A Pause to Honor the Dead

I hate to fall prey to the ridicule of more enlightened sorts, but I can't help but feel that the Earth is alive and, well, taking action. You can only judge by the lights of your own experience, of course, but how many near misses before we get her hint? An earthquake that shifts the length of day and wobbles us on our axis and a tsunami that kills thousands and nearly causes a meltdown of Chernobyl proportions,  poisoning the Land of the Rising Sun for generations, just might be the cause for some reflection on everyone's part.
This is a moment when concerns for our planetary health have come to the fore. Many would have us believe that nuclear power is integral to our energy future, but there are other choices. Renewable energy: the wind, sun, geothermal and hydro, can provide all of our needs with existing technologies and the necessary upgrades to our grid infrastructure.
Here is a video from the Post Carbon Institute that puts it all into perspective. The take-away is that we will have to live within our means and plan for the future in an intelligent, (ie equitable) manner. As a people, I think we get that, whether Republican or Democrat in basic political disposition.

It will be a struggle, but justice will prevail in the end. It always does. Here is another video I showed Friday in my honors Spanish class. It is based on Neruda's epic poem Nuevo Canto a Stalingrado,  in honor of the Russian heroes of the battle of Stalingrad and the Allied forces and partisans who rose to the rescue of civilization.

On Wisconsin

In the wake of the Ash Wednesday ambush on working families, Wisconsin progressives fight on, with a large rally today bringing in farmers from the western part of the state who see the link between teacher's unions and rural economic health. Energized activists also promise a political pushback against the bill outlawing collective bargaining rights for public employees, starting with an election April 5th, where they vow to replace a self-identified conservative judicial activist in favor of an independent on the state's supreme court. With these initial steps, progresssives are harking back to the salad days of Wisconsin Gov. "Fighting Bob" LaFollette and his nation-wide Progressive Party, with its alliance of labor and farmer movements, as they swing into action to mobilize an energized Democratic base.
Many analysts see the Walker bill as a long term boost for those who prefer not to balance the nation's deficits on the backs of working people. They see polls showing Americans in favor of collective bargaining rights, and in favor of teachers, as a sign that the bill may be an example of over-reaching on behalf of right wing ideology that will ultimately come back to haunt the Republicans in the next electoral cycle.

In Like a Lion

March swept in on clouds of winter storms and sub-zro weather. But winter seems to finally be loosening its grip. Here are some pix of late winter on the farm!

On another tack, some notes on the current turmoil re teacher's unions in Wisconsin. I loved Jon Stewart's sketches contrasting the treatment of corporate excess on outlets like Fox and the argument that state spending needs to be balanced by reining in teacher's salaries and benefits. The jester plays such an important role, speaking truth to power and reminding us of the foibles of the proud. Here is Stewart:

The Daily Show - Crisis in Dairyland - For Richer and Poorer - Teachers and Wall Street
Tags: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Where's the Revolution? Who are the Class Warriors?

Reading the news it's uncanny to see how the winds of change wash back up on these shores. We create a social network, and despots fall. Future historians will have a job trying to untangle the weave of influence that is washing across the Middle East. But let's say for argument's sake that the rise of Facebook, coinciding with the Obama presidency, has given a de facto impetus to democratic impulses across the globe in acknowledgement of the continuing power and sway of the American Revolution. It is ironic and somehow fitting that at the same time things are heating up back home, but in reverse, as lawmakers in Wisconsin of the capital D persuasion seek to forestall a democratically elected legislature from implementing reactionary policies that would curtail basic freedoms, some of the bulwarks of American democracy. I'm talking about the hard won rights to collective bargaining that took working men and women many years of struggle to gain, sometimes in the face of oppressive power that would make Gaddafi grimace in recognition. That's where we are in today's America, looking through a glass darkly as state legislatures try to dig out from the wreckage created by a financial corporate elite, nay oligarchy, by reneging on promises to humble teachers and public sector workers, and attempting to gut the remaining power of organized labor. As a public school teacher, I can tell you that the protection of a union, in ensuring all kinds of workplace equity, not just fair wages, is an essential if not the most crucial factor making this a tenable career.  Anybody who would believe that the people who negotiate with teacher's unions have a vested interest in caving in to union demands because they are elected officials, as David Brooks states in his most recent NY Times opinion piece, is not living in my world. On the contrary, teachers make handy scapegoats for all sorts of ills, and are left holding the bag because the rest of the working class has already been gutted.
Republicans like to point to the work of community organizers and union organizers and wave their finger and accuse them of inciting hatred and class warfare as if there were no such thing as class and therefore no reason for organizing beyond the evil attempts at world domination of Marx and Lenin. But with Scott Walker of Wisconsin, it couldn't be clearer that the power grab has already happened and we're just now waking up.

Shout Out For A Little Sunshine

I saw a movie last night which inspired me to write something after a brief hiatus. There was a lot going on in the world, with seismic shifts in the Middle East and super storms and digging out from some of the karmic wreckage which occasionally accumulates in any life, I suppose. But Little Miss Sunshine, a 2006 gem which won an Oscar for best original screenplay that year, lifted me out of the funk I was in. It's about a family, the Hoovers,  on a road trip to California to enter their daughter in a beauty pageant. The family is a take on average dysfunctional America, with a father who has sunk the family's savings into a self-improvement scam he has authored and fervently believes in, a teenage son alienated from humanity, a gay uncle who has just failed at suicide, and a crude, politically incorrect grandfather who snorts heroin. It's a satire on a hyper-competitive society which warps children, adults and families, and it made me laugh in self-recognition. That's the beauty of comedy when it's serious and well-intentioned in that it can treat of close-to-home truths that can be really so painful. It can also strike hammer blows for transcendent truths and this movie does, coming down emphatically on the side of genuine being, as opposed to the artifice of achievement that characterizes our neurotic culture.

A bit of honest disclosure would reveal that just hours before watching the movie, Susan and I had had a long conversation about the appropriate role of youth sports in our family life, with me taking the position that sports teach truths about winning and losing and learning to take a little of both, and Susan coming down on the side of "there's too much competition and not enough time for genuine personal growth in kid's lives." And even though she is undoubtedly right, we are way too competitive and it's way too much about achievements at earlier and earlier ages, I really do believe that in moderation, athletic competition can be a great educational benefit. I guess the key is the word moderation, which when lacking can give horrible results. And in general, moderation is passe. Little Miss Sunshine is about growing and living and coping as a moderate being in an immoderate world. If that describes you and your life, I recommend this movie. Also worth it are great performances by Steve Carrell of The Office as the gay uncle, and Alan Arkin as the crackpot grandfather.

Man Up, Sarah Palin

The shootings in Arizona, a tragic event that has brought the nation momentarily to its senses, has also stoked a new fight over who or what is to blame for the senseless act of a madman. There is no doubt that Loughner is a delusional young man in the grips of schizophrenia. The roots of his particular condition are hidden from casual commentators and beyond the scope of a blog post. Many reporters have pointed to the suburban ennui and decay of his Tucson neighborhood, his reclusive parents, his drift into drug use and conspiracy theories, as contributing factors. But the belligerent political rhetoric of the right, using visual images of gun fetishists in its propaganda, inciteful, accusatory and personally vilifying speech and actual gun toting protesters at political rallies, must have certainly added to Loughner's deranged plans of action. Sarah Palin's controversial crosshairs web page targeting Congresswoman Giffords, taken down in the hours after the shootings, are the smoking gun for irresponsible hate-mongering that led us to this moment.
Rhetoric on the right is now wriggling away from accepting responsibility. It is true that there is no direct link between Loughner and political groups, but it would be nice to hear centrists like David Brooks acknowledge the violent and undemocratic underpinnings of recent Republican and Tea Party imagery and speech that led a kook to act out the hate that has us in its grip.

In With The New

The old year is fading fast from memory, much like the last snow under the onslaught of a thawing Bermuda high. As the second decade of the new century gets underway, there's a chance for us to highlight the positive accomplishments, the steps we've made in the right direction, and underscore the persistent dilemmas that confront us as a nation and as individuals.
Americans are feeling better about themselves, according to polls, more secure about what the future brings this year than last, and for good reason. The economic deep freeze shows signs of thawing at last, and congressional moves to pass some laws moving us forward reflect the self-righting logic that makes this democracy work. But Republicans are about to take over the majority in Congress, vowing to repeal health care reforms, fight the EPA's ability to curb greenhouse gas pollution and in general do everything they can to ensure that Obama does not win re-election in 2012. The more things change, it seems the more they stay the same.
On a personal level, reaching the age of fifty means making peace with some of my own limitations, at the same time appreciating the gifts that I have. As the kids get older, the joys of family life seem to deepen even as the challenges of managing relationships get more complex. Personal goals remain as elusive as ever, but new ideas bring new inspiration and new hope.
Keep on keeping on, and remember the words of 1 John 4:7-8: "Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love."
If that doesn't inspire you, think of the Christmas lesson of Play Doh. It started out as an industrial cleaner used to get soot off of wall paper. When the market went out from under it as people stopped burning coal in the 1950s, the inventors noticed that children liked to make Christmas decorations with it and re-invented the stuff as an educational aid. 
It's never over until the spark of ingenuity and creation goes out. There's more than one way to skin the cat. Just ask the makers of Play Doh, or any kid you know.