East Bay Kerry

Bush doesn't want to hear from the American People

From today's MediaCorps alert:

Earlier today we asked you to call in your questions to George Bush tonight during an exclusive interview with Larry King at 9:00 p.m. EST.

We just found out that George Bush will NOT be taking any questions from viewers. In fact, Bush's appearance on Larry King LIVE is taped.

Should we have expected anything different?

At campaign stops across the country, the Bush-Cheney campaign has routinely barred individuals who disagree with the president from attending public events with Bush, and the Republican National Committee has required event-attendees to sign endorsement forms that pledge their support for the re-election of Bush.

If we can't get into Bush's events and we can't ask him any questions during a rare, exclusive hour-long interview, WHEN will we ever get the chance to ask him the important questions? When are we going to get the chance to ask him what he plans to do about the 1.9 million Americans have lost their jobs under his watch? Or that 44 million Americans still don't have access to health insurance? That our children and young people will shoulder a deficit that is already out of control? That higher education is completely out of reach for most Americans?

Think it's already bad enough? Check out newspaper clips of some of the latest Bush campaign stories --

Bush Spokesman Says Woman Should "Come To Her Senses" and Support Bush If She Wants To See Him. [Arizona Republic, 8/12/04] Sue Walitsky, communications director for the Kerry-Edwards campaign in Arizona, had a valid ticket to see Bush speak at the Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Pheonix, AZ, but the Bush-Cheney campaign refused her admittance with no explanation. Walitsky said that she wore no Kerry button and did not bring any Kerry campaign chum that would have upset Bush supporters. Danny Diaz, a spokesman for the Bush campaign said, "If she's willing to come to her senses and support him, we'll be happy to welcome her in." Walitsky said that the Kerry campaign allows everyone with valid tickets, regardless of political affiliation, to attend Kerry campaign events.

Campaign Staff Rips Up The Tickets Of Three Teenagers. [Reno Gazette-Journal, 6/19/04]] In Reno, Nevada, Bush's campaign workers stalked the line of attendees to a Bush rally to ensure that only his supporters were allowed inside. "Three Reno teenagers had tickets pulled out of their hands and ripped to pieces by a campaign staff member after someone in line pointed out an anti-Bush sticker on one of the teens' shirts." 17-year old Jonathan Daniel tried to assure staff that he wouldn't make trouble and only wanted to hear the president on the issues. The campaign would not be swayed. Daniel protested, "I believe it's my right as an American to hear where he is leading our country."

Family of Three Was Kicked Out Of Bush Event For Bringing A Pro-Choice T-Shirt. [Saginaw News, 8/6/04] The Millers, a family of three - husband, wife and daughter - were removed from a Bush-Cheney campaign event because the wife, Barbara Miller, brought a pro-choice t-shirt with her. A campaign worker confiscated the t-shirt informing the family that "We don't accept any pro-choice, non-Republican paraphernalia." The campaign worker returned an hour later with another worker and a security guard and accused the Millers of "smuggling t-shirts." Barbara Miller, who brought the t-shirt because she was cold and had not considered the implications of its pro-choice logo, reports that a guard grabbed their three tickets from her hand and ripped them up "violently and told her, 'They're no good anymore.'" A Bush campaign spokeswoman, Jennifer Millerwise, defended the right of the campaign to ask individuals who intend to "disrupt campaign events" to leave. "These events are put on ... for people of an open mind who are interested in hearing [Bush's] positive message and his vision for a future," she said. Theresa Miller, the daughter, said that was what she was there to do. "I'm not an American? I can't see my president?" she asked.

Here's what you can do to make a difference:

Write to all the major news networks with your questions for George Bush. Ask the major news networks to focus on the number of Americans who want George Bush to answer the real questions. Ask your friends, family, neighbors, and coworkers to join you in this effort.

To email CNN, click here.
To email MSNBC, click here.
To email ABC, click here.
To email FOX, click here.
To email CBS, click here.
To email NBC, click here.

Don't let this happen to you. If we can't get our questions directly to our president, let's take them right to the American people.

MediaCorps Assignment: The Bush Results on Jobs: Jobs Lost, Lower Pay

Message of the week from the Kerry-Edwards Volunteer Media Corps.

The current Republican strategy is to mislead the American public by distorting John Kerry's record and accomplishments for political gain.

No matter what the Bush-Cheney campaign does, it cannot speak to the American public like you can. Your letters, your calls, and your commitment to the Kerry-Edwards ticket are the most convincing evidence to your friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers that America can and will do better with John Kerry and John Edwards.

This is why, now more than ever, it is important that you continue to speak out. If you have a moment to spare, write an extra letter to the editor (or two!) between now and November 2, write and show your support for the Kerry-Edwards ticket.

For those of you who are rapid-response buffs, you are going to love your next assignment. Let's move this one out as fast as possible -- if you attended a convention party and met some enthusiastic supporters, or had a chance to meet up with other Kerry-Edwards supporters this past week, please contact them and ask them to participate by writing letters as well. Each day this week I will provide you with more writing points and statistics to use in your letters. If you have friends who are more concerned with one issue over another, send them what you think will be most convincing to them.

Your next assignment:

Bush's new campaign slogan is "results matter." We agree -- results DO matter -- that is exactly why we think America needs Kerry-Edwards. Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper and explain why George Bush's poor performance on jobs means that your community should vote for Kerry-Edwards.

• Statistics on the Bush economy and the jobs that have been lost are at the end of this email. Use them as proof of Bush's poor performance.
• Click here for a side-by-side comparison between Kerry-Edwards and Bush-Cheney.
• Click here to send your letter to your local newspaper. If you have the time, please consider hand writing your letter.
• Click here to share your letter with other Media Corps members.

You're the best!

Amanda Michel Internet Team

P.S. Alexa and I have been so overwhelmed with your emails and letters over the last few weeks that it has been difficult to report back to you on everything. Now that we have a database up and running that easily displays all your letters and where you sent them, we'll be in a much better position to respond to you.

The Bush Results on Jobs: Jobs Lost, Lower Pay

• 1.8 Million Lost Jobs. Since George Bush took office, the economy has lost 1.8 million private sector jobs. [Bureau of Labor Statistics]
• 7 Million Jobs Short of George Bush's Prediction. After 9/11, the tech bubble, and the recession, the Bush administration predicted nearly 6 million new jobs would be created between January 2001 and May 2004. Instead, we lost more than 1 million new jobs -- 7 million jobs short. [Bureau of Labor Statistics; Economic Report of the President, 2002]
• Jobs Are Shifting to Lower-Paying Industries, Paying $9,160 Less. On average, jobs in growing industries pay $9,160 less -- or 21 percent less -- than jobs in contracting industries. [Economic Policy Institute, "Jobs Shift From Higher Paying to Lower Paying Industries," January 21, 2004]

How I spent my summer vacation campaigning for Kerry Edwards in the Land of Enchantment

A Swing through New Mexico — or "How I spent my summer vacation campaigning for Kerry Edwards in the Land of Enchantment" - by Sandy Buffett

I wanted to share with all you "swing state" volunteers about my wonderful recent trip, as the East Bay Kerry New Mexico swing state captain, to my home state. The state went blue for Gore in 2000 by only 366 votes, and Nader, then and now, has a following. The current Governor Richardson, it is expected, will help deliver the state for Kerry, but it's a true battleground swing state for John Kerry. So this is what I did for my summer vacation time:

Upon my arrival into Albuquerque, I decked out my rental car in Kerry bumper stickers and signs in the window. I must have looked like the "Real Deal Express" rolling through the state. I got a lot of thumbs up and honks! People also came up to me at gas stations and parking lots asking for Kerry bumper stickers.

