Discussing an Agenda for a Democratized Economy So it is the People’s Economy

By Gary Berg-Cross

Saturday, Nov 3rd, from (2-4 p.m.) the MDC chapter of WASH will have a talk Margaret Flowers & Kevin Zeese (co-directors of Its Our Economy) entitled: "Shifting Economic and Political Power to the People. ”  This will be at the Wheaton regional library 11701 Georgia Avenue  Wheaton, MD 20902.


As attorney Kevin Zeese notes the Roman philosopher/statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero defined “Freedom” as “participation in power.” By that standard most of we Americans are not free since do not participate in real power and decision making. Yes, we get to vote every now and then, but this seems a distant form of influence now.  Real power resides in organizations like the Bank of America which has spent millions lobbying the US Congress to pass laws that benefit then directly or indirectly by deregulating industry. One example cited is their spending millions to oppose bills like the Credit Cardholders Bill of Rights &  the Foreclosure Prevention Act, Helping Families Save their Homes Act, Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act, all of which would have directly benefited consumers and hence the Public. 

Self advancement and deregulation explains in part why our system could not avoid a Bush-era economic/financial system collapse in 2008.  This followed the longer, contextual 30 year decline of basically stagnant and minimized worker wages. The result has been to produce a numbing, record household, personal and educational debt. 

An article on the Its Our Economy site described the scene this way:

At the same time working Americans saw jobs disappearing, hours reduced, salaries shrinking and more under-employment.  They also saw their retirement savings disappear, 5 million foreclosures, record bankruptcies, record poverty and shrinking housing values.  The cost of everything from health care, to food to energy kept rising while incomes fell. And, the social safety net, limited as it was compared to other developed countries, was shredded, a process continuing as austerity budgets take hold across the United States.

Why doesn’t the economy work better for most Americans? 

One particular chicken and egg problem seems to be the growing wealth gap caused in part by stagnant wages and debt. This inequality creates an imbalance of actual intertwined economic & political power. Eggs that hatch from such confluence craft economic and political policies that seemed designed to extract wealth from the economy and direct it at a favored few. The result is a form of structural poverty leading to struggle on many fronts (education, health care, home ownership, saving etc.). 

Margaret & Kevin will describe a 20 point:“ strategy and tactics to shift economic power, and thereby political power, to the people. “

As time permits they may cover parts of their 20 point agenda to stabilizes the economy in the short term & turn things around from misguided policy to a more sustainable democratic economy. The outlined action evolved from a Prosperity Agenda (www.ProsperityAgenda.US) written in 2009 to provide for a democratized economy that combines policies that have proven to be effective along with innovative new solutions.  Here are highlights of the proposal.

*  *  *

New, Efficient, Clean Energy Economy
1. The foundation for a new economy is a carbon-free/nuclear-free energy economy; that distributes energy production down to individual homes and businesses and uses energy efficiently.  
2. The U.S. automobile industry, recovering from near collapse, is caught in the web of long-term costs for its retired and current employees, especially the uncontrollable cost of health care and rapidly changing transit needs.  Further, the auto industry has to move toward the new green economy, instead continuing to build SUV’s rather than hybrids and electric cars.
3. Infrastructure in the United States is literally falling apart and not keeping up with the needs for a sustainable carbon-free/nuclear-free energy economy. Long term investment is needed for new infrastructure. 
4. The U.S. and world need to dramatically reduce carbon emissions. A critical step is to tax carbon emissions at the source as they enter the economy, i.e. tax coal, oil and gas for their emissions

5. Develop local economies to reduce use of fossil fuel in transport and allow local businesses and communities to flourish. 
Creating Jobs, Providing Housing, Health Care and Building Local Economies
6. Individuals as well as state and local governments are in fragile financial positions and thus in need of an economic and social safety net.
7. Another tool for developing local economies, particularly around housing and land use. This is a nonprofit corporation which acquires and manages land on behalf of the residents of a community.
8. To address housing we must stop the mortgage crisis by requiring mortgage holders to reconfigure mortgages to allow homeowners to stay in their homes and not lose them to foreclosure. 
9. Face up to the health care crisis which is approaching 20% of U.S. GDP.  The United States has the most cost-inefficient health care system in the world.

