and national dignity in return for an additional possible measure of physical security?

Why should we still care about these issues? The Abu Ghraib abuses have been exposed; Justice Department memoranda justifying cruelty and even torture have been ridiculed and rescinded; the authorizations for the application of extreme interrogation techniques have been withdrawn; and, perhaps most critically, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, which prohibits cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, has been enacted, thanks to the courage and leadership of Sen. John McCain.

We should care because the issues raised by a policy of cruelty are too fundamental to be left unaddressed, unanswered or ambiguous. We should care because a tolerance of cruelty will corrode our values and our rights and degrade the world in which we live. It will corrupt our heritage, cheapen the valor of the soldiers upon whose past and present sacrifices our freedoms depend, and debase the legacy we will leave to our sons and daughters. We should care because it is intolerable to us that anyone should believe for a second that our nation is tolerant of cruelty. And we should care because each of us knows that this issue has not gone away."

Dems and the Evangelical Vote

2006-05-25T10:28:00.000-07:00

From a recent posting at the Emerging Democratic Majority:

Can Dems Win Evangelicals? ...is a question that would have been quickly dismissed a few years ago, but is now well worth asking, suggests Amy Sullivan in her New Republic Online article "The Christian Right Moves Left: Base Running." Sullivan recounts a recent incident at Messiah College in which GOP Senator Rick Santorum was char-grilled by evangelical environmentalists, who were unhappy with his opposition to the Kyoto Accords and support of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Sullivan sees the incident as emblematic of a larger trend within the evangelical community --- and a growing problem for the GOP:

...Rove is also reportedly worried about another group of evangelicals: the nearly 40 percent who identify themselves as politically moderate and who are just as likely to get energized about aids in Africa or melting ice caps as partial-birth abortion and lesbian couples in Massachusetts. These evangelicals have found the White House even less open to their concerns than their more conservative brethren have...They have also been aggravated by the refusal of the Christian right's old guard to embrace new causes like the environment and global poverty.

Others have noted the growing interest in environmental causes among evangelicals, as evidenced by their increasing references to Genesis 2:15, in which God tells Adam to "watch over" the Garden of Eden "and care for it," posited against the sorry record of the GOP on every environmental issue. Sullivan offers a revealing statistic in this context that should be of interest to all Dem candidates:

...63 percent of evangelicals in a March survey released by the Evangelical Environmental Network agreed that global warming is an immediate concern.

It is doubtful that Dems will win a majority of self-described evangelicals. Yet it is quite possible that they can win a healthy slice of the evangelical vote this year and in '08... But it won't happen automatically. As Sullivan points out, the national Democratic Party, as well as state and local candidates, must make a focused commitment and an energetic effort to make it a reality.

Quote of the Day

2006-05-05T01:25:00.000-07:00

"For people of all faiths, prayer is a powerful act of devotion. Today, people of faith gather all across the country to reflect on our many blessings as a nation and to seek thoughtful discernment on the many challenges before us.

We know that the suffering of our neighbors, both domestic and around the world, is a burden we must work to alleviate. For the nearly 1 in 5 American children living in poverty, for the nearly 46 million Americans who are uninsured, for the millions of refugees around the world, and for the hundreds of thousands of innocent lives lost to genocide in Darfur, we must come together around these and other common concerns to offer hope. Today and every day, we must strive to find the moral high ground to impact real change.

Today we reaffirm our commitment to work to heal our nation and to come together around our shared values to rebuild our American community with honesty, security and opportunity and to demonstrate moral leadership around the globe."

-- DNC Chairman Howard Dean, on the National Day of Prayer

A Good Cause: Net Nuetrality...Save the Internet

2006-05-02T16:05:00.000-07:00

Make History

2006-04-25T21:32:00.000-07:00

Just looked at the DNC page and over 820,000 have volunteered for this weekends 50 State Canvas....

Strongly encourage you to join in this, the first ever 50 state wide canvasing

Join in what will help reach out to 1 million doors, starting a million converstations about changing the direction of this country....the next step in the campaign to take back Congress, Governorships this year, and the White House in 08!