On my first day there, I met with the Kerry field director and the NM Democratic Party Volunteer Coordinator in Albuquerque for coffee. I introduced some background to East Bay Kerry, what we've accomplished to date, and some ideas for how we can help. They were thrilled when I shared some of our flyers (hard copy and electronic for their use), how-to guide on tabling, houseparty kit info, an overview of our grassroots organizing structure, and some of the wackier ideas for fundraisers and visibility events. We agreed to to develop some upcoming phonebanks and letter writing parties here in the East Bay. They also expressed a high level of interest for us to hold a fundraiser in the Bay Area for the NM Dem Party coordinated Kerry campaign. I definitely plan to organize one and would love to get a host committee together.

I was surprised that even ...

... the main Kerry office in Albuquerque had almost no Kerry supplies in early July. I had brought with me a suitcase full of signs and bumper stickers — purchased by us East Bay volunteers — and donated them to the cause. In the parking lot, I met a member of the Albuquerque Teachers Union and gave him a big stack of signs for his members, we exchanged emails, and now he's part of our swing state listserv! I expect we will continue to serve as a "pipeline" for getting supplies to NM. I believe, in terms of GDP, NM is the poorest economically of all the swing states. The state, however, is rich in human-resources, talent and desire to elect John Kerry!

So the day after Kerry announced Edwards as his running mate, we learned that Kerry, Edwards, Elizabeth, and Teresa were coming to town that weekend! I volunteered all day for the outdoor sunset rally—during the day it hit 95 degrees and then a late afternoon monsoon storm rolled in. I was worried that the weather gods would defeat us, but when Governor Richardson announced the candidates' arrival and they bounded onto the stage, the sun came out (I kid you not!) and we had a glorious sunset rally.

10,000 people came out for the rally! Yes, one percent of the entire state's population showed up for a wild, electric, populist rally. Teresa spoke in some Spanish, Kerry joked about the VP choice being more important than the state's official question "red or green chile?" and John and John were on fire. It was the largest campaign rally the state has ever experienced. The local press also covered it for days several days after the event!

The next day I attended the open house for the new democratic headquarters in Taos, a small artist colony and ski resort town in a heavily Hispanic and Native American community. Again, showing up with a box of supplies to give to community members was really well received. After the party, I sat down with their volunteer organizer and we shared volunteer strategies. They made a request that our EBK writers bureau draft a 2 pager for Veterans that they could distribute in their community. Their concern is that many of the rural, conservative veterans—while registered democrats—are reluctant to change commander in chief during wartime. I also learned crucial information from them and listened to their perspectives on how to Get Out The Vote in a rural community where few people have internet access.

I headed over to the Taos Pueblo Indian reservation, where an inter-tribal "pow-wow" dance competition was being held in the buffalo field, a sacred and phenomenally beautiful location in the shadow of Taos Mountain and big blue sky overhead. (Strangely ironic that this field is adjacent to Donald Rumsfeld's ranch…) Anyways, wearing my new "Kerry Edwards" t-shirt and armed with a handful of flyers, buttons and stickers, I walked through the festival handing materials out. I came upon a table for the native American veterans group and they asked me to speak a bit to their group of 10 or so veterans. What a wonderful experience—luckily, I had some "Veterans for Kerry" buttons which they gladly pinned on. I hope some of Kerry's "Band of Brothers" surrogate speakers, or JK himself, can make it up to Northern New Mexico to meet with these Veterans.

The following day I registered voters in front of a coffee house and met with some of the Ruidoso democratic party volunteers. At each turn, volunteers were so open and appreciative to meet a fellow volunteer traveler! To sum up, the lesson from this trip is JUST GET OUT THERE. I didn't have a directive or an action plan given to me, I just made some phone calls and SHOWED UP! I hope each volunteer with East Bay Kerry and throughout the Bay Area will coordinate with their respective swing state team, and then pack their bags and go get John Kerry elected!

If anyone is interested in joining our New Mexico swing state team, please contact me at sbuffett2000@yahoo.com or 510-557-4148. Thanks!

How to Become a Political Teenager…and still have free time.

An article by Kelly Rubert for Sprawl Magazine.

The robots are coming to get you.

The robots are coming to get you.

Right here in America. At the movies, when robots go rogue, the moral is often Shelley’s Frankenstein. You deserve the mayhem for screwing with the natural order, infringing on God’s turf, or just because you’re playing with fire.

Part two is always the heroes getting us out of trouble. When robots attack, it’s fine to smash ‘em up. It’s not as if humans are attacking, it’s just some gadget run amuck.

Ever notice how handy it is to squish human groups into that machine category? That intellectual shortcut lets you name your fear, like Zionist Jews or Terrorists or Communist. The film I, Robot (2004) animates that visceral fear of The Other, a horde of likeable humanoids with the potential to snap into murderous monsters. This despite the hard-wiring of selfless ethics. The retro Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004) also sports a legion of mad robots bent on destruction.

So that’s the external threat, hordes of faceless enemies. Al Qaeda, if you will.

Fear personified

But what happens when you’re the robot? When someone programs you? How do you know you’ve been programmed? What’s your relationship with your maker? How much free will do you really have? Can you figure out when and how to exercise it? The Manchurian Candidate (1962) had Red China programming people and this year’s edition, The Manchurian Candidate (2004), has a corporation at the controls. Their chilling argument is that with sufficient technology, anyone can be made to think and do anything, even murder, without awareness of the programming. In the Stepford Wives (2004) carefully managed robots take over for imperfect spouses; but their mind controls seems nearly as effective. In Spider-Man 2, self-aware prosthetics twist a scientist's mind, and I, Robot's Officer Spooner feels identifies with robots because of his own bionics.

So when you’re the robot, you’ve an identity crisis, insecurity, and confusion.

And Fear.

I mentioned fighting back. These stories rarely end with the robots taking over. Expect ordinary people to take up pitchforks and baseball bats to fight back. To assert primacy. Because in action we leave victimhood behind, we switch gears from introspection and conversation to targets and methods. From prey to hunter. From rest to adrenaline.

9/11 cast a pall of victimization on a proud America. We tried to make sense of things. Then we got in gear. We rushed new laws without reading them, reshuffled the Executive Branch, toppled the Taliban, and sacked Saddam. But things aren’t right, aren’t working. Our children and neighbors still come home in body bags. We’re imposing a birth tax to pay for this year’s economy. We don’t feel safer, richer, or in command of our fate. And, as in the robot movies, we are afraid of ourselves and of the world.

I think that’s why Dean and Kerry and Edwards have had such appeal. Why so many are “becoming political” for the first time. Why 3000 people are mobilized in the East Bay a whole four months before the election, in a place where just four years’ ago we were lucky to get 300 volunteers on election day.

We crave leadership that helps us believe there’s a trustworthy path. We demand leadership that comes not from fear but from hope and from opportunity. We need leaders with a strategy for keeping the “robots” friendly or bringing them around. And for helping us find our confidence and trust ourselves. Trust that we know what we’re doing and that we are in charge.

Are you feeling that way now? I’m not, but I’m working on it.

I spent a week in Vienna, Austria, this month. It’s a gorgeous place with wonderful people. But the grandparents of folks living there built concentration camps an hour outside of town. I’m sure they were nice people before it seemed like a good idea to kill all the Jews, Gypsies, and homosexuals. But somehow their programming got screwed up, messed with, and they surrendered themselves to the machine.

Could it happen in America? Ashcroft trading solid freedoms for marginal safety. Ridge calibrating our adrenaline levels with colored flags and vague threats. Rumsfeld and Rice and Wolfowitz beating the drums for war, spinning tragedy as accomplishment. Secrecy trumping transparency. Personal loyalty to the President above all.

They are all nice folks, good people, patriots all.

But we feel it happening here.

And it makes our skin crawl.

So we’re mobilizing. We’re raising money. We’re blowing off a night of T.V. for meetups and phone banks and letter writing. And we’re casting ourselves as Will Smith turning back the robot tide, as Denzel or Sinatra throwing off the mind control.

It’s a subtle thing, tyranny.