End the Wars and Reduce the Military Budget
10. End the Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Libyan wars and reduce military spending.  The United States needs to end a foreign policy based on empire and militarism

Re-making Finance, Shared Prosperity
11. Transform corporate welfare into taxpayer investment. Even before the current bailout, the U.S. government provided hundreds of billions of dollars annually to big business interests in loans, tax breaks, under-valued access to federal lands and a host of other mechanisms. 
12. Democratize access to financing by re-making the Federal Reserve and re-forming the nation’s money system. The Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors leadership is the exact opposite of democracy; it is control of the money system by the wealthy few, plutocracy.
13. Democratize corporate power by increasing shareholder rights, expanding the rights of shareholders to choose directors of corporations and submit resolutions to set the direction and priorities of the corporation they invest in and of which they are part owners. End corporate personhood, so that corporations do not have the rights of human beings. 
Financing the Government: Taxes and Deficits
14. Reconsider the tax structure to make it more equitable. 
15. Be mindful of the deficit and debt at all levels of government but also recognize there times when government must spend to rebuild the economy. 
Workers Rights
16. Democratize the workplace by encouraging employee-owned businesses
17. Reduce the work week with no reduction in pay. Before the economic collapse, 7% of the U.S. GDP was based on consumer buying.  Since the early 1970s wages have been flat in the U.S. and the consumer economy has continued because of two-income families, increasing personal debt and cheap goods from abroad.  This is unsustainable
18. Establish a national guaranteed income for all Americans based on the model proposed by Richard Nixon in 1969.
International Trade and Finance
19. End World Bank and IMF dominance (which means ending U.S. and European dominance) of the world financial markets.  These entities need competition and regional banks in Latin America, Asia, Africa and other regions should encouraged as should stabilization funds to assure currency stabilization.  These organizations need to be democratized, made more transparent and include appropriate representation and decision-making by developing nations.
20. Remake international trade from corporate trade to people’s trade.  The current rhetoric calls trade agreements “Free Trade” but in reality they are trade agreements that favor corporations over the interests of labor, the environment and consumers.  Trade agreements need to be redesigned so they serve the interests of people and the planet rather than the interests of corporations. 

Kevin Zeese, co-director of Its Our Economy, is an attorney who has been a political activist since graduating from George Washington Law School in 1980.  He works on peace, economic justice, criminal law reform and reviving American democracy.

Margaret Flowers, co-director of Its Our Economy, is a Maryland pediatrician. After graduation from the University of Maryland School of Medicine in 1990 and completion of pediatric residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Flowers worked first as a hospitalist and then in private practice. She left practice in 2007 to advocate full-time for a single payer health care system at both the state and national levels.

Images

Hierarchy of Power: http://griid.org/2012/09/11/a-grand-rapids-power-analys/

Carbon Democracy: http://www.amazon.com/Carbon-Democracy-Political-Power-Age/dp/1844677451

Democracy and Alternatives: http://www.srilankaguardian.org/2011_11_01_archive.html

Kevin: http://portland.indymedia.org/en/topic/economicjustice/newswire/archive44.shtml

Margaret: http://portland.indymedia.org/en/topic/economicjustice/newswire/archive44.shtml

People Organize to Protest G8, Present Alternative Economic View

by Gary Berg-Cross

May 18, 2012 10:00 am to 2:00 pm
Community Room, C. Burr Artz Public Library
110 E. Patrick Street, Frederick, Maryland

The “Occupy G8 Summit for the People” is an alternative to the G8 that will have speakers (see agenda below) discuss the effect of concentrated wealth on global public policy, the effects of wealth inequality on peoples’ well-being and alternative economic structures that would close the wealth divide and create a more democratic, sustainable economy. The Summit will include time for hearing the voices of the 99% who will be in attendance. The public and the press are invited.

This summit will discuss how to:

• Build the international economy from the bottom up, not the top down.
• Highlight the wealth divide that undermines the foundation of the economy and corrupts political decision-making.
• Increase the minimum wage, end poverty and reduce debt to provide a stronger foundation on which to build a new sustainable economy.
• Institute a Robin Hood Tax on the purchase of stocks, bonds and derivatives.
• Build a new economy that is both economically and environmentally sustainable.
• Build wealth at the base by encouraging worker owned co-ops and other democratized economic institutions; and by turning corporate welfare into taxpayer investment where everyone profits from the investment by the commonwealth, not just the corporate owners.
• Recognize that we all share a common destiny and that even the wealthiest require the commonwealth in order to increase their riches.

Schedule

10:00 am – Welcome Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, co-directors, ItsOurEconomy.US and organizers for October2011.org/OccupyWashington, DC

10:10 am – Global Wealth Inequality Sam Pizzigati, Too Much; Brooke Harper, Global Trade Watch; Jeremy Weyl, JubileeUSA

11:10 am – Creating a Global Economy Based on Sustainable Resources Brent Blackwelder, former executive director Friends of the Earth and Steady State; Ruth Caplan,Campaign for Global Water Watch and Alliance for Democracy; Alexis Baden-Mayer, Organic Consumers Association

12:10 pm – Break

12:20 pm –Building a New Economy from the Bottom Up Rob Kall, Editor of OpEd News and Bottom Up Radio Show; James Riker, University of Maryland and co-facilitator of 2010 G20 Civil Society Dialogue; Emily Kawano, Solidarity Economy Network and Center for Popular Economics; Lisa Stolarski, The National Cooperative Business Association

1:30 – Reception

Sponsored by OccupyFrederick, October2011.org/OccupyWashington,DC and ItsOurEconomy.us

Behind the Scenes in the Attack on Planned Parenthood

By Gary Berg-Cross

Edd Doerr, Explicit Atheist and others have discussed the “brou ha ha” around HHS mandated regulations on birth control and the claim of a religious exemption for Catholic institutions based on conscience. Some conservative pols have characterized that struggle as another front of the war on religion, while many see it as an attack on vulnerable, often poor women, ever a silenced majority.

I find it interesting that while this has been going on we’ve seen an attack on Planned Parenthood and its funding. Activists had been applying political pressure on Komen for years to not support health care provider Planned Parenthood because it offers abortion. An example was the deceptive Video ‘Sting’ attacking Planned Parenthood which as called a “Dishonest Hit Job is Part of Religious Right’s Campaign to Deny Women Access to Reproductive Health Care” by People for the American Way.

The anti-abortion crowd found a vehicle for their attach by getting some leverage on the Komen Foundation. Karen Handel, a Republican who once ran for governor of Georgia on a platform calling for the defunding of Planned Parenthood, seems to have been at the center of that effort. During her campaign for office she wrote when she pledged to eliminate all state funds for breast and cervical cancer screening to the group if she were elected governor:

“[S]ince I am pro-life, I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood,”

After failing to become governor in a tea-party like campaign. Handle became senior Vice President (for public policy) of the Susan G. Komen charity almost a year ago and seems to have continued her campaign. According to the Huffington Post Komen insiders say Handel got defunding on the agenda and spent months pushing a plan to shift the organization's grant strategy and collaborate on a bit of a witch hunt. Emails reveal that handle was the prime instigator and argued that Komen could just say that the change is policy came about because Planned Parenthood was under investigation no one can blame us for being political HuffPo has internal emails. This lead Komen’s apparently passive and narrow thing Board to cut off funding for 17 of the 19 Planned Parenthood affiliates in December.

This is surprisingg to many but an examination of Komen leaders by Mother Jones and others shows them to be consistently conservative and opposed to Planned Parenthood. Founder and CEO Nancy G. Brinker ,who is the face we largely see in TV defending the action, served under George W. Bush as chief protocol officer for the U.S. She later served as ambassador to Hungary. Reports have noted that both she and her now late husband, Norman, have been major Republican donors.

Another member of Komen’s Advocacy Alliance Board is Jane Abraham. She is the General Chairman of the anti-choice and anti-science Susan B. Anthony List. She seems pretty political since she is on its Political Action Committee. One of Abraham roles has been as a leader to establish what they call “crisis pregnancy clinics”. These are designed to prevent any abortions. What they do is mislead women about their health and reproductive rights. Want to know another interesting connection. Abraham works with Maureen Scalia, well known wife of Supreme Court Justice Antony Scalia.

And there are other interesting political and perhaps religious connections. Ari Fleischer, former press secretary for George W. Bush pops up. I’ve been surprised and disappointed to see him and Ralph Reed on CNN as “political” commentators. It seems that discredited, conservative voices have vampire like abilities. Ari, a prominent right-wing pundit of Pinocchio level lying fame who some identify with political Chabatists, was apparently quietly involved in hiring Handel, and making the interviews of prospective candidates discuss how to handle controversy about Komen’s relationship with Planned Parenthood. Fleischer views on Planned Parenthood are documented in his book, Taking Heat. He criticized it as a partisan, ideological organization that receives undeserved positive coverage in the press. Such things seem like fuel for tea party activists, who act like bullies and are the real promoters of culture war with hot button issues that divide people. And of course Ari was available to discuss how to give Komen positive press and shield it from backlash. One hand washed another in conservative political circles.

But all that has failed and Handle has resigned. Sensible things can happened when people pay close attention to a scandal and what it reveals. And part of what it reveals is a confluence of influence makers who get leadership roles in institutions with good missions and sterling reputations. This allows work behind the scenes on conservative, often hybrid religious-political agendas. This is an old story. Some might remember how the Red Cross provided a leg up on the political career of some Republican chairman going back to Elizabeth Dole and Bernadine P. Healy, M.D. More recently Bonnie McElveen-Hunter was head of American Red Cross. She has a nice resume. Before that job she was ambassador to Finland, and before that worked for Eliz Dole's presidential bid!

The Democratic Underground argues that such things were rewards for her:

“financial support of the Bush campaign. McElveen-Hunter was reported to be one of just 15 people who raised more than $1 million for Bush's presidential run. She headed Bush's effort to raise money from women, a campaign called "W is for Women."

She personally gave $102,750 to Republican candidates and party committees during the campaign, including $100,000 in soft money to the Republican National Committee. She also contributed $5,000 to the Bush-Cheney recount effort.”

None may dare call it a conspiracy, but it does show a bit of how the system and money work and how organizations collaborate to accomplish their agenda. Such top down, power elite control occasionally get frustrated by energetic, truly grassroots responses. OWS comes to mind here, but in this case it had come from women and progressive activists who have found a voice and shone a light on a wicked brew of politics and power pushing its agenda hidden away from view. It's perhaps another episode in the struggle with reactionary forces that insist on looking back rather than ahead for wisdom.

A Freethinker’s Inspiration of Atheist Posters

By Gary Berg-Cross

I ran across some new atheist posters at the recent Humanlight celebration. What got my attention there was a poster of the Last Supper with Jesus replaced by the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM). I’ve heard there another poster with the disciples replaced by famous freethinkers – sort of like below I guess but structured around a table. I haven’t run into that one yet.

But the experience got me thinking about what might be a list of some of the best posters. You tube has a good start on this and more than one although if you go there you get a warning that the content has been identified by the YouTube community as being potentially offensive or inappropriate!!s just to represent freethinkers in some way, sort of a variation on the fish symbol.

Viewer discretion is advised, as they say.

Below are a few of the ones that grabbed my attention.

One type is is just to represent freethinkers in some way, sort of a variation on the fish symbol.

Another type is with Darwin in it. Side note, Darwin Day Feb 12 is here in less than a month and I hope the DC area has a good celebration.

Darwin gets into many posters, but so does the Last Supper theme. One shows imaginary figures.

As a side note I also like a take on OWS as a Christian assembly.

FSM makes an appearance again in a Sistine chapel creation poster.

I’m sure there are many good ones I’ve missed so perhaps readers will post comments on their favorites.

Accommodation and Openness: Thoughts on Religion & Non-Belief Cooperation at the Occupy Movement

By Gary Berg-Cross

There are many voices that can be heard in the Occupy movement, but coverage sometimes simplifies it down to familiar categories often framed in false dichotomies. So it is described by Fox and right wing outlets in what seem like hot button labels such as anti-bank or anti-capitalism. Or it characterized as made up of (or controlled by) a new brand of amoral, dirty hippies. For good measure the label of atheist & secular humanist are smeared on with rigor by right wing outlets in an effort to get an emotional response from their base.

But clearly religious moments, and even events, have become part of many Occupy camps. Indeed, while a minority of what is shown, religious imagery have been common since the protests began. In New York, activist clergy carried an Old Testament-style golden calf in the shape of the Wall Street bull to decry the false idol of greed. In contrast fundamentalist & some establishment religious leaders are cautious about involvement and less visible. They seem uncomfortable with the focus on what they see as “liberal issues” and are natural allies of the powers that be. An example of this tool place in Atlanta on 10/25 when a mix of clergy stood behind Mayor Kasim Reed as he walked into Occupy Atlanta to hold a press conference. It was then not surprising that later these clergy were rebuffed when they tired to serve as intermediaries between the movement and the mayor.

What we think of as liberal and interfaith groups seem more comfortable with the movement and see it as a fight for social justice and participatory democracy. As a result these segments of the religious community have secured some role in various Occupy events and the movement itself has made room for them as part of acceptance of the 99%.

One example of this spirit was the Chicago group, Interfaith Worker Justice, publishing an interfaith prayer service guide for occupation protests nationwide. Another example is downtown Dewey Square in Boston with its fill of tents, tarps and cold weather garb. But early on organizers ensured that encampment provided room for what was called a "Sacred Space" tent. It was made clear that it accepts all faiths & spiritual traditions. That welcome was evidenced by the presence of a Buddha statue abutting a picture of Jesus, and a hand-lettered sign pointing toward Mecca. Boston reporters also noted a mix of chakras, "compassion meditation" and discussion of biblical passages.

Religion might not fit into the movement seamlessly everywhere, but back in NYC, activist Dan Sieradski has helped organize a Jewish Yom Kippur service arguing that the movement must find space for religious faith somewhere:

"We're a country full of religious people….Faith communities do need to be present and need to be welcomed in order for this to be an all-encompassing movement that embraces all sectors of society."

That all encompassing movement includes a mix of believers and non-believers and we need to avoide a superficial response, to the legitimate question, “Is Occupy largely is a predominantly secular, atheist or Humanist undertaking or is religious?” This seems hard to answer, and perhaps is too simple a formulation. Some self proclaimed atheists have written of involvement, but often in cooperation with “left-leaning”/progressive religious groups. Secular and progressive religious groups may be similar minds on some issues that OWS is stressing and tactical cooperation among many parts of the 99% may be needed to move society forward. Indeed the Occupy efforts seem to be energizing progressive, religious activism. This may allow for some convergence of secular and religious activism over humanistic values and ideals such as fairness. It is perhaps good that secularists and religions can get together focus on something larger than their movements and rally about common values. This raises some accommodationist issues, but what is clear is that there have been roaring responses when some commonality has been raised, such as when Cornell West gave a shout out to:

"the progressive agnostic and atheistic brothers and sisters"

To some this suggests that the movement might serve to point out “not just the gulf between haves and have-nots in modern America, but between the religious right and not-so-religious left.”

In earlier times some religious groups and their leaders like MLK have been at the forefront of progressive social movements. Ministers like MLK could raise the nation's conscience on some of the issues OWS represents – inequality, poverty and injustice, languishing civil and ending wars. Improved national conversations represent one target for such movements and greater social consciousness. But since the 70s the main activism has been on the fundamentalist side, whose right-wing political activism has, among other things, eroded the separation of state and church. More liberal religious denominations, like unions have lost membership, and now seem less a part of the national conversation.

The Occupy movement may be a vehicle to get a succinct, social justice message out. A chicken and egg factor is the forging of an alliance between interfaith groups, atheists and secularist humanists of like mind. It might be needed for the greater good, but would require accommodation on both sides. Religious groups might have to accept the pragmatics of having non-belivers as partners, whose moral values are as valid & acceptable as those from the faith community. The responsibility of nonbelievers towards religious believers, as expressed by John Shook, is to help the religious “accommodate themselves to the cold hard truths about naturalism and the firm political structures of secularism. “

This togetherness & accommodation idea may not play well with some religious groups nor with many new atheist/secularists, but it may be something nonbelievers may accept as part of a broader, humanist, evolutionary path for both.

Statues of Freedom and Movements of Freedom: Differing Images

by Gary Berg-Cross

This past Friday, Oct 29, 2011 the iconic Statue of Liberty, Auguste Bartholdi's great work, turned 125 years old. Lady Liberty is based on the Libertas, the Roman goddess symbolizing“ freedom”. The history of the building of the statue is quiet interesting in itself and lots of papers have dusted off histories to refresh our memories including that the Statue was 10 years late in arriving and the arm and torch lay in NY for almost that time waiting for the body to arrive. The snippet below is from the Brooklyn Eagle, which is used to deliver as a boy. (Brooklyn housed many immigrants who poured across the Brooklyn Bridge and flowed in masses around City Hall Park, where the inaugural ceremony was held.)

Bartholdi went to his Paris studio, where he started on the statue’s arm and torch in hopes of having the lady raise her lamp at the start of the American centennial celebration in Philadelphia in 1876. The statue missed the opening, but the arm and torch arrived in time to become a major attraction. Meanwhile, Bartholdi needed an engineer to design his statue’s “skeleton.” Though its copper skin was quite thin, it was clear Lady Liberty would eventually weigh tons. The artist took on railroad bridge designer Gustave Eiffel to build an iron framework. Eiffel arranged the framework so it could be easily taken apart to ship across the ocean.

