Thank You Howard

Governor Howard Dean, M.D., is a great American Hero.

By being a Vermonter -- outspoken, but not overspoken; sensible, thoughtful, but passionate -- by taking an anti-war stance early on, became the focus of a deep strain of peaceful, compassionate Americans who strategically needed to get the idea of peace past the corpo-media by injecting it, at last, into the national horse-race.

But we needed more than just an anti-war president. Hell, Nixon was anti-war. (OK, not really.) We needed a focus for a grander strategy. And here is where you really shone, Howard. (Forgive the informalism, I'm feeling like thinking of you as a man in this moment, and not as your titles, which you certainly deserve respect for.) You told us to retake the school boards, and the local offices, yes, as a stairway to the presidency and peace, but you also told us to take back the Democratic Party. Yeah, yeah, maybe you read Lakoff, and maybe you heard Wellstone, but you brought it all together -- Framing, grassroots control of the party -- addressing, finally, Corporatism. (I think it was the direct attack on corporatism, when you leveled it at the media giants, correctly, but not with the best timing, which brought you down from the national horse-race, but not from your vision, which you continued to fight for, brilliantly.)

I asked Denis Kucinich, when he was here in Oakland, what we could do to stop the PATRIOT ACT, and he simply replied, with, what was certainly not meant as one, but what seemed to be transmitted as a shrug, "organize." I asked him more questions, and hung out while he tried to answer a small circle of us, all asking "yes, but what do we DO?" Nothing got answered. His politics are all in the right place, but he couldn't answer the fundamental questions that many of us had. It seemed no one could.

When I went to see Governor Dean speak, it was in a small office in the Upper Valley in New Hampshire, where I was helping out, and he came through to rally the troops. I gave him my CD with my song "I Want My Country Back" inspired by his speeches. I stood and chatted a moment with him -- he also plays guitar -- I found that I didn't have ANY questions for him. His speech that day had, again, answered all my questions -- Organize, yes, but here's how, and here's why. He said we might not win this year, but maybe in 10 years, we'd own the party again, and that we, and independents, and sensible republicans would own our country again.

He lost the 2004 election. I went to see him a fourth time, and play onstage for him my song, at a DFA party/conference (after the primary) called DeanFest. DFA is Democracy for America, which Dean renamed from Dean for America, after his presidential campaign closed. Democracy for America was a grassroots/netroots campaign run by a tiny staff and lots of online and in-the-streets activists. These same people overwhelmed the local Democratic Party chapters and pushed to have Dean installed as Democratic Party Chairman.

Dean focused his tenure on the so-called 50 State Strategy, which was a means of funding and supporting party offices in all 50 states, not as the previous party leadership had ignored many rural states, leading to the Republicans' and conservative christians' grassroots efforts to gain a hold in the so-called Red States. Dean's brilliance was to tackle this head on. We were there, working in Nevada, for John Kerry the war-waffler, ferchristsake. I went to Reno to walk the hot streets in Summer, and then the cool, dessicated dusty backstreets on election day in November, to get out the vote. Reno. Armpit of the West. Red State. We almost won. That was huge. But I saw dozens of people I knew from the Bay Area. I saw my NEIGHBORS from Berkeley -- in Reno getting out the vote, monitoring the polls.

DFA produced a short-list, of sorts, called Dean's Dozen. These were true grassroots politicians, coming fast up the political bean stalk. DFA added it's support to these energetic souls seeking higher offices. (DFA also held and still holds training sessions for those getting into politics and organizing.) Someone saw Barack Obama, and headed him to the Dean's Dozen. Maybe our valiant new President is so brilliant that he didn't need Howard's push. From where I sit now, and what I saw back in the 2004 campaign, it was George Lakoff who documented how the Republican thinktanks worked people's emotional judgment, and who pushed the research to give us all a clear concept of what Framing is about in a political world. Then Paul Wellstone said "I'm here from the democratic wing of the Democratic Party." Then it was Howard Dean who took a big, sometimes stumbly, grab at reframing the debates in this country. He was wildly successful. Barack Obama probably understood Framing innately, but it sure seems like he read Lakoff, and listened to Wellstone and Dean. And the grassroots/netroots that Dean helped build DID take over the party, and did reach so many people, now with an understanding of how we get power over greed and money. (Hey, there's a LOT more of us numerically than corporations -- I guess that means we have money.) And that grassroots effort helped put Obama over the top. Not the pro-war Hillary.