Beating it starts with shedding fear. Willing ourselves to free our minds and our hearts. Helping others do the same.

Then, working together, to earn the leadership we need, that we deserve. John Kerry. John Edwards.

Welcome to East Bay Kerry. You are not alone.

Farenheit 9/11

Will it effect the election?

'Fahrenheit 9/11' is a wake-up call

As a lifetime Republican, I was skeptical of Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911, but went to see it anyway, expecting a healthy dose of over-the-top banter between Mr. Moore and hapless interviewees in government, the popular press, and at large.

What I saw, however, was a compelling assembly of facts and testimony taken directly from our nation's collective experiences and a clear indictment of our government's behavior before and since the 9/11 tragedy.

And when you consider all of it, you cannot come to any other conclusion than this: The Bush administration and its benefactors have clearly manipulated the fears of the American people for the benefit of their own private interests.

When history is written, we will look back at this presidency, and we will be ashamed as Americans for what has happened, and that we were too complacent and trusting to notice.

Thank you, Michael Moore, for waking us up.

Robert White
Tracy, CA

Maybe.

07/24 - New Hampshire Outreach House Party (V)

Come to Alameda and write Letters to the Editor to newspapers in the swing-state of New Hampshire. Bring any articles or materials that might suggest themes for the letters, and your host will provide some too.

The party will be on Sat., 7/24 at 10:30am in Alameda (RSVP for directions).

Contact Joanne McKray at joannemck@comcast.net, or 510-522-6270 to RSVP or for more information.

A Navy Vet Defends John Kerry

From Howard Egeman of Oakland:

As a naval veteran who served from 1969 to 1973, I am extremely upset about the tactics that opponents of John Kerry have been using to attack his service and even question his Purple Heart.

What astounds me is that these people are individuals, such as Vice President Dick Cheney, who went out of their way to avoid the draft that caught many of us who did not know anyone (or have a dad who represented Texas in Congress), and they question the patriotism of those of us who served.

At the same time they do so, they take action to try and lower the quality of care that veterans from earlier wars, such as World War II and Korea, could get by closing down some of the facilities (for example, the VA Hospital in Livermore).

To me, my service in the Navy is something that caused me to grow up. I have been proud to be a veteran and am extremely upset whenever any vet is attacked, since for me and many others, my trip home was the worst experience. I simply could not get a job, and all I did was obey the law by serving, which is something that Kerry did as well.

All of us who served realized that war is something that should not be played with. Today's soldier and sailor is tomorrow's veteran. I hope that with Kerry in the White House, that never again will people who served their country (such as former Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia, who lost three of his limbs) have their military service questioned by anyone, particularly a non-veteran.

Where was Bush when Harold Butler Jr. needed him?

Oaklander Harold Butler Jr. was gunned down a week ago by American gunfire. In an East Oakland store.

Butler was 17, an honors student, college bound, and working nights at UPS.

President Bush, where were you when our child needed you?

Butler was the 31st Oakland homicide this year.

An assault rifle was used. Four other people were shot.

President Bush, why haven't you removed the weapons of mass destruction right here at home? You might have saved Butler.

Why did you cancel Federal funding for the Oakland community police who might have prevented this murder? Is this how you take care of our families?

Where is your compassion? Where is your strength on law and order? Why aren't you keeping our neighborhoods safe for us, for our children, for Harold's five brothers and sisters?

We have real problems at home, Mr. President. Oakland isn't waiting for your first photo-op at Harold's Skyline High School memorial. We're waiting for results with tears on our faces. And blood on the street.

06/26 - Kerry Letter-Writing & Socializing House Parties

Letter-Writing & Socializing House Parties will be held all over the Bay Area on Sat., June 26. The Swing-State Committee, along with the Fundraising/ House Parties Committee, and the Writing Committee have banded together to have a Bay Area-wide day of action to help the swing-states. On that Sat., we'll all get together, armed with pen and paper and send some letters to media outlets either here in CA, or in the various swing-states. Stay tuned for more details...