The Common Good

2006-04-21T15:26:00.000-07:00

I totally agree with this American Prosect essay:

"What the Democrats still don’t have is a philosophy, a big idea that unites their proposals and converts them from a hodgepodge of narrow and specific fixes into a vision for society. Indeed, the party and the constellation of interests around it don’t even think in philosophical terms and haven’t for quite some time. There’s a reason for this: They’ve all been trained to believe -- by the media, by their pollsters -- that their philosophy is an electoral loser. Like the dogs in the famous “learned helplessness” psychological experiments of the 1960s -- the dogs were administered electrical shocks from which they could escape, but from which, after a while, they didn’t even try to, instead crouching in the corner in resignation and fear -- the Democrats have given up attempting big ideas. Any effort at doing so, they’re convinced, will result in electrical (and electoral) shock.

But is that as true as it appears? Certainly, today’s Democrats can’t simply return to the philosophy that was defeated in the late 1970s. But at the same time, let’s recognize a new historical moment when we see one: Today, for the first time since 1980, it is conservative philosophy that is being discredited (or rather, is discrediting itself) on a scale liberals wouldn’t have dared imagine a few years ago. An opening now exists, as it hasn’t in a very long time, for the Democrats to be the visionaries. To seize this moment, the Democrats need to think differently -- to stop focusing on their grab bag of small-bore proposals that so often seek not to offend and that accept conservative terms of debate. And to do that, they need to begin by looking to their history, for in that history there is an idea about liberal governance that amounts to more than the million-little-pieces, interest-group approach to politics that has recently come under deserved scrutiny and that can clearly offer the most compelling progressive response to the radical individualism of the Bush era.

For many years -- during their years of dominance and success, the period of the New Deal up through the first part of the Great Society -- the Democrats practiced a brand of liberalism quite different from today’s. Yes, it certainly sought to expand both rights and prosperity. But it did something more: That liberalism was built around the idea -- the philosophical principle -- that citizens should be called upon to look beyond their own self-interest and work for a greater common interest.

This, historically, is the moral basis of liberal governance -- not justice, not equality, not rights, not diversity, not government, and not even prosperity or opportunity. Liberal governance is about demanding of citizens that they balance self-interest with common interest. Any rank-and-file liberal is a liberal because she or he somehow or another, through reading or experience or both, came to believe in this principle. And every leading Democrat became a Democrat because on some level, she or he believes this, too....

This is the only justification leaders can make to citizens for liberal governance, really: That all are being asked to contribute to a project larger than themselves....

The Democrats need to become the party of the common good. They need a simple organizing principle that is distinct from Republicans and that isn’t a reaction to the Republicans. They need to remember what made liberalism so successful from 1933 to 1966, that reciprocal arrangement of trust between state and nation. And they need to take the best parts of the rights tradition of liberalism and the best parts of the more recent responsibilities tradition and fuse them into a new philosophy that is both civic-republican and liberal -- that goes back to the kind of rhetoric Johnson used in 1964 and 1965, that attempts to enlist citizens in large projects to which everyone contributes and from which everyone benefits.

Arguing for it is the only way that Democrats can come to stand for something clear and authoritative again...."

Emergency Rooms and Easter Week

2006-04-13T22:49:00.000-07:00

I spent last weekend -- a mere 9 days after my 39th birthday -- in the UCLA cardiac emergency center.

Before I go any further, I should say that I'm fine. But at the time I felt three of the five symptoms of a heart attack: tightness in my left chest, shortness of breath and nausea. A bad trifecta of symptoms -- especially with my family history of a grandfather and a myriad of uncles having died of heart attacks.

After feeling these three in combo, I was ready to go. No additional motivation needed...my wife Laura drove me to the emergency room -- which in retrospect was the one dumb move I made...not just dialing 911 mostly out of a sense of pride that I wasn't "that bad" off.

Once there they moved me into the emergency cardiac ward, checked out my blood pressure (which was pretty high, but that is not uncommon during emergency room experiences) EKG, chest X-rays, the whole 9 yards. Nothing definite, but from the first it did not appear to be heart failure...at he first X-ray would show an odd smudge on my heart. They'd need to take another.