I'm not a Christian, but from a literary perspective, if President Obama is viewed as Jesus of Nazareth, maybe a messiah, maybe just a man, then Governor Dean would be John the Baptist.

Prepare ye the way.

The New Model Politican: Obama2008

Current events make sense to me,
with the Roberts-bot
programmed to derail Obama2008
at the critical moment,
the moment having been decided by thinktankers
watching endless loops of Barack-O-Vision,
recorded debates and interviews of the new model of politician.

"Must figure out his weak spot!" they cry
as they ply their digital emo-decoder
and out it spits the moment:

================================
DEPLOY ROBERTS-BOT @ 0900 HOURS
TO READ RE-ORDERED OATH (SEE ATTACHED)
================================

Washington is a place like no other.
the best politicians in the country come to ply their art
the best paid and best paying lobbyists,
thinktankers, and other salesmen
come to sup with the politicians
and the great masses of beaur-o-crats
(beaureaux-crats?)
type and shred
type and shred
at their whimsies.

To survive in that town,
you must be bloodsucker or blood
The new politician, sucked soon,
soonly becomes a preternatural ancient.

I understand current events
I was in D.C. in 2003
with guitar on back
ReDefeat Bush shirt on chest
and asked two nice looking guys at Dupont Circle,
how to get to the whitehouse.
They earnestly
smilingly
happily
sent me on my way
in the opposite direction.

Later, another soul pointed me right.
Me with no map or metro map, even,
having popped up from the metro,
and now stuck off in Georgetown
where the nice gents sent me.

That is how Washingtonians think, I think.
I was visiting in Virginia, at the time.
People in Charlottesville, good Southern liars, true,
would not concoct such a lie.
Residents of my beloved Brooklyn,
and playful Manhattan,
would not lie, they'd just tell you where to stick it.
Unless you asked for subway directions,
then they are honor-bound,
as New Yorkers,
to give you
the complete,
the whole,
and the detailed truth,
including where to transfer to avoid exiting.

When Obama hit D.C.
Americans cheered
and Washington-BOTs quaked.
The Roberts-BOT was unsuccessful:
Obama reframed
with grace
and strength.
Some may have deployed the Biden-BOT
But Obama2008 reined him in.
Or was that part of the Obama2008's strategy
For me, I watch as the new model of politician
brilliant
graceful
eloquent
but also compasionate, empathetic
runs his routines
Maybe in the future, when Obama2008
has defeated
the blatant backstabbers
All new political models
from all manufacturers
will have empathy and compassion circuits come standard.
Brilliance, eloquence, and grace extra.

Pic: coming back from Pirate Cat radio

Riding back from our friend Matt Holdaway's show on Pirate Cat Radio, my gal Wendi took this photo.

A Good Day

Yesterday, I was working with my friend Bond on my song "Good Days Coming", and I wrote this:

We mixed on Inauguration Day
I wept.
A new mix.
A new President.
A new day.


A day after Inauguration. I'm wondering now if there is an Obama Shopping Channel.
Items for sale to-day:

Cut Glass Bowl on Quartz Base, just like the Obamas' welcoming gift to the White House.

Leather-bound journal and fountain pen, for writing one's memoir. The perfect kiss-off gift.

For him:
Cashmere Overcoat and matching Obama-maroon Cashmere Scarf.

For her:
Cold-weather Chic
Gala Gowns

For the whole family:
Framed picture montage of Cheney being wheeled out of the White House and Bush's walk of shame to the airplane.

Later, Wendi reads to me that jCrew has claimed that their website crashed due to people looking for Obama items. Man, what a free plant. Someone obviously thought of it soon enough to pull the plug on the server while the art department quickly fakes up the images of the products they are, at this very moment, selecting and stocking based on the innagural ceremony and ball photos.

I'm alive with ideas, cartoons, songs, poems. And for once in my life, I actually have a President, and I'm actually proud to be an American.

In short, a Good Day has arrived!

Laramie