The Resistance and Restoring Democracy

Good luck comes from aligning strategies and tactics with
positive trends to overcome the contradiction and realize one's vision.

I. Vision - Ideas for the Future

1. Human Birthright - WAFE

Clean Water
Clean Air
Clean Food
Clean Energy

2. New social contract

Push to restore full employment; everyone must have economic benefits

Strengthen (not gut) rules that support good jobs.

Protect basic right to a union

Level playing field re trade agreements

Counter stark inequality by raising taxes on top 10%
Don’t be complacent

3. Better health plan 

Single payer system

Increase Medicare and Medicaid

4. Reinvigorate democracy

Improve voting accessibility
Limit money in politics
Uphold ethical standards
Undo gerrymandered districts

5. Overcome Divisiveness / Racial Tension

Uphold laws against discrimination
Invest in immigrant education
Hearts must change
Protest for equal treatment
Not retreat into bubbles
Keep expanding human rights

6. Solidarity not uniformity

Be Mindful

Show kindness

See & acknowledge all sides

Assume commonality

Don’t be attached to a particular outcome

II. Contradiction - How Did We Get Here?

Economic Inequality: breeds cynicism

Racial Tensions: global wave of immigration engenders uncertainty and fear

Polarization: closed-mindedness created by biased media

Foreign threats: can US keep its values in responding?

Decaying Democratic institutions: dark money in politics, citizen complacency

 III. Positive Trends

1. Environmental Mindset Nearing Tipping Point

. 33 states and DC have reduced carbon emissions via energy efficiency and renewable fuels

. California, New York, and Massachusetts (Republican Governor) leading the way on clean energy:
            CA has cap and trade
            WA carbon tax; have to pay $25 per metric ton = money for education

. Jobs in solar industry now outnumber jobs in both the coal and fossil fuel electric power sectors

. Cost of clean energy down 41%

            cost of wind energy down 64%

            Cost of batteries cut by ¾

. Solar = 25% job growth in 22 states in 2016

. Wind Energy grew 32% since 2015
. Socially Responsible Investing matches old style (fossil fuel/farm industry) investing 

. Jobs Justice Climate March April 29

2. Pro-Choice Democratic Women Ready to Run for Office

. Emily’s List launched Run to Win campaign to recruit thousands of pro-choice women to run

. Emily’s List already has 500 women ready to run in 2018

. Emily’s list is targeting candidates down to local school board level

. Facebook says there are 2500 women ready to run for office. Training groups are popping up.

. We can help women to run for office = Help Petition, Phone, Knock on doors

3. Grassroots Organization Is Happening

. Group called Together We Will is action-oriented and has 100,000 members

. Van Jones Dream Corps is organizing Love Army, a multicultural movement

. Indivisible Groups are forming and demonstrated against immigration ban at airports

. Move On holding phone conferences on action priorities

. Support growing for Indigenous Language Media

. Groundswell Movement – 3.6 to 4.5 Million in US marches

. Nasty Women Get Shit Done PDX produced diversity support yard sign

. A grassroots member-owned cooperative used county and city bonding authority with community banks to bring high-speed Internet to rural Minnesota

Oregon Representative Peter DeFazio says: Do some research and identify a group that is aligned with your values – add your support to their efforts. A powerful and organized volunteer force is the most effective way to target issues and Implement change.

IV. Strategic Directions for Restoring Democracy

1. Democrats need to be clear how bad things are

. Fewest Democratic elected officials at all levels since 1920s
. GOP total control of 25 states / Dem’s 5
. Senate problems in 2018: 25 seats up (10 in states Trump won); GOP only 8 up – all in red states

2. Resistance needs to be clear on advantages

. Clinton won popular vote

. With 48 seats – Democrats can filibuster
. Resisters need to figure out how to harvest long-term advantages – youth, educated, minorities

3. Get a message on the economy that cuts across class & racial lines

. College debt

. Focus on Bread and Butter Issues of ‘nationalists’

4. Congressional Democrats Need to Resist Republican Representative in the White House (Never use the President's name. Make Republicans own the disaster they have created)

. Total obstruction or pick fights?
. Against tax cuts for wealthy (unites Dem liberals and Red State incumbents)
. Prioritize confirmation fights, e.g. Pruitt for EPA
. Convince working class GOP supporters they were conned and are being played

5. Rebuild Your Farm Team

. Progressives need a message and persistent infra-structure to turn out voters every 2 years
. Get Obama to work on electing progressives up and down the ballot
. Obama and Holder on Democratic Redistricting committee  (Obama.org)

6. Democracy Needs You Your Full Span of Life

. Talk in real-life (not just social media)

. Organize

. Run for office

. Show up and stay at it

. Presume goodness

. Have faith in America (The power of ordinary citizens to bring about change)

7. Pursue A Red State Strategy

. Four red states are actively cutting carbon emissions: Alaska, Georgia, Tenn., W. Virginia
. Clean energy (wind and solar) is cheaper than fossil fuels in: Iowa, Illinois, Kansas, Nebraska
. Red state of Nebraska fought against Dakota pipeline
. Three red states have an emphasis on Early Childhood Education: Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska
. Grow from Blue Counties in Red States. An example is Atlab Pareval (Asian Indian American) won County clerk of courts in Hamilton, Ohio.

8. Don’t think about next President yet

V. Tactical Actions

1. Be the Media

. Examine where you are getting your news
. Support Independent Journalism
. Understand opposing views - common ground with the ‘pro America’ crowd could be “No other government has the right to interfere in our elections”

. Rachel Maddow doing more analysis than most reporters

2. Engage On A Personal Level

. Be in Protest Marches: Be smart – not violent; if see people fighting, back away

. Join groups - Environmental activists, Peace camps, Women’s March
. Donate to Progressive causes

. Reach out to elected officials: visit local members of office – thank, resist, deliver letters

. Run for office – be a precinct delegate

. Get involved in county and state politics – less than 5% participate in politics

. Put consumer pressure on corporations that lobby and fund alt-right campaigns

. Daily Routine: Call Congress 202-225-3121 – Call state representative. Select/do one action

. Be prepared for the worst
. Stay committed - Keep in mind that periods of chaos bring renewal Jamaican disaster brought unprecedented economic investment.

3. Blue States Form Regions of Resistance

. State legislatures ratchet up standards - In 1970 CA and NY made abortion legal; they created the new normal.

. Pass health laws – think beyond ACA

. Protect the vulnerable - set up sanctuary cities

. Don’t let senators cut deals

. Stand up for Immigration - If Muslim Registry, we all sign up.

4. Hold Republican Representative in the White House Accountable

. Tell congressmen to stand up to Republican representative in White House

. Support local initiatives to resist Republican representative in White House and GOP

. Form a team of 5-10 Rapid Responders

. Donate to organizations opposing Republican representative in White House

. Resist: show solidarity - rally people to show that we know what they are doing

. Find International Support (74 countries oppose Republican representative in White House)

. Boycott Trump and Koch brands: Amazon, Uber, Hobby Lobby, Walmart, Sears, Welches juices, Tident Gum, Universal Studios, Forbes, Millercoors, etc

5. Mount legal challenges

. Investigate unethical appointees; expose them

. Litigate – follow the law

. Run ads to support legal defense
. Support electoral reform -National Popular Vote Interstate Compact – have 10 of 165 votes so far

. Give money to groups like Common Cause and FairVote.org

Resources for this document Include

Action Network, Climate Hawks Vote, Common Cause, Daily Kos, DCCC, Diane Dunlap PhD, Emily’s List, Every Voice, Hear Our Voice, Karen Snyder, Michael Moore, Move On, People’s Action, Take Action Eugene, Sierra Club, Sisters March/Women’s March

Street Theatre: Connect the Dots

500,000 people, mostly women, marched in
Washington, D.C. on January 21, 2017.

On Saturday I participated in the Women’s March on Washington in my hometown of Eugene, Oregon along with seven thousand of my fellow citizens. One of my granddaughters marched in Montreal, Canada. In addition to at least 700 marches in the US more than 70 additional events were held in cities across the world.

Street Theatre

On January 21, 2017 the street drama – Hear Our Voice - took front stage from Tel Aviv to Barcelona, Mexico City to Yellowknife, Paris to Moscow, Belgrade to Kolkata, Athens to Buenos Aires, Berlin to Cape Town, Belfast to Copenhagen, New Delhi to Paradise Bay in Antarctica. Over three and a half million people worldwide (and still counting) participated in this time-tested consciousness-raising and unity-building strategy.

Street theatre is effective. It brought an end to colonialism in Africa in the fifties, made civil rights front and center in the sixties, gave a boost to women’s rights in the seventies, and hastened the end of wars in Vietnam and Iraq. Every generation I have known has used street theatre to wake up those stuck in the past.

Marchers wore and carried signs
displaying their message to the world.

Don’t get me wrong. I think history is very important; there is so much we can learn from it. But not by holding on to the recent past. Cultures such as China have practiced street theatre for centuries, but I first came to know of it as a consciousness-raising tool while doing field research on African independence movements. What I learned in Africa during the summer of 1963 was embedded in community development methods we used in the Black inner city ghetto of Chicago.

January 21, 2017 was global street theatre. Over 3.6 million global citizens marched for women’s rights, civil rights, and human rights in more than 770 cities. Beyond the actors in this drama, how many others participated as witnesses, as viewers? Like it or not, hundreds in probably a thousand towns and cities were impacted by yesterday’s events. Streets were blocked. Public transportation was taxed. And beyond those impacted directly in these cities, how many others witnessed this global drama on their television, computer, or cell phone screens?

Women in India marched under the banner of I Will Go Out to protest
the sexual harassment and assault they experience in public places.

H.E.R³.S.

Each marcher chose her/his own costume amplified with signs to shout their message. As with the marchers, messages were diverse. A few that struck me included:

            Women are the Wall and Trump Will Pay

            Today We March. Tomorrow We Run for Office.

            Make America Think Again

            Penguins for Peace

            Respect My Existence or Expect My Resistance

Respect My Existence or Expect My Resistance
- sign carried by a Latina mother and two daughters. 

One that keeps me chuckling was:

Thou Shall Not Mess With Women’s Reproductive Rights. Fallopians 1:21

I had a tiny bit part in yesterday’s drama and I was thrilled to play it. My own sign was based on a statement made on behalf of international marchers. A Swiss representative announced they were marching on behalf of H.E.R.S. (Health, Economic Security, Representation, and Safety).

I adopted their slogan and adapted my sign accordingly even though I felt that by not including education it seemed to exclude an important issue for a lot of women. If I were to do my sign today, I would change it to:

H.E³.R.S.

Health Rights

Economic and Educational Equity

Representation at 50/50

Safety of Body and Spirit

My rain poncho hides my rainbow colored Hillary pin.

Regardless of the Dumpster’s lies about his dismal inaugural attendance and Fox lie machine’s attempt to divert attention from the march, January 21, 2017 was a truly historic event. Part of its significance is that so many ‘fringe’ movements came together to participate in a common movement: Democracy On The March. It is also significant that cadres of organizers were behind each of nearly a thousand marches. Those organizers will continue to be the yeast of a global march toward a new future. Hundreds of speakers and musicians will continue to broadcast the vision supported by these marches. Aziz Ansari's opening on Saturday Night Live is such an example.

Bravo for the cadres of organizers and the more than 3.6 million actors in one of the largest performances of global street theatre I have ever witnessed.

Slogans from Hillary's campaign were recycled
to show support for women's rights. 

Connect the Dots

70,000 years ago Homo sapiens were integrated with the natural environment and honored the feminine principle of creativity. 20-10,000 years ago Sapiens sought to gain control over nature, resulting in patriarchal societies that put forceful control at the center of the universe. As our global population has now reached seven billion people, humanity of necessity is regaining its respect for nature.

Coinciding with the event on January 21, 2017 are other benchmarks that I believe point to a recovered respect for nature. A few I've noticed:

• The Water is Life campaign to stop the Dakota pipeline went viral.
• The car industry is marrying the tech industry in search of driverless vehicles that make owning a car unnecessary.
• Agribusiness is attempting to integrate organic farming.
• Energy from alternative sources such as solar and wind is now cheaper than that from fossil fuels, especially in developing countries.
• Beirut is fast becoming a tech capital for North Africa and the Middle East.
• India is launching an online program at the low cost of $9 to train thousands of solar energy technicians.
• Development in China and India has helped bring down the global number of people in extreme poverty.

I believe the theme of clean energy jobs has supplanted that of climate change as a motivating factor around the world. In other words: hope has replaced fear. Perhaps that will someday be seen as Barack Obama’s most significant and lasting legacy – the leadership role he played in bringing first China and then over 200 other countries to an awareness that clean energy is our hope for the future. 

Accompanying a growing respect for nature, we are beginning to see new bi-gender cultures emerging. I see evidence for this in the number of men around the world who marched on January 21. Some wore signs: “This is what a feminist looks like.” Another piece of evidence is Canada’s self-conscious decision to have a cabinet that is equally 50% female and 50% male.

Pink was the color of the day.

Make no mistake: Koch brothers, big business, and Russia are heavily invested in fossil fuels and are fighting contemporary balance-restoring trends tooth and nail. They represent the past and do not want to see this new world take over. They may hold back the US for a time but believe me, they are no match for India and China, both of which have embraced a clean energy future.

If you have not yet done so, divest of any stock you own in fossil fuel industries. If for no other reason do so as an act of resistance toward the Dumpster and his fossil fuel cabinet appointees. By the way, divestiture is another strategy developed in Africa to challenge apartheid in South Africa. We owe so much to Africa! When will we begin to repay our debt?

We will not be silenced.

The global street drama on January 21, 2017 was a testament that women’s rights are human rights and that our common future lies in respect for nature and bringing an end to the millennia long rule of patriarchy.   

PEOPLE POWER ALWAYS WINS

A New Era

Sustainability Star 

For several decades grassroots people around the globe have been engaged in protecting nature and fighting climate change. Two recent articles refer to the success of those efforts:

1. The globe has reached the tipping point where clean energy is now as cheap as or cheaper than energy from fossil fuels.

2. A planetary paradigm shift has occurred from mindless use of resources to a concerted effort to engage in sustainable development.

It is precisely because private citizens are succeeding in the fight to stop using fossil fuels for energy consumption that corporate America used hook and crook to gain access to the United States federal government. At the very moment that newly elected federal government officials will attempt to quash the environmental movement is exactly the time when each of us must accelerate our engagement in protecting the one planet that is known to support human life. Now is the time to maximize people power at the home, community, and state levels.

Early Adoptors

Twenty-five years ago my commitment to a reduced carbon imprint involved dedicating myself to demonstrating that an individual could live, work, and even prosper without owning a car. I live in a community that has an exemplary public transit system. That’s not to say that it can’t be improved, but to point out that my choice of residence was predicated on having access to public transportation. The money I saved from this one lifestyle choice enabled me to invest in a small condominium and save for my senior years.

Many of my friends also made carbon reduction lifestyle choices. Some committed to no longer flying in airplanes. Some were first to buy energy efficient cars. Some did home energy audits, changed all lighting to LED, made their homes and businesses more energy efficient, and became directly involved in the environmental movement. Some are actively engaged in divesting of fossil fuel stocks while others went to North Dakota to support Standing Rock in its fight to protect the priceless resource of clean water.

The Task Before Us Now

During a recent visit to my art gallery in Seattle, I met with a colleague who volunteers with the Sierra Club. I pressed him to tell me the most critical action I can now take to insure that climate change deniers do not stop the momentum of the environmental movement. He said that all the environmental and economic problems have to be addressed at once. When I asked for a summary of these problems, he agreed to send me a list compiled for the Sierra Club by Court Olsen in 2013.

When Olson’s list of twenty Available Major Public Policies That Would Help Curb Greenhouse Gases arrived, I summarized the list into the following five arenas of People Power Action to Renew the Earth. Then I created the above Sustainability Star. Everything below is summarized on the Sustainability Star. I created the star as a small poster to have in my kitchen as a daily reminder of actions I can take. Contact me for a printable version.

Protect Health, Land, Water, and Forests (think community jobs)

• Promote a vegetarian diet to free up grazing land and reduce methane emissions from cattle.
• Promote organic farming and fertilizers to enrich soil, incentivize a transition away from corporate farming and synthetic fertilizers. In the last decade the number of careful small-scale farms has increased.
• Subsidize organic farming labor wages and organic foods for low-income families through actions such as organizing local CROP HOPS where people go to an organic farm during high labor times and work for free. If you think of all the millions of dollars raised for not-for-profit organizations through running, walking, and biking marathons, you get an idea of how great the desire is to be out in nature doing something that will benefit others.
• Incentivize planting trees and forest preservation.
• Buy farmland and return it to managed forestland. 

Increase Energy Efficiency Training & Requirements (think community jobs)

• Set up free and widespread training and classes for adults and children regarding energy efficiency.
• Change to LED lighting everywhere.
• Require more energy efficient appliances and incentivize retirement of inefficient appliances.
• Promote automatic monitoring/shut off controls for lighting and appliances.
• Establish nationwide (think city and state-wide) high-energy efficiency requirements for all new buildings.
• Require minimum of 50% energy efficiency improvement of existing buildings by 2030. With proper tax-based or utility billing paybacks, this creates local jobs.

Maximize Clean Energy Production (think community jobs)

• Decentralize utility power generation by promoting local neighborhood energy production alliances.
• Start community solar/wind/hydro power projects.
• Increase utilities’ use of renewable energy generation sources: solar hot water/steam, photo voltaic solar, energy storage (salt tanks, pumped storage, etc), geothermal, wind, hydropower, bio-waste fuel burning, algae based oil). 

Eliminate Fossil Fuels (think ending dangerous unhealthy jobs)

• Divest of fossil fuel stocks.
• Tax fossil fuel consumption.
• Restrict natural gas and oil fracking.
• Subsidize the phase out of coal power plants rapidly, oldest first.
• Protest federal anti-environmental actions.
• Prevent export of fossil fuels to foreign lands.
• Stop fossil fuels exploration subsidies.

 Accelerate Clean Transportation (think community jobs)

• Use, promote and incentivize mass transit.
• Transition mass vehicles to all electric power.
• Use federal (state) incentives to build national (state) high-speed transit network to eliminate short distance airplane flights.
• Accelerate increased fuel efficiency in new cars and trucks.
• Offer incentives to destroy low-mileage vehicles.

Happy New Year! 

In the past I have often felt overwhelmed by the wide breadth of issues related to climate change. But being able to summarize concrete actions into five specific arenas has given me a grip on what I can do to have an impact. If you email me I can send you a printable pdf of the Sustainability Star. In 2017 I hope you will join me in making the Sustainability Star shine brightly in local communities everywhere.

Winter Solstice Greetings

 My top painting, Chinese New Year, has sold! Yeah.

My art work is now being represented by Fountainhead Gallery on Queen Anne hill in Seattle. My introduction to the gallery was facilitated by Leah and Laura Early. Acceptance into the gallery has happily provided opportunities for more frequent visits with colleagues in the area. You can find a few of my paintings on the gallery's website. I will be adding more to their site in 2017.

My first big show at Fountainhead will be Pilgrimage in June 2017. Since Pilgrimage has traveled throughout Oregon, Idaho, and California I am now ready to sell the paintings. Women's advancement has been my lifelong passion. Thus a percentage of proceeds from the show will go to Central Asia Institute, an organization that for twenty years has been pioneering education for girls in this mountainous and once remote region. 

I recently had the opportunity to attend the opening of the gallery's holiday show in which I have two paintings.The show's title, The Poetic Heart, offered me an opportunity to write a poem for my two paintings: Chinese New Year and Sunshine and Shade. Because the poem reflects my feelings around Winter Solstice, I share it with you as my holiday greetings. 

Nature’s Eternal Rhythms

By LiDoña Wagner

Deep in damp winter earth,

Lies a seed of hope, dormant, resting …

Absorbing rain and snow,

Slowly gathering strength,

Patiently awaiting sun’s warmth,

Praying for miraculous rebirth.

When darkness reaches fullness,

Nature’s balanced rhythms shift.

Light’s return is announced with beating drums,

Bursting firecrackers, vigorous lion dances.

Enough, we shout. Enough of lethargy!

Get on with it!

Gentle golden rays return,

Pushing back cold and shade,

Gracing earth’s hidden treasures,

Sloughing off dead cells,

Nudging hope to spring forth.
Awake. Energized. Alive!

May your 2017 be filled with opportunities for personal growth, local activism, and compassion for our planet and her peoples.

Photo by Sheela Westre

Wake Up, America

Every young person seeing me wear this pin has enthusiastically liked it.

On November 8, 2016 many of the values upon which our union of fifty states were founded were trampled in an outrageous election that left most sane people gasping for air. Pundit after pundit will give their belated analysis of what caused the veil separating reality from media hype to bring an ignorant and racist sexual predator into the highest position in our federal government. Many will blame Hillary for not being ‘the right woman’or for failing to do thus and so.

Bullshit.

Hillary Clinton was the only woman with the elephant hide to withstand the withering criticism that standing at the top of the ballot requires. Having endured decades of hostile media labeling her ‘a bitch’ (translates ‘nasty woman’), at our moment in history she was the right woman to lead my generation’s charge against the highest glass ceiling of American society. Please read Hard Truths by Hillary Clinton for a compelling contemporary history of the world. Because of her willingness to take society’s stones and arrows, there now stands a phalanx of younger women who will take up the battle she waged.

Hillary at the top of the ticket helped 95 pro-choice Democratic women win election to the US Senate, US House of Representatives, state and local offices. For example, consider these four new female US senators.

• Kamala Harris - an African American and Indian American from California
• Catherine Cortez Masto – winning Reid’s Nevada seat, our first Latina senator
• Tammy Duckworth – representing Illinois, first Thai-American senator
• Maggie Hassan – current New Hampshire Governor who defeated a rabid Republican

For the full list of 95 pro-choice Democratic women supported by Emily’s List, go to: 

www.emilyslist.org.

You can also find Emily's List on social media. 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/emilyslist

Twitter: https://twitter.com/emilyslist

Instagram: http://instagram.com/emilys_list   

Emily’s List

For those of you who don’t know, Emily’s List is a 30-year-old organization that encourages women to run for public office, teaches them how to run campaigns and helps fund their campaigns. EMILY stands for Early Money Is Like Yeast (it makes the dough rise).

Thirty years ago a handful of Democratic women looked at the lack of female representation in US congress and began poking around to find out why this was the case. They learned that when women announced a desire to run for office, their party leaders said, “You can’t win so we’re not giving money to your campaign.” With no money to build a campaign, they did indeed lose their elections.

With nothing but a Rolodex of friendly contacts, these women began raising money to fund the early stages of women candidate campaigns. One woman at a time, they began helping elect women to US congress. Emily’s List has supported every Democratic woman in congress today.

Over time, Emily’s List discovered that they needed to seek out and encourage women to become political candidates. More recently they realized they needed a pipeline of women gaining exposure and experience at the local and state levels. Thus this year’s crop of 95 pro-choice Democratic women winners up and down the local, state, and national levels.

