A Thanksgiving Gift: An Artist and a Song

This Thanksgiving week, I want to thank a friend who lives in Texas and is passionately committed to peace and justice.  He sent out an email which included the web site for an artist and a song for our times.  The artist's name is Makana, and his song is "We Are the Many".  He is the 1960's Bob Dylan of today, with the song reminiscent of "Blowin' in the Wind", "Times They Are A Changin'", and "Masters of War".

Listen to the songs of an era and we can learn the stresses and spirit of that era.  "We Are the Many" is a cry for justice, much like the Psalmist: "Listen to the sound of my cry....", "Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord...."; or the prophet Isaiah: "...but you shall cry out for pain of heart...."; or Lamentations:
"... they hiss, they gnash their teeth, they cry...."  During this Thanksgiving week, I am thankful for Makana and his song.

A backstory sets the context.  Makana is a singer from Hawaii. His full name is Matthew Swalinkavich, but changed to his stage name to Makana, which is "the gift" in Hawaiian.  He has performed at the White House.  He was asked to perform during a sit-down meal for the APEC G-20 meeting a couple of weeks ago.  Dinner music for the powerful.  The story goes that he started his musical set singing traditional Hawaiian-style music. Eventually, he unbuttoned his shirt to reveal a t-shirt that said, in handwritten letters, "Occupy with Aloha".

Describing the roll-out of the song, he says: "I started out very cautiously because my intention was not to disrupt their dinner.  My intention was to subliminally convey a message that I felt was paramount to the negotiations.  Eventually, I got enough courage to go for it for an extended period of time.  I ended my show with the line 'the bidding of the many not the few'.  I sang it about 50 times in different ways for them to hear." The lyrics and the melody provide a stirring anthem for the Occupy Wall Street movement.  Check it out and be thankful: makanamusic.com. The accompanying video will touch your heart.

We come here, gather round the stage

The time has come for us to voice our rage

Against the ones who've trapped us in a cage

To steal from us the value of our wage

From underneath the vestiture of law

The lobbyists at Washington do gnaw

At liberty, the bureaucrats guffaw

And until they are purged, we won't withdraw.

CHORUS: We'll occupy the streets

We'll occupy the courts

We'll occupy the offices of you

Till you do

The bidding of the many, not the few

Our nation was built upon the right

Of every person to improve their plight

But laws of this Republic they rewrite

And now a few own everything in sight

They own it free of liability

They own it, but they are not like you and me

Their influence dictates legality

And until they are stopped we are not free. CHORUS

You enforce your monopolies with guns

While sacrificing our daughters and sons

But certain things belong to everyone

Your thievery has left the people none

So take heed of our notice to redress

We have little to lose, we must confess

Your empty words do leave us unimpressed

A growing number join us in protest. CHORUS

You can't divide us into sides

And from our gaze, you cannot hide

Denial serves to amplify

And our allegiance you cannot buy

Our government is not for sale

The banks do not deserve a bail

We will not reward those who fail

We will not move till we prevail. CHORUS

We are the many

You are the few

Echoing the Psalmist and the prophets, Makana and his song are gifts for which we can be thankful.

Blessed Thanksgiving!

Peace!

Ron

The Injustice of Luck

"How Lucky They Are" is the headline of an article written by Greg Breining of the Startribune.  He writes that a University of Minnesota professor has concluded that "Mostly, extreme wealth comes from luck."  He continues: "In a capitalistic society, extreme concentration of wealth does not arise from extreme differences in work ethic, skills, investment smarts or other virtues.  Nor does it come from connections, cronyism or crookedness."

Carried to its logical end, Joseph Fargione, lead author of the study, states "...the inevitable outcome of unfettered capitalism is oligarchy."  In short, "luck" has significantly created an unequal caste system of division between the rich, middle, and poor, with power resting with a small, wealthy elite.

Fargione quotes Alexis de Tocqueville, who in 1837 warned that the American industrial class is "one of the harshest that ever existed, [which could create] permanent inequality of conditions and aristocracy."  Fargione supports de Tocqueville's analysis by referring to Kevin Phillips' book, Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich, which reads: "[By 2000] the United States was not only the world's wealthiest nation and leading economic power, but also the Western industrial nation with the greatest percentage of the world's rich and greatest gap between rich and poor."

Breining quotes U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis who observed, "We can either have democracy in this country or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both."

The top 1% of Americans control about 40% of the nation's wealth.  In a recent article in the New York Times, the author reviewed the Social Justice Index study of the 31 participating countries of the OECD. The social justice categories include: poverty prevention, overall poverty rate, child poverty rate, senior citizen poverty rate, income inequality, pre-primary education, health rating, and intergenerational justice rating.  In the "Overall Social Justice Rating", the United States came in 27th, just ahead of Greece, Chile, Mexico, and Turkey.

Unfettered, unregulated capitalism, coupled with a growing separation between the rich and poor, protected by a justice system that protects the powerful, governed by a political system that is irresponsive to the growing economic divide, and controlled by a corporate elite that cares more for profit than people, is crushing the United States and much of the world.  The result is the decline of the West.