To my direct left was a poor older woman who was both a stage 3 chemo patient, and DEFINITELY suffering a major heart attack. To my right was a motorcycle accident victim, who seemed to drift in an out of consciousness, and had many tubes in his mouth and face keeping him breathing.

After midnight I sent an exausted Laura home. She was so tired and brave and scared for me. By 2 AM that morning they decided to move me into a semi private room, that still had nurses watching nearly every minute. I was woke up every hour for a blood test, a EKG, or a blood pressure test.

I shared the room with Carlos who is a 17 year old who was recovering from being shot four times in a gang drive by shooting in Inglewood. Amazingly for him none of the bullets most of which went through his body hit any vital organ critically.

That next morning we shared a TV, I let him choose the TV -- which everything he choose had guns and people being shot: Aliens, Dirty Harry, Platoon. None of those viewing choices really helped my nausea, but I figured the dude had just gone through enough, and I just zoned out from things and tried to sleep.

Shortly I was carted down to take the second X-ray. Before I left I wished Carlos good luck on top of the luck he had already seen. It went quickly --although I still felt light headed a bit even then -- and soon was back resting, as Carlos' parents came to take him home.

Alone for the first time during this whole ordeal: as I just rested, practiced slow breathing, and watched it as the monitor showed the calmer heart rate. I figured the second X ray results would be a few hours away at the soonest. Try to rest. Tried not to worry.

I tried some of the meditation and prayer techniques we did in church: "Breath in Jesus, breath out fear."

At that point something that was a sheer act of grace occurred: a volunteer brought a dog in. The dog's name was Lucy, a rescue Mutt, that was the gentlest and kindest animal.

There were many others like her in the center she said, with other friendly dogs, just visiting sick folks, giving them a dog to pet. After putting a sheet up on the bed, Lucy curled up near my feet. I petted her, and remembered my old family dog. After a long while, I was feeling really tired again and I wished them well and thanked them for such a kind visit.

Not long afterwards the second X-ray results came back fine and they said they would be releasing me to go home. Yesterday I took an EKG/treadmill stress test, that pretty much excluded ANY chance that what I was dealing with was heart related. Could be stress over leaving my work after 14 years, could be a pinched nerve which I may have had -- and does account for each of the symptoms I faced. Everyone all along the line said what a good decision I made to go in, and that for most people the first signs are ignored to their peril.

I'd been to emergency rooms and hospitals before. I was aware of the crisis and pain there, but I hadn't ever been there as a patient.

I slowly got back to normalcy this week, and resurfaced to see Easter this weekend.

It is impossible for me not to think of my wounded roommate, the poor cancer stricken heart patient, or the motorcyclist and think about how fragile a thing it is to be human. How when Jesus became one of us, pitched his tent with us, really experienced what it means to be human, including the suffering and pain and worry and crisis of it...what an amazing act that was.

I also think of the friendly volunteer and her calm happy doggie Lucy. What a gracious, Christ-like act that was. "I was sick and you visited me."

And lastly how great it was to be home that night to see my 2 year old son Cammy and Laura again, and to rest and be well.

Somehow those images seem like hyper-real icons of Easter to me this week. The pain, the grace and the homecoming of it all.

Tim

quote of the day

2006-04-13T21:38:00.000-07:00

Q. What is the one question that you wished you were asked more often about the Emergent Church, and how would you answer it?

A. Brian McLaren:
I wish people were more interested in the question of how the Religious Right has changed our evangelistic context.

The name "Jesus" is heard differently now than it was thirty years ago because of the amazing "success" of the Religious Right. If I say "Jesus" to many of my friends, they don't think of someone who came to forgive sin; they think of people who want to shame people for their sins. They don't think of someone who had special good news for the poor; they think of people who want to give every possible advantage to the rich because they think the poor are to blame, largely, for their poverty. They don't think of someone who overturned the status quo, but of people who represent the status quo.

They don't think of someone who talked about turning the other cheek, but of people who defend preemptive violence. So, I wish people would seek to understand the rising dissatisfaction surrounding how the Religious Right has "rebranded" Christianity, and how Emergent and other conversations like it are seeking to rediscover the Jesus of the Scriptures and fairly represent him and his message to our world.

quote of the day

2006-04-10T21:12:00.000-07:00

Good comments, good reminder from today's quote of the day from historian Gary Willis:

"Some people want to display and honor the Ten Commandments as a political commitment enjoined by the religion of Jesus. That very act is a violation of the First and Second Commandments. By erecting a false religion — imposing a reign of Jesus in this order — they are worshiping a false god. They commit idolatry. They also take the Lord's name in vain.

Some may think that removing Jesus from politics would mean removing morality from politics. They think we would all be better off if we took up the slogan "What would Jesus do?"
That is not a question his disciples ask in the Gospels. They never knew what Jesus was going to do next. He could round on Peter and call him "Satan." He could refuse to receive his mother when she asked to see him. He might tell his followers that they are unworthy of him if they do not hate their mother and their father. He might kill pigs by the hundreds. He might whip people out of church precincts….

It was blasphemous to say, as the deputy under secretary of defense, Lt. Gen. William Boykin, repeatedly did, that God made George Bush president in 2000, when a majority of Americans did not vote for him. It would not remove the blasphemy for Democrats to imply that God wants Bush not to be president. Jesus should not be recruited as a campaign aide. To trivialize the mystery of Jesus is not to serve the Gospels.

If Democrats want to fight Republicans for the support of an institutional Jesus, they will have to give up the person who said those words. They will have to turn away from what Flannery O'Connor described as "the bleeding stinking mad shadow of Jesus" and "a wild ragged figure" who flits "from tree to tree in the back" of the mind.

He was never that thing that all politicians wish to be esteemed — respectable. At various times in the Gospels, Jesus is called a devil, the devil's agent, irreligious, unclean, a mocker of Jewish law, a drunkard, a glutton, a promoter of immorality.

The institutional Jesus of the Republicans has no similarity to the Gospel figure. Neither will any institutional Jesus of the Democrats."

Thank You, Harry Taylor

2006-04-07T14:44:00.000-07:00

Tell Harry Taylor Thank you...

466 pages of people have done so already...

Slate: "The Religious Left: It is Fruitful and has Multiplied"

2006-04-06T23:28:00.000-07:00

Great article, here is a snippet:

"Lo and behold, there is a religious left. The Catholic Church is helping to lead the fight against immigration restrictions. A week doesn't seem to pass without some group convening a conference on religion and liberalism. Last year, Rev. Jim Wallis' progressive manifesto, God's Politics, became a best seller; now Jimmy Carter's book attacking the religious right is on the list.

According to research by professor John Green, white religious voters made up 21 percent of Kerry's tally, compared to 11 percent for Al Gore in 2000. If you add African-Americans and Latinos, who as a group are also very religious and liberal, the religious left amounted to about 40 percent of the Kerry vote. Not surprisingly, the religious lefties are seething over the religious right's political dominance. But they're also frustrated by their secular ideological comrades. The political left "often sees religion not merely as mistaken but as fundamentally irrational, and it gives the impression that one of the most important elements in the lives of ordinary Americans is actually deserving of ridicule," complains Rabbi Michael Lerner in his new book, The Left Hand of God. "The Left's hostility to religion is one of the main reasons people who otherwise might be involved with progressive politics get turned off."

Bible-thumping liberals: Many Democrats consider the term "progressive evangelical" to be an oxymoron. But that's ignorant. Instead, evangelicals break into three groups. The fundamentalists (think Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson) are solidly Republican and represent about 15 percent of the electorate.

The moderates represent another 9 percent. They generally voted for Bush because they agreed with him on foreign policy and abortion and gay marriage. But the ones who cared most about economics preferred Kerry, a sign of how the Democrats could win over more of them.

Finally, there are the liberal evangelicals, who make up about 3 percent of the electorate and tend to vote Democratic. They're especially concerned with poverty and the environment. All told, then, between 7 and 10 percent of the electorate are white evangelical Christians who either vote Democratic or could. That's a voting bloc equal in size to African-Americans."

"Our Faith is Offended..."

2006-04-02T00:35:00.000-08:00

This is from last April 2005, but I just came accross it and like it a lot. It's from a Pew Research Center: Faith, Politics & Progressives: A Conversation with John Podesta who is the CEO, Center for American Progress; and former Chief of Staff to President Clinton... Here are exceprts:

John Podesta:

"It's tempting to look at that and believe, as I think many opinion leaders do, that whatever common ground there is between the walls of faith and politics, it's generally on the right. I think that enhanced the belief that American politics is polarized into two warring factions: a religious right that promotes government intervention in all areas of private life, so long as it doesn't interfere with the free market, and a secular left, which would be content to do the opposite. I think that's a simplistic assessment and it may explain why it's so widely held, because it is so simplistic. But obviously, I think, as particularly people here know, the reality of this is far more complex...

Historically, whether we're talking about Frederick Douglass or Dorothy Day or Rabbi Heschel or Dr. Martin Luther King, or the millions they helped to lead, there's an America that expressed its faith by fighting for abolition and for women's suffrage, by walking picket lines, by marching for civil rights, by protesting the war in Vietnam. The progressive religious tradition not only predates the Dobsons and the Robertsons, it certainly continues to this day and I think – and this is my plea to you today – that it is something that is highly under-reported in the coverage of religion in public life today.

But we do see it in local campaigns to win a living wage for low-income workers. The Center was involved with ACORN – and a broad religious coalition – in trying to raise the minimum wage in Florida, the ballot initiative that was successful in the 2004 election. We see it in efforts to protect voting rights, we see it in the campaigns to provide debt relief to the most impoverished countries on earth, we see it in the movement to promote peaceful conflict resolution both at home and abroad. But I would argue that where we need to see much more of this and much more of this conversation is right here in this city – in the media and in every forum where the spiritual dimension of public policy is considered...

We began last June when we brought together more than 400 clergy, advocates and scholars who attended our first faith and policy conference. It was dedicated to a faith agenda aimed at bringing people together, not stigmatizing them, not dividing them. It crossed sectarian lines because our faith is offended. And people from all those traditions, I think, shared this.

Our faith is offended when our nation allows 1 in 6 children to live in poverty – we're 45 million Americans; 19 million lack health insurance – when disease, hunger, poverty and war ravage 2 billion people on the planet, when our leaders deny the damage that their policies are plainly doing to God's earth and our own society.

I don't think we had all the answers at that conference, but we started with the belief that whether you're a Christian or a Jew or a Muslim or a Buddhist, you loved your neighbor and you recognized your responsibility to your community and to the nation. The people who came together, I think, truly believed that progressive governance is not only more fair and effective, but it is the right thing to do in a profoundly moral sense.

Another important thing that we did was we didn't try to teach politicians how to talk the Bible, but we did try to bring the voices of the progressive religious community into the public debate. One of the people who attended our conference and who has become quite prominent in the media these days was Jim Wallis. We had Jim Forbes, Bob Edgar, Sue Thislewaite; we had a range of religious voices that we tried to lift up, to give them the support that they needed....

We obviously need to do more than just remind people of the history of progressive social change. We have to provide a forum for a new generation of religious activists. So people sometimes ask if what we want to achieve on the left is what religious conservatives have already created on the right. I think we can probably do better than Jerry Falwell, Ralph Reed, Tom DeLay and the others. What we're about, I think, is renewing and restoring a progressive religious tradition that for most of our history helped make ours a more benevolent, a more compassionate, a more caring society.

I'm Catholic, as I said earlier. I attend Mass, I take communion. It's a source of strength for me. I think it's really what makes me a progressive. And while – and I'll close with this – like many Catholics, there are issues where I disagree with my church, I could not help but be touched by what I think really all Americans experienced recently – the life and works of John Paul II.

He once observed that America today has what he called a heightened responsibility to be for the world an example of the genuinely free, democratic, just and humane society. That is as clear and precise a statement of what faith has to say to politics, I think, as anything I could come up with.

Those moral values not only help define me as a Catholic and as an American; they're the reason why in this time of conservative power, and particularly at a time when I see a conservative abuse of power, I'm standing my ground as a progressive and I am willing to get engaged in this fight and this debate for the direction of our country."

quote of the day

2006-03-30T23:22:00.000-08:00

From Markos over at DailyKos:

"Remember. Friday is the end of the fundraising quarter. If you have any inclination to contribute to a candidate in the near future, today is the day it can have the most impact. Even if it's $10, please give to someone, anyone. Peruse the various ActBlue fundraising pages, like the Netroots one, Firedoglake, Atrios, one of my own personal favorites James Webb in the Virginia Senate race, or your favorite candidate. "

April 29th: 50 State Neighbor to Neighbor Outreach Day

2006-03-30T08:27:00.000-08:00

Governor Dean just announced an early and massive grassroots outreach effort, timed ahead of the 2006. It's time to start getting out message out in a simple way that positive change is possible and 2006 is a referendum on the direction of the country under Bush, NOT hundreds of individual races. The outreach focuses on a simple and clear six point message of a "Democratic Vision" of a new direction for America.

Honest Leadership & Open Government
Real Security
Energy Independence
Economic Prosperity & Educational Excellence
A Healthcare System that Works for Everyone
Retirement Security

To support this national outreach day, in addition to the printed materials, they have put up high resoulution PDF files you can download and print...nice. More resources, details and online signups are here...check it out...

"Dear Fellow Democrat,

Are you ready to make history?

Thanks to the overwhelming support from thousands of Democrats, who donated to get the literature for the canvass printed and shipped, we're on schedule and gearing up for the unprecedented Neighbor-to-Neighbor Organizing Day on April 29th.

On that Saturday, thousands of volunteers will recruit hundreds of thousands more Americans committed to changing the status quo this year during door-knocking events in communities across America.

Democrats have a clear vision for America, and we're going to get the word out by making personal contact with our neighbors. And along the way we will build new relationships among volunteers on the ground, a network that will have an impact beyond a single day.

Whether you've never volunteered or you're a seasoned door-knocking veteran, it is crucial that you take part in this historic organizing push.

Please RSVP for an event near you:

http://www.democrats.org/50statecanvass/find

In many states, Democratic Party staff on the ground have already put together staging areas for massive voter contact events on the 29th. Thanks to donations from people like you, hundreds of thousands of pieces of literature are being printed and shipping in bulk to those locations right now.

If there isn't an event near you, don't worry. Some state parties will have canvassing events on alternate dates, or have other important events that planned for that weekend.

You can still plan your own canvass in your community. Our online tool makes the planning process easy, and if you create your event before April 10th, we will get doorhangers to you in time for your canvass on the 29th.

You can create your own event here:

http://www.democrats.org/50statecanvass/create

Whether you're attending an event or hosting your own, we have also put together materials on the web to help you make your canvass as effective as possible."

"The Heresy of Our Time"

2006-03-27T21:52:00.000-08:00

From Bill Moyers speech last week:

"There are no victimless crimes in politics. The cost of corruption is passed on to the people. When the government of the United States falls under the thumb of the powerful and privileged, regular folks get squashed.

We are dealing here with a vision sharply at odds with the majority of Americans. These are people who want to arrange the world for the convenience of themselves and the multinational corporations that pay for their elections. With their fundamentalist medicine men twirling the bullroarers in the woods, they would turn America into their petri dish – a replica of the Marianas, many times magnified: A society “run by the powerful, oblivious to the weak, free of accountability, enjoying a cozy relationship with government, thriving on crony capitalism,” in the words of Al Meyeroff, who led a class-action suit in behalf of the worker on the Marianas and learned what they were up against. Let this, too, sink in: If the corporate, political, and religious right have their way, we will go back to the first Gilded Age, when privilege controlled politics, votes were purchased, legislatures were bribed, bills were bought, and laws flagrantly disregarded – all as God’s will.

...These charlatans and demagogues know that by controlling a society’s most emotionally-laden symbols, they can control America, too. They must be challenged. Davidson Loehr reminds us that holding preachers and politicians to a higher standard than they want to serve has marked the entire history of both religion and politics. It is the conflict between the religion of the priests – ancient and modern – and the religion of the prophets.

It is the vast difference between the religion about Jesus and the religion of Jesus.

Yes, the religion of Jesus.
It was in the name of Jesus that a Methodist ship caulker named Edward Rogers crusaded across New England for an eight-hour work day. It was in the name of Jesus that Francis William rose up against the sweatshop. It was in the name of Jesus that Dorothy Day marched alongside auto workers in Michigan, brewery workers in New York, and marble cutters in Vermont. It was in the name of Jesus that E.B. McKinney and Owen Whitfield stood against a Mississippi oligarchy that held sharecroppers in servitude. It was in the name of Jesus that the young priest John Ryan – ten years before the New Deal – crusaded for child labor laws, unemployment insurance, a minimum wage, and decent housing for the poor. And it was in the name of Jesus that Martin Luther King Jr. went to Memphis to march with sanitation workers who were asking only for a living wage.

This is the heresy of our time – to wrestle with the gods who guard the boundaries of this great nation’s promise, and to confront the medicine men in the woods, twirling their bullroarers to keep us in fear and trembling. For the greatest heretic of all is Jesus of Nazareth, who drove the money changers from the temple in Jerusalem as we must now drive the money changers from the temples of democracy."

Don't Wait for 08: The Midterms

2006-03-27T10:02:00.000-08:00

From the Democracy Corps strategy memo on the mid term election, including a focus on how Bush's policies by and large help the wealthy and do not focus on "The Common Good:"

"Element One: Nationalizing the election around Bush. In the Congress, Republicans are rushing to find their independence, but they have supported Bush’s direction at every step. Bush is less popular than Republicans and less trusted on the issues.

Democratic message choices are stronger when referencing Bush. Indeed, Bush is weaker than the Republicans on nearly all issues, including security, as we saw in the recent NPR survey.

Bush and the congressional Republicans have nationalized the issues that now put them
in so much difficulty. We should keep the focus there, as they try to change it.

Element Two: Bush’s direction versus new direction. The choice in this election is not very complicated, as demonstrated in the most recent Democracy Corps poll.

The Republicans want to continue Bush’s direction.
The Democrats say, we need a new direction.

...Element Three: What is wrong with Bush’s direction? He governs for the few (wealthy, corporations and CEOs), when we need an America that works for everyone.

When we ask voters what is wrong with what is happening with the Republicans in Washington, it is not a complicated story: far above all other things, voters say the Republicans “work mainly for the wealthy and corporations,” with an added number saying, they “don’t watch out for the average person.”

quote of the day

2006-03-23T07:46:00.000-08:00

"And if Jesus' parable of the sheep and goats is correct (Matthew 25), the Day will be less like judging a criminal trial and more like judging a livestock show. You don't need a cross-examination to tell a sheep from a goat. Day slips into day, and after decades of goatish deeds, it will be nearly impossible to turn back."

-- Frederica Mattews Green, on the Day of Judgetment of Christ

quote of the day

2006-03-22T23:22:00.000-08:00

In a race with the "Democratic Establishment" very strongly behind one candidate, and the "Netroots" rushing to support the other candidates, Lindy Scott still brought in about 16% of the vote yesterday in the IL-06 primary. I'll have more thoughts later, but wanted to include this quote of the day. Thanks Lindy!...

"Where do we go from here? I will continue to advocate for the well being of all of our neighbors. I will continue to fight for better education for our children, good health care for all, fair treatment for undocumented immigrants, alternative forms of energy, and a foreign policy that respects other countries and their citizens.
I want to follow in the steps of Abraham Lincoln. He did not win every one of his elections. Nevertheless, he did transform his defeats into lessons that made him a better person and a better public servant. That is my goal. Let us continue to improve our world by serving our neighbors as ouselves."

- Lindy Scott, from his blog today

Still at 37

2006-03-22T09:32:00.000-08:00

Bush still stuck at 37% with 57% disapprove...

We need to keep opposing Bush policies that the American people are continuing to see with disapproval...And proposing a better path.