As the statue neared completion in France, funds for its pedestal ran out. Publisher Joseph Pulitzer, himself a Hungarian immigrant, ran editorials in The World calling for help. The poor and middle class answered, and the $1 and $2 donations mounted. In all, Americans gave $350,000 for the pedestal. Among those who helped were New York artists who organized an exhibition in 1883 and auctioned manuscripts by Bret Harte, Mark Twain and other writers. A poet named Emma Lazarus was asked to contribute a sonnet, which is mounted on a bronze plaque on the statue. She wrote a poem titled “The New Colossus,”…

In NY harbor this October there was lots of celebrate and at Friday's ceremony some125 candidates from 40 different countries, took the oath of citizenship, although some other “immigrants” may have feared attending due to a “papers please” attitude abroad in the lands. One thing the main stream media celebrated was the new high-tech gear - added in the form of five webcams. These are located inside her torch. Four of the cameras now point towards Ellis Island, Governors Island, Liberty Island and the Freedom Tower respectively, while the fifth gives viewers a unique look at the torch itself.

Roman ideas of a free Republic were popular in the founder’s time and so Libertas has served a symbol for some time. It is good to be reminded of her in these time, but the addition of those extra camera does serve to remind us of a few lingering issues of freedom. One is made by Roberto Lovato in his “Of America” blog who noted the increasing surveillance of ordinary citizens and not just at stop lights:

“Much is being made in the media about the “live web cams” that are part of the high-tech makeover of the Statue. Less (or not) reported are the dozens of infrared surveillance cameras, vibration sensors, experimental facial recognition monitors, and other now ubiquitous electronic surveillance devices that capture the image of visitors and send them to databases of national security agencies. The profits from this kind of multi-million dollar makeover of Liberty go to corporations invested in redefining freedom.”

If Big Brother is watching, videos by protestors and observers play an important role in getting the actual experience of current Freedom efforts, like the Occupy movement, out to the citizenry. In the early days of Occupy Wall Street (in the newly named Liberty Park) videos suggested that mainstream, corporate media wasn’t isn’t telling a fair or complete story about its aims, process, ideas or even its general schedule which is available online as shown below:

Occupy Wall Street (OWS) Agenda Sunday, October 30

3:30pm Multi-Faith Service

5:00pm What Is Wrong With Capitalism? Occupy Wall Street Forum w Alex Callinicos

6:00pm Internet Working Group meeting

7:00pm General Assembly

People wonder about what participants are saying and you can read to your heart’s content at OWS article sites like http://occupywallst.org/article/urgent-winter-donation-needs/. But pictures can be more compelling than long arguments, even when cogent. Early on OWS protesters were able to capture detailed and often graphic jarring images of police tactics and even spot violence in what seemed to concerted effort to intimidate citizens who were exercising 1^st Amendment rights. Streaming media could show the attempts to speak out for rights by way of what seemed reasonable peaceful and lawful public demonstrations. This was the case in late Sept. when some 60 - 70 armed police officers surrounded the park in which 200 to 300 peaceful Occupy Wall St. protesters were encamped.

You can see some of these videos on truthtransmission.com, but not much appeared on mainstream media at the time. Things have changed a bit with tear gassing and mass arrests on the Brooklyn Bridge and now the war-like scenes from Oakland.

Such images seem to have advanced the movement which is more popular than the earlier Tea Party movement. But now it seems that there are some efforts to darken the citizen’s eye view of events by removing electrical power, confiscation media etc. We’ll have to see how this struggle over rights to protest and be heard plays out. It’s an open question whether Occupy Wall Street media team will be able to sustain their operation without things like confiscated generators. But for now sites like Global Revolution still bring you live streaming video coverage from independent journalists on the ground at Occupy and other nonviolent protests around the world. And of course you can see images of Lady Liberty, whose generators at least are working fine.

P.S. Some online sites have collected interesting parcels of Lady Liberty related images.

Lakoff’s Framing Advice to Occupy Wall Street (#OWS) - We love America & are here to fix it with your help

by Gary Berg-Cross

My past blogs have included references to George Lakoff’s idea on Frames - cognitive-metaphorical structures (such as geospatial words) routinely used to organize thought and interpret the world. So we conceptualize well-being as wealth, both of which plug into pre-existing notions that trigger emotional responses. It is easy then to see wealthy people as good, healthy folks.

I've also blogged on the Occupy movement and Oct2011. In a recent Truthout Op-Ed Lakoff provided advice (by request) on how the protester movement occupying Zuccotti Park near Wall Street can avoid being framed by others with differing political interests. Lakoff believes that framing is epistemic – it influences the methods we use to understand the world and our concept of truth. In combination with language it central to making clear says what the character of something like a movement is. A proper frame may help solve that criticism that others don't know what the movement’s ideas and objectives are. But to do this effectively we need some principles by which a movement can properly frame itself. I found that some of these principles suggestive of ways that Secular Humanists might employ frames (We are all Citizens of the World or We are part of nature) to help with a wider understanding of our values. Perhaps that will be a topic for another time.