If this disparity is primarily because of "luck" as Fargione concludes, the world is truly out of control and the end is dire.  Correction then is to do the opposite of the above analysis: to balance serendipitous LUCK with responsible LAWS, with the goal to provide opportunity and enough for all people, to create a system that allows for wealth and opportunity to be spread around.  Luck is not enough to provide these outcomes.  Actions should include: 1) institute a more just and equitable tax code, expecting all to pay an appropriate amount, yet expecting the more well-to-do to pay more, enacting a transaction tax or "Robin Hood" tax on all Wall Street investments, and eliminating appropriate tax loop-holes; 2) make Medicaid and Medicare available to all people, cutting payments to physicians and making payments dependent on healthy outcomes rather than number of treatments, working with drug companies to control expenses; 3) make appropriate adjustments to Social Security, such as eliminating the contributory ceiling on contributions, and instituting a means test;  4) cut defense spending by eliminating "cost plus" weapons programs, bringing troops home from Europe, Afghanistan, and most of over 700 global bases; 5) create ways to get the odious effects of money out of elections and Washington politics, starting with the repeal of the Citizens United decision; 6) make public education affordable and available to all by eliminating the voucher system and privatization.

Justice ought not be dependent upon luck.  God did not create a world that feeds upon luck for righteousness.  Justice and righteousness have their roots in love, compassion, equality, and opportunity.
Let luck be a by-product of these virtues.  Luck ought to be the cherry on the top rather than the uncertain, occasional, win the lottery, main course.

Peace!
Ron

The Voter ID Canard

The question of making Voter IDs mandatory for elections is a very hot issue as we approach the 2012 elections.  Approximately 34 states will have Voter ID bills on their ballots.  While there is always a need to promote ways to guarantee free, open, and honest elections, this push for Voter IDs is an inappropriate response which will disenfranchise countless times more votes than they will prevent fraud.

Indeed, the Voter ID movement is a canard: a suppressive response to a made up problem.

According to the Christian Century of 26 July, 2011, "Federal prosecutors spent five years during the Bush administration trying to crack down on voter fraud, but their cases were negligible because they could find so few cases.  Fewer than 100 people were convicted nationwide, and almost all the cases involved not deliberate fraud but honest confusion."

The Advancement Project, an advocacy group of civil rights lawyers, describes this push for government issued identification before people are allowed to vote as "the largest legislative effort to scale back voting rights in a century".  Why?

A survey by the Brennen Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law found that 11% of citizens, 21 million people, do not have a current photo ID.  That fraction increases to 15% of low income citizens of voting age, 18% of young eligible voters, and 25% of Black eligible voters.  Those demographic groups tend to vote Democrat, and Republicans are imposing what they know many will be unable to meet. (New York Times, 27 April 2011).

In the state of Minnesota, the state which has perhaps the cleanest voting record of all states and the highest voter turn-out in the nation, The League of Women Voters reported that there were "0" voter impersonations and only 115 felons who voted.  In Minnesota felons cannot vote.  Of those, approximately 35 registered to vote but did not vote, and the rest voted.  This is a "fraud error of .0000383% in a total vote count of 3 million.  In a survey of all 87 Minnesota counties, of which 80% responded, which comprised 90% of all Minnesota voters, there were NO REPORTED FRAUDS other than the 115 felons, of which there were only 36 convictions.

The ACLU reports that between 2002 and 2007, the United States Attorney General reported ZERO evidence and convictions of impersonational voter fraud.  In Texas, the governor pushed through a Voter ID law even though there were ZERO instances of fraud, according to the Texas Attorney General.

Requiring Voter IDs presents problems: 1) Accessibility to Department of Motor Vehicle locations; 2) Having to accurately fill-out provisional ballots; 3) In some cases the expense of the card.  The people most affected will be those least able to go through the required hoops.

There is significant evidence that the big push for Voter IDs originates from the Republican Right.  Specifically, a Right-wing group called ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council), funded significantly by the Koch brothers, is playing a major role in this voter suppression drive.  ALEC has provided model bills for legislators to consider, including Voter ID bills.  I encourage you to Google ALEC.  ALEC is corporate power stifling the democratic process.  In 1980, Paul Weyrich, the founder of ALEC, said: "I don't want everybody to vote."

The Brennan Center for Justice estimates that nearly 5 million "would be voters" may be affected by the passage of these Voter ID bills.  Overwhelmingly, this would benefit the Republican Party.

Making voting more difficult for certain groups is a violation of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act because everyone is guaranteeed the right to vote, and putting up unncessary barriers is a violation of the Constitution.  It is like an old fashioned "poll tax" which prevented many Blacks from voting.

The Voter ID is a canard designed to disenfranchise millions of voters at the expense of Democratic candidates, to the benefit of the Republican candidates.  This is unfair.  Unjust.

I would urge all to speak out against Voter ID cards and vote in opposition.  Voting is the kingpin of democracy.  Democracy requires equal opportunity for participation.  I would also encourage those interested to search Brennen Center for Justice and the ACLU for up to date information.

Democracy for ALL!  Equal participation for ALL!

Peace!
Ron

Austerity = Inequality

One of the best books I have ever read is called The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein.  She attacks the economic theory that austerity is the way to prosperity for all.  On the contrary, austerity, under the banner of supply side economics as proposed by economist Milton Friedman of the University of Chicago, creates inequality and hardship for most people, with more wealth going to the upper class corporate types and less for everyone else.

Naomi calls this economic strategy "disaster capitalism".  The strategy is: 1) Wait for a major crisis; 2) Sell-off pieces of the state to private players (privatize as much as possible); 3) Make these reforms permanent.  In short, create or seize upon economic chaos, create a "shock" to the system because "only a crisis produces real change".

What kind of changes evolve from this "shock doctrine"?  Ease public education requirements to promote charter schools, schools for profit.  Then: tax cuts, free trade, privatization, cuts to social spending, deregulation, vouchers, downsize government, flat tax, and more.  Sound familiar?  Austerity = inequality!

Klein documents this economic mess by citing what is happening in South Africa, Russia, Chile, Iