Time for some campaigning

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Netroots Nation Day 1

Okay, here is post 1 about my trip to NN08!
I got to SLC about midnight and met my friend Chris's mom, Lordes. She is very interesting, her house is filled with stuff, all kinds of stuff. Ranging from cheap crap to very expensive foreign dolls, this place is packed. I slept with, gah! of all things, a bed full of elephants.

You know what they say..."if you lie with the dogs, you will get flees". I don't know just what I'll get from sleeping with elephants.



So I got to Phoenix about 6:40 am. I had breakfast with my friend Ellen.

I had very nice conversations on the flights with lovely people. One is Affton a BYU student, and another was Linda, a woman from California.

We talked the whole time on the planes and really didn't get bored for a moment. it is nice to meet new people, and it was a treat that I sat next to them.




I got to Austin about 1:40 pm and got my suitcase and then met up with Dorothy from Hawaii. We took a taxi ride to the hotel. I checked in, took a shower and then had a minor emergency!
The cord to charge my computer was dead and I couldn't charge my computer! So I took at $12 cab ride to the place where I could get one, and $45 later, I had a new charger. The guy at the hotel said it would cost just $.050 to ride the #3 bus back to the hotel, but I couldn't find the bus stop, so I decided to walk. I was on 26th st, and the hotel is on 3rd and over about 6 blocks. I wasn't thinking right when I realized that this is about 3 miles! It was humid and about 95 degrees outside, but I walked back to the hotel. Here were some of the sites I saw walking back to my hotel.

I was carrying my purse and my computer, and I was sweating like a pig...just look at my shirt when I got back.

Then I went back to the hotel. changed my shirt and blogged a bit.







Then I went to the BurntOrange party. It hadn't started yet, so I got a fat tire beer and talked to a local regular about the soccor game on TV.

I went outside where I met some wonderful people. I met Greg from MT and a local Austinite who has some great ideas about precinct grassroots organizing. Greg from MT and I talked a bit about rural politics, and MT. There was another guy there who was cool who was wearing a gree O*bama shirt and responsible for a cool flier I want to post on my door in the hotel. It says "Democracy begins at Home" and has suggestions on organizing neighborhoods.

During the BurntOrange party I met the founders of Drinking Liberally! Here they are. Greg is in the middle, and I forget the guy on the left's name, but you can look it up by going to drinkingliberally.org.
I got swag bag and was so starving, I ate the fortune cookie right away. Check out this fortune..."For some sad reason, you still have high hopes for Ron Paul". So I taped it to a postcard I'm sending to a friend.

Well, I'm off again. I'll post more later.
Peace!

More on racism and wealth

clipped from www1.umn.edu Rich with exhaustive research and statistics, this book is also a compelling history of the United States. The Color of Wealth makes the case that since the founding of the colonies, the U.S. government has systematically enacted policies that favored white wealth acquisition--like Jim Crow laws, the denial of citizenship (and thus property rights) to Chinese immigrants and land theft from Mexican-Americans and Native Americans throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. Even the venerated G.I. Bill, which is credited with creating the middle class after World War II, did little to help African-American veterans who were denied admission to predominantly white colleges and redlined out of many neighborhoods. The result today is that white families are more likely to acquire wealth through inheritance, own stocks and other investments and possess homes with a higher average value than families of color.

Yes, the rich are getting richer

While this evidence maybe good for seeing improvement it is still the richest 20% of people making most the money. In 2006, the median annual household income was $48,201.00 according to the Census Bureau. Census data also shows that 19.26% of all households had annual incomes exceeding $100,000. They are making twice as much as the middle class. The top 20% of Americans are making 5 times more then the lower class. Another sad point is that 12.3% of middle-class people's income declined in 2006 and they are living in poverty and the bottom.
And also, the top 6.37% of Americans are making one third of all the income in America.

So these facts, however positive they may seem to African Americans' economic improvement, they are masking that African Americans are still making just 60% of White Americans, and the continued economic inequality in America.

clipped from findarticles.com For African Americans in households earning $100,000 or more annually, that rate increased to 7.4%, up from 6.5% of those polled, or 1.275 million, up from 1.089 million. The number of households earning more than $100,000 annually increased to 12.7% or 16.31 million in 2001, up from 11.9% or 14.89 million people in 2000. 2000 2001 Overall Adults with Household Incomes of $75,000 22.6% 24.3% African American Adults with Household Incomes of $75,000 14.9% 16.5% African American Adults with Household Incomes of $100,000 6.5% 7.4% Overall Adults with Household Incomes of $100,000 11.9% 12.7%