In advice to OWS Lakoff first notes that in charting political & financial action frames often evoke competing moral systems. In short, a movement that seeks some political and financial system influence needs to understand politics as part of a moral dimension that is framed in its language. Political figures, as well as movements and their spokes people, tend to make policy statements/recommendations with implied or explicit claims about what is the right thing to do. Appeals to the benefits of Capitalist System or a Democratic System claim to do more good than harm and are thus moral statements. You can see this in the OWS movement's statements with an implied sense of the common good. The lead one is "Democracy Should Be About the 99 Percent". Others are aimed at progressive causes such as the idea that strong Wages & Unions Make a Strong America and related grievances - middle-class wages have not gone up significantly in 30 years and there is conservative/corporate pressure to lower them. In criticizing the top 1% an implied claim is that they are just in it for themselves and can get away with unfair gains it since they have power.

Implied in such things are values and principles fit the common sense claim that “Some moral principles or other lie behind every political policy agenda.” We might ask broadly what are they for the OWS folks and what are they for their “opponents” (just as we might for Secular Humanists and our opponents).

Broadly Lakoff sees “Two Competing Moral Framing Systems” each with political slants and differing idea of democracy. The bulk of American conservatives have a particular moral system that you see in the actions and mentality of Wall Street. Lakoff’s list of these includes:

1. The primacy of self-interest 0 yes they are in it for themselves but this is seen as moral

a. Of course financial folks want big bonuses – well all do.'

2. There is Individual responsibility, but not broad social responsibility outside the core group. It’s OK if I can game the system to advantage

3. Hierarchical authority based on wealth or other forms of power.

a. A moral hierarchy of who is "deserving," defined by success within the system.

b. We in Wall Street are on top. You are just jealous.

And the highest principle is the

Rigid primacy of this particular moral/truth system itself, which goes beyond Wall Street and the economy to other arenas: family life, social life, religion, foreign policy and especially government.

Derived from these we have the idea of Conservative governance in their version "democracy" - a system of governance and elections that fits this model. Strong leaders who see decisions and moral judgement in system of black and white, devalue compromise which is seen as surrender etc.

The alternative view of democracy has a progressive with more of a social frame:

1. Democracy starts with citizens caring about one another and acting responsibly on that sense of care, taking responsibility both for oneself and for one's family, community, country, people in general and the planet.

2. The role of government is to protect and
empower all citizens equally via The Public: public infrastructure, laws and enforcement, health, education, scientific research, protection, public lands, transportation, resources, art and culture, trade policies, safety nets, and on and on.

3. Nobody makes it one their own.

a. As Elizabeth Warren said, if you got wealthy, you depended on The Public and you have a responsibility to contribute significantly to The Public so that others can benefit in the future.

b. Moreover, the wealthy depend on those who work and who deserve a fair return for their contribution to our national life. We’re in this together

4. Corporations exist to make life better for most people.

a. Their reason for existing is as public as it is private.

OK so we have 2 frame systems. What should the Occupy movement do? Lakoff suggests that OWS should take an approach to policy that follows from its own moral focus. Thus OWS should frame the following types of messages:

1. We Love America. We're Here to Fix It

That is OWS is a patriotic movement, based on a deep and abiding love of the Public, that is the country. This combats the idea that patriotism that just about the self-interests of individuals. There is a level of the Public Good.

“Do Americans care about other citizens, or mainly just about themselves? That's what love of America is about. I, therefore, think it is important to be positive, to be clear about loving America, seeing it in need of fixing and not just being willing to fix it, but being willing to take to the streets to fix it. A populist movement starts with the people seeing that they are all in the same boat and being ready to come together to fix the leaks.”

Publicize the Public

Get the word about The Public out. Democracy being about the 99 Percent is in this frame.

“nobody makes it purely on their own without The Public, that is, without public infrastructure, the justice system, health, education, scientific research, protections of all sorts, public lands, transportation, resources, art and culture, trade policies, safety nets ... That is a truth to be told day after day. It is an idea that must take hold in public discourse. It must go beyond what I and others have written about it and beyond what Elizabeth Warren has said in her famous video. The Public is not opposed to The Private. The Public is what makes The Private possible. And it is what makes freedom possible. Wall Street exists only through public support. It has a moral obligation to direct itself to public needs.

There is also a more practical political message to formulate based on the recent Tea Party experience. They:

“solidified the power of the conservative worldview via elections. OWS will have no long-term effect unless it, too, brings its moral focus to the 2012 elections. Insist on supporting candidates that have your overall moral views, no matter what the local issues are.”

