I've been having trouble all day being thankful. And all day I've had a hankering to write a diary on climate change, which this might morph into, but...
Thank you D'kos, for a place where I'm beginning to let my voice speak free. You see I'm fifty, and for reasons I mostly won't get into here, now, I think, although I will write what I will - but there you see it, my problem - three clauses before I even mention what my point might be. In 1988 I would sit at my window on First Ave in NYC writing, drunk, stoned, by the blue light of an ancient TV writing fifteen page "footnotes" to define my usage of "drunk" in the first line of an essay I never wrote.
In other words I've always wanted to write, but could never just do it - I was always too self-conscious, at least. And so I did what many would be writers do and worked in bookshops. In the last two decades, besides managing three different Borders and being fired for, essentially, accusing them of institutional rascism (by which I break my agreement not to speak of that) and for having Pete Seeger sing union songs in the basement of my store, I have worked in, managed, and/or owned three of the best Independent bookshops in the country (winning "Bookseller of the Year" along the way). That became both my "literary" and my political work.
Depending on the time and the store my "political work" varied dramatically. In New York in the mid-eighties I was possibly the only person talking to both sides of the pornography debate (if any of you remember that) while complaining to everyone that the argument was destoying feminism (and it's still a core identity issue, if no longer so starkly defined). But as manager of St. Mark's Bookshop I made sure that in addition to carrying both translations of DAS KAPITAL we also carried works by Kissinger and Brezinski (not to mention creating the first "Structuralism" section in any stateside bookstore).
As the owner of Bick's Books in Washington, DC, I took equal pride in stocking five translations of Dante's DIVINE COMEDY and in being a center of resistance against Bush the First's "Gulf War" - a position I might not agree with today. I take pride, too, in helping Chomsky and Foucault sell better than Crichton and King, at least in that one store.
Two years ago, however, I left that world to work with my wife and make a living that would allow us to send our kids to school without too much debt. Since I live in a place where Nader almost beat Bush in 2000 (if you extrapolate our vote counts and voter participation to the whole country, Al Gore won more votes than were actually cast nation wide: we had over 80% participation with Gore taking about 65%, while Bush and Nader were close to equal), and since I'm just not that good with people (unless my job forces me to be), I haven't been that active lately. I haven't known what to do, even as it became ever more necessary to just do something. Until I found Dkos.
Now I'm not a regular poster, and I haven't found my voice yet, but it's starting to come to me. If I remember correctly I've done one rant, one semi-comedic piece in the voice of Frodo, and one installment of a larger project to apply the AA 12 steps to the idea of our soceity being addicted to oil. Or, put another way, I got drunk enough to do my first post, wrote a little comedy piece to make points I was scared to just put to paper (or whatever metaphor best applies to blogging), and, in my first "serious" post, spent most of my time apologizing for writing at all. Frankly, my employees wouldn't recognize their know it all boss in this at all.
Which is my thank you. Thank you kos, and thank you everyone else, for a place where I can try to find a voice that will allow me to contribute whatever wisdom I have to our mutual struggle for a more just society. I don't agree with 90% of what I see here, but I'm also mightily impressed that I get more "hard news" here than anywhere else. I find the "comments" arena hard to take, and all too often a total waste of time, until the most trenchant thing I read all day is someone's off hand comment. I was hurt that my Frodo piece was answered by a hundred jokes on LOTR trivia, until I noticed that I had started the whole thing by being unwilling to frankly state my views. Which is how I will finish my thank you - thank you for letting me "say" what follows.
First of all, and here's the thanksgiving wine talking to a certain extent - damn, I"m doing it already. First, I often don't undertand why all of you aren't lining up behind Kuccinich. OK, OK, Okay - of course to a certain extent I do understand - I can understand saying that the hell with it, nothing is more important than electing a woman, and, for the same candidate, that nothing is more important than finding someone who can stand up to the coming insane right wing attacks. Similarly, I can see arguing that backing a black man is the most important thing, as well as supporting someone who want's to change the nature of politics itself, however poor a job his campaign may be doing in doing just that. And, finally, I can see how Edwards might inspire economic populists to get involved, but he just doesn't move me.
Which all leaves me wondering why more of you don't look at the fact that only Dennis is putting forth consistantly progressive policies and get behind him, if only to try to move the party a little bit to the left. For me there's a long list of fundamentals where only Kuccinich is speaking of policies I can support - from health care to Iraq. Frankly I agree that he is unelectable, but by getting behind him now we might move towards a point where we can elect someone like him in 2012, or whatever. To me it's very much like Goldwater in 64. It's not about winning now so much as about building a movement that can dominate in decades ahead.
Which, I guess, is the point I really want to make, and is why I've dropped out of the draft Gore movement even though I think climate change is THE issue (both in terms of the human future and as the "cause" which can re-invigorate liberalism). Gore gets it. It's not about winning the next election (however much we need to beat whomever Bush annoints, and he will); it's about building social movements which will change the political terrain. Weeks ago I was struck by a post or comment that said something along the lines of the protests didn't stop the war (in Vietnam) legislation did. As someone who was at every demonstration from SDS at the Pentagon to Trying to shut DC down for May Day I KNOW that it was the social movement that created said legislation. Just as social movements undid apartheid, just as social movements - not Ronald Reagan - brought down the Berlin Wall, Just as social movements liberated India (and America, before that). Just so we need a social movement to change America's thinking about climate change. And Gore gets that.
We need people like Gore, or McKibben, who can carry the message to the "masses", and we need democratic politicians who struggle to get half-assed compromises through the process, and we need ten thousand college students to get out there and block the trucks on their way to build the next coal power plant. I think Al Gore recognizes that, and his role in that, and also, that the second he became president he would be dealing with the crisis of the day and that, no matter his intentions, he would not be able to focus on this over riding issue.
And let's be clear - it is THE issue. Yes, Iraq sucks. I's the single worst thing that has happened in my lifetime, if only because it was so self evidently - big words in America - both insane and criminal to invade. But next to global warming a million dead is "trivia". It hurts me to say that. I cry almost every day thinking about Iraq. But, if you follow current science at all (and I'm sorry, I'm just not going to try to provide links or I'll never end up posting this) then you have to realize that we're talking about billions of lives and the future of civilization itself. I live on an Island, and half of it will be gone in 100 years, if the worst scenarios come true - and that's talking about last year's worst case, now the science is even more terrifying!
I have a whole lot more to say about that. We need a way to talk about climate change which will move people the way the other social movements I've mentioned put millions of people in motion. We need to change the discourse just the way the right wing has over the past forty years. We need to get together, now, people, on this over arching issue, and on the way we'll fnd solutions to most of the other plagues that chase us. It's not about Draft Gore - he knows what he's doing, and he really does have bigger fish to fry. To hell with this notion that "Our President" is the most important person in the world. In 50 years, or a hundred, will they remember Reagan, or Gorbachev and Mandela? (Actually, it probably depends on who's writing the history.) But, please, if you support Hillary, or Edwards, or Obama, or whomever: Please, send them a message that there is no longer room for compromise, that whatever else, climate change is the defining issue of the day. It's like slavery, there is no middle ground.
But enough for now. You'll be hearing from me again soon. For now, thank you for letting me rant a bit - now perhaps I can get to sleep.