Racism's complexities

clipped from www.gossamer-wings.com African American salaries are 60% of white American salaries. Bill Gates has more wealth in securities than all black American households combined. 10,000 blacks have graduated from America’s top 25 business colleges in the last 25 years. But almost no blacks have ownership or stock options or are CEOs of top corporations especially the new high tech companies. Nor do blacks serve on the boards for Internet companies. In fact, a recent book, Black Wealth/White Wealth, authors Melvin Oliver and Thomas Shapiro say that systemic barriers to upward mobility have seriously impaired the ability of many black Americans to accumulate wealth and a better life. For example, the average white blue collar worker has been able to accumulate more wealth than the average black professional, at least in part due to the country’s history of racial oppression.

part two of Woot

clipped from www.youtube.com

My favorite video, of late

clipped from www.youtube.com Neighborhood Leaders - Part 1 Democrats in 50 states are taking to the street...

My Online Schedule

Wow, seems like I'm online all the time lately. so just where does my time go?

wake up-drink water
check e-mail(s)...reply to e-mails
Check Daily Kos
Check other blogs/news
Check E-mail
Eat breakfast
Shower-dress
Check e-mail/Daily Kos
Make daily plans
Smoke
check e-mails and Daily Kos, and democrats.org
Write, or start to write something
Look through books on activism
think about sewing
mess with computer set up
Smoke
make ipod playlist
clean
Water Garden/weed garden
Smoke
Check email/Daily Kos
Surf around, read pollster.com, polling report, fivethirtyeight.com, democrats.org.

Yes sometimes I go to work, and make a lot of phone calls.

I believe this is too true.

clipped from www.dailykos.com You Americans Aren't Selfish Enough You pay all these taxes but you don't want anything in return for it.  You don't want free health care.  You don't want time off of work.  You don't want anything.  You're not selfish enough. You get mad when someone is taking welfare and sitting on their ass.  What have you got against sitting on your ass?  The whole point behind having a government and paying taxes is to have more time to sit on your ass.  That's what technology is for.  You Americans work longer than anyone, pay all these taxes, make all these robots, and then you not only don't you sit on your ass, but you get mad when anyone else does.  You're fucking crazy.

It Sounds Like A War Outside

I'm not a big fan of fireworks. They are costly, and don't do much for me.

But since yesterday was Independence Day I thought back about how I have spent my past Fourth of Julys.

For the last 2 years I went to my local bar's party and hung out with new people. But before that, I spent time with some veterans to see just how these super patriotic families celebrate.

I spent the 4th with Anita, Sonia, and Tom. Tom and Anita are Veterans. I would also add that both his son and daughter joined the military and have been sent to war, just like both Anita and Tom. I dated his daughter for awhile right before she was sent to Afganistan. His son, Mike, also joined the military and was sent to Iraq. When he was sent, he had two sons, a 2-yr-old and a 4-yr-old. In Iraq he had 3 of his fingers blown off, and part of his head. while the Army surgeons did a great job, everytime I think of Iraq, or Mike, I think of what this man gave up and the reasons he did.

We BBQed, and jumped on the trampoline. But about dark, I learned more about what it means to be a veteran. In Vietnam, Tom helped spray agent orange, and got sprayed himself. Because of his time in Vietnam, he has PTSD, and while we loved watching the Army Marching Band, and the fireworks on TV, at dusk I saw something different happen.

While his wife, Anita, and the 5 puppies went outside to sit and listen to the fireworks. But before we went outside I helped in the 4th of July ritual. We had to close all the windows and drapes, and make sure he was situated with plenty of pillows and blankets. Then he locked himself in the room with some headphones and an Ipod.

As we were sitting out on the porch alone, I learned that because of his PTSD, the 4th of July is a bad time for him. Fireworks sound like bombs and give him flashbacks to being in war. He has to listen to music and put the pillows over his head. Even the flashing lights can give him flashbacks, and when they come he can be disfunctional for a week.

It is strange to me that Americans would celebrate our Indepencence by reenacting war. We could be doing more like NPR, reading the Delcaration of Independence and Constitutuion, leanring more about our own form of government and the founders, but instead we put on a theatric imitation of war. We didn't become who we are because of war, be became America because of the ideas and committment of our founders. It wasn't death that made this country, it was life.

I think fireworks can be cool sometimes, like for new years eve, or other special occasions, but it seems counter-intuitive to celebrate the 4th how we do.