The message is that money directs our politics and that is not for the common good. In a democracy, that must end to move towards the common good. A long tern solution is that we need publicly supported elections.

Proper framing will help us get there.

Martin Luther King’s Inspired (Humanist) Life and Thoughts

By Gary Berg-Cross

Today marks the official opening of the MLK monument and it is a suitable time to reflect on the life, work and thought of this great moral, American voice. The Memorial, like the FDR complex, sits astride the Tidal Basin, across from the Jefferson Memorial and near to the Lincoln Memorial. It celebrates another step in our progress from the time of the Founders but also reminds us of these four giant’s unfinished dreams. I know that we’ll never get a Monument, but as Norm Allen and others have pointed out long before Martin Luther King, our Robert Ingersoll uttered similar words:

"I have a dream that this world is growing better and better everyday and every year; that there is more charity, more justice, more love every day. I have a dream that prisons will not always curse the land; that the shadow of the gallows will not always fall upon the earth; that the withered hand of want will not always be stretched out for charity; that finally wisdom will sit in the legislatures, justice in the courts, charity will occupy all the pulpits, and that finally the world will be governed by justice and charity, and by the splendid light of liberty...." (The Works of Ingersoll, (The Dresden Edition), Volume IX, p. 186)

King’s Monument involves both a “mountain of despair” and a “stone of hope” in which MLK’s likeness partially emerges dreamlike. In the context the Occupy movement the moment reminds us of unfulfilled democratic dream and King’ legacy as a polarizing figure in support of inconvenient truths. His has won begrudging support over time while the Occupy movement is still in its early phase. See my blog on the DC Occupy and Occupy the issue of objectives.

We all know that as a Christian King drew ethical inspiration from the Bible, and his speeches are full of these ideas and phrasing. An example is "We are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

But non-believers joy in his Humanist spirit as well. As freethinkers, such as Susan Jacoby, have pointed out, King's moral appeal, while rooted in his own faith, transcended all religions and open to the participation of all. He was highly influenced by Humanists. One of these was the black humanist movement and several black atheist leaders of the late 19th and early 20th century. Norm Allen, in his speech for the Center for Inquiry entitled Martin Luther King, Jr. from a Humanist Perspective, argues that only later did churches provide organizational capacity that nurtured its form of Black activism. Jeff Nallin Remembering the Humanism of Martin Luther King provides several key quotes showing King’s pluralistic & religion-neutral positions. When asked how he felt about the U.S. Supreme Court's decision ruling school prayer unconstitutional his response was:

I endorse it. I think it was correct. Contrary to what many have said, it sought to outlaw neither prayer nor belief in God. In a pluralistic society such as ours, who is to determine what prayer shall be spoken, and by whom? Legally, constitutionally, or otherwise, the state certainly has no such right. I am strongly opposed to the efforts that have been made to nullify the decision.

Another declaration on church-state relations was that the church "is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool."

As a truth seeker King was not hesitant to blame organized religion where it was due, one case being support of violent resolutions:

In a world gone mad with arms buildups, chauvinistic passions, and imperialistic exploitation, the church has either endorsed these activities or remained appallingly silent. During the last two world wars, national churches even functioned as the ready lackeys of the state, sprinkling holy water upon the battleships and joining the mighty armies in singing, "Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition." A weary world, pleading desperately for peace, has often found the church morally sanctioning war.

These are not the type of passages that earned a space on the Monument but 14 select passages are
enshrined there. As a humanist I find inspiration in the words and ideas which I find reflected in much of the discussion by the Occupy movement, starting with the idea of ultimate goals of things like Justice and Fairness in a Moral World:

Justice

"True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is the presence of justice." And

"We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice."

The Goals of a Moral Society

"We must come to see that the end we seek is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience."

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But other values that Secular Humanists might agree with, and sometimes make up topics on this Blog, include:

Generosity Towards and Love of Fellow Humans

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that."

The Value and Role of Truth & Reality

"I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant."

Opposition to War and Militarism

"I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America. I speak out against it not in anger but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart, and above all with a passionate desire to see our beloved country stand as a moral example of the world."

"It is not enough to say, 'We must not wage war.' It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but on the positive affirmation of peace."

Cosmopolitarianism’s Role in Peace

"If we are to have peace on earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a world perspective." and

"Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies."

Human Rights

"I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits."

The Virtues of Conviction, Fortitude and Thoughtful Action in Support of Inconvenient Truths

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."