Emily’s List sends out information about the women they are supporting. As a potential funder, you give directly to the campaigns of those women you choose. I personally funded our four new senators, some returning female Democratic women senators, and some who ran great campaigns but did not defeat their Republican Koch-funded opponents; women such as Katy McGinty in Pennsylvania and Deborah Ross in North Carolina. Please note that these two women did better than two of the males picked by the Democratic Party: Evan Bayh and Russ Feingold.

This sign will remain on my lawn. I am proud of Hillary's campaign.

The People’s President

Hillary Clinton has won at least 1.5 million (the number keeps growing as votes continue to be counted) more votes in the general election than the Dumpster who won enough Electoral College votes to become President-elect. Hillary’s victory was won by those who represent the values for which she ran: inclusivity, higher wages, working together, fighting for clean energy to combat the growing disaster of climate change, love trumps hate, and more. Her victory represents a far larger margin than Al Gore won in 2000.

The racism, bigotry, and misogyny that characterized the campaign of The Dumpster are a direct result of decades of untruths propagated by the Fox Lie machine and major media all owned by wealthy conservatives. Fed a constant diet of entertaining falsehoods, people have lost the ability to discern fact from fiction. Many people found The Dumpster’s outrageous lies and Roger Ailes-fed slogans supported their predispositions, failing to subject these to a truth test. Is it even possible to ever again have a free press that informs rather than entertains?

Hillary Clinton is clearly The People’s President. Even with thousands of Democrats stricken from voter registers in Republican-held states, unabashed voter suppression through difficult poll locations and extreme ID requirements, vicious intimidation, and vote buying by the Koch Hispanic outreach program, a preponderance of individuals in these United States believe in the basic American values represented by Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine.

I stand with a proud line of Hillary supporters.
The Eugene GOTV run by young people succeeded
in electing a Democratic woman as my areas's state representative
despite gobs of outside money for the Republican. 

Grassroots Democracy

Our federal system of government is in tatters. Since the Supreme Court foisted Citizens United on our democracy, the financial powers that have always threatened our democracy have escalated. Republicans have hamstrung our legislative functions. With these ‘big business’ proponents now in control of the House, the Senate, the presidency, and soon the Supreme Court, all checks and balances are lost. Washington will be nothing but an on-going circus and entertainment machine. There will be no policies for the benefit of common ordinary citizens, only for the rich and powerful.

This being the case, I have come to the conclusion that it is up to grassroots activists working at community and state levels to forge a new style of ‘Stronger Together’ government. California Governor Jerry Brown gave the battle cry by proclaiming that his diverse and populous state will not be bludgeoned into accepting the draconian, hate-filled, and outdated ideas spouted by The Dumpster and his loyal followers. In two years Jerry Brown transformed a state bankrupted by Republican Arnold Swartzenegger into a healthy economy. Thousands of people in major cities across the nation heard Brown’s clarion call and have stood up to support a new form of grassroots democracy.

Concerned citizens can create sanctuary cities to protect our most vulnerable residents, raise the minimum wage to rebuild a middle class, continue to build and escalate clean energy businesses and jobs to fight carbon-induced climate change, and engage young people in a new style of community and nation-building (thank you Bernie Sanders). Such efforts could provide a beginning point for all those states that want to participate in a new form of government for and by the people.

Perhaps it is illusory to postulate that modeling a new future might attract the interest of open-minded citizens in Republican-controlled states and counties. However, if it is true that some people in this occupied territory voted for The Dumpster not out of the racism and bigotry represented by gun-toting white supremacy believing men but because they truly want change and are willing to work for it, then perhaps it is possible to hope for a national awakening of civic engagement.

As a human community, America elected a dedicated and compassionate woman to lead the country. As a corrupted political system, America gave power to an unworthy man. John Kerry, a respected world statesman, was swift-boat advertised out of the presidency. Al Gore, a Nobel-prize winning environmental activist, was hanging chadded out of the presidency. It’s time for grassroots democracy to create new political systems.

Wake up, America.