By Matt Rawlings
We are witnessing a moment in history that is so pregnant with possibility. So many people right now are wrestling with their own ideas about how the world is supposed to work. The cognitive dissonance is palpable. The eight years of the Bush administration represented so many terrible setbacks and created so many problems. Outrage was piled upon outrage and the very soul of the people threatened to follow the man into darkness and violence.
In 2006 the Democratic voters came out strong to repudiate the Bush administration’s policies and to demand an end to the pointless wars. After the “thumping” that the Democrats gave to the Republicans (winning majorities in both houses) in ’06, nothing seemed to have changed. In ’08 the imminent departure of the most corrupt and incompetent administration in living memory, coupled with the dramatic rise of the inspiring and eloquent man who is now our president gave us all hope that a galvanizing, unifying leader had come. We saw in Obama the kind of president who could use his charisma to bring healing to our people and our institutions. He also held the promise and the potential to energize the American people to demand change from this congress that had fallen so short of the mandate that had been given them in ‘06. We saw the opportunity to repair the damage done to the American Dream over the course of the previous 30 years.
Many tears were shed that night in November, and they were tears of joy. Our journey through the valley of the shadow seemed at last to be over. We could emerge to build a more hopeful, just, peaceful and honorable America .
What a big disappointment the last year has been as we have watched our hopes betrayed. The status quo remains in all of it’s corrupt and pitiless splendor.
We watch as the majority of the country struggles to understand what just happened in America . I’m not entirely sure myself. But one thing is sure: the system is broken. There is no one who can fix it- except us, the American people. There seems to be no other alternative.
I believe there is a way. The strategy is a simple one, the tactics we will need to employ are numerous.
The corporate money in our political system is the linchpin. The status quo radiates from this one point like the spokes on a wheel. Everyone can see it, but none dare touch it, for the forces that protect it are as powerful as the armies of the world. That is exactly why we must seek to grasp hold, and pull with all our might.
We will use our opponent’s strengths against them. We build a movement that consists of the millions of Americans who would be satisfied by this one thing alone:
We want our government to work exclusively for us, without the inherently corrupting influence of corporate money.
Corporations are not people. They can live forever and their only purpose is profit. They have shown themselves capable of every manner of evil in pursuit of their hollow aims. Integrity, honor, compassion and justice will continue to fall victim to the schemes of men for whom the highest end is the naked lust for wealth and power- so long as our lawmakers toil in servitude to these men, we will all suffer.
They seek to keep us divided with wedge issues so that we will fight each other and disregard our self-interest. But they have gone too far. The writing on the wall foretells the death of the American Dream. Many can sense this. Others have been shouting this for years to all who would listen. But few would. In the beckoning silence of despair and disappointment, now they are beginning to listen.
Demagogues and Charlatans, always ready to harness the fear and anger of their fellow man to their own selfish ends seem to rise like locusts. By their fruits ye shall know them. Though they may fool some, the blinders have fallen from the eyes of many, and they now thirst for the truth. And when we show them this one simple truth, they will see all that has lain hidden in plain sight, and they will join us.
This is a struggle that knows no creed or doctrine, no religion or faith; it truly knows no nation. It is simple in concept and vast in application. The integrity of our democracy is at stake, the future of the planet hangs in the balance.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. – Gandhi.
We start where we are right now. We start local. We build by accessing every available means of transmitting the information. We recruit interns. We raise money. We design training programs to teach volunteers how to recruit. We network with each other. We share best practices. We promote relentlessly in every possible media. Eventually they will stop laughing, and then they will show the world their true face.
In the beginning it will be the activists. But more will come. They will join us not because we have shown, told, or taught them something new- but because we have validated what they already know, because we seek to return to them that which is rightfully theirs:
My government does not work for me. We the people built this country- it’s roads and bridges, it’s monuments and skyscrapers. We labored in the mines and in the fields, on the factory floor, in the forests and on the open road. We fought and died by the millions in this nation’s wars. We fought countless battles to secure our freedoms and liberties. This country was built by the blood, sweat and tears of millions of honest, hard-working, god-fearing Americans who asked for little more than the chance to pursue the American Dream and the expectation that their children and grandchildren would have that same opportunity. We built this country and we will not stand by while it is stripped bare by corporations that care not for us, nor even for the future. We will uphold the sacrifices made by generations of our ancestors who built this great nation so that we might live in peace, prosperity and freedom in the United States of America . You corporations may continue to exist, so that you may serve our needs, but we will take our government back, and with it the power to control our own destiny.
Nearly all Americans more or less can sign on to this. Whether you are conservative or progressive, Pro-choice or Pro-life, Pro-gun or Pro-gun control- the simple truths are the ones we all understand. We all care about our children. We all want to have the opportunity to work to build a good life. We all care about our shared inheritance as citizens of this vast and beautiful nation. We have to work together to insure that this inheritance will remain intact for the next generation.
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Matt Rawlings lives in Weaverville , NC with his wife Jenny and son Alex. He is a carpenter and woodworker. Matt is currently working on founding a new party (as yet unnamed)* that will work to take back the power that rightfully belongs to all Americans. He will be running for the US . House of Representatives in the 11th district. He can be reached at ibigkojr@hotmail.com
*As soon as possible (after the official name is determined by the advisory board) we will set up a proper website with updates, etc.
Matt, thanks for sharing this compelling piece of writing.
In the same vein, I’m copying below a comment made by a poster yesterday on a Common Dreams reprint of an article describing the whittling away by lower federal courts of any remnants of “campaign finance reform” along with the prospect of an adverse Supreme Court ruling in the same direction. After a couple of commenters express some despair about the situation, this is what a commenter with posting name of phoenix posted:
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As with most “hopeless” situations, we may be too much constrained by our experiences with reality to comprehend fully the power of dreams of better things. MLK’s dream of an more eqalitarian America, when pursued in the hard world of reality, did have effects in the realization of that dream. There are dreamers today, even as we seem to be inundated by the power of the money changers, in those who recognize the fact that people have their vote within their own power, and they do not HAVE TO be influenced by all the media sloganeering and by the domination of the news and the air waves by the well-heeled and their designated politico puppets. To begin with, there are millions of people who never even vote but who would do so if they ever once heard a compelling narrative of how their votes could make a difference in this money and consumption crazed world. Many of these, and many as well who dutifully troop to polls to vote for a D or an R candidate selected by one or another of the corporate duopoly, would vote for a man or woman who honestly and forthrightly ran AGAINST the obscene compaign chests enjoyed by their opponents. Years ago Lawton Chiles “walked across Florida” to be elected Governor, and such shoestring campaigns still will appeal to that part of our population that is not bedazzled with office incumbents and/or the celebrity character of those who aspire to office. What I’m saying is that a grassroots, low-budget campaign can work; and is the best way (even more effective than campaign finance reform) to pull the teeth of the corporate tigers who run our politics. One such organizing effort of which I know is underway in western North Carolina, and I’m sure is happening in other places as well. What grassroots organizers desperately need is a kind of “committee of correspondence” to pool their experiences and resources and inspiration. The American revolution was built out of such beginnings, and aren’t we a bit overdue for a revolution which Thomas Jefferson said we needed every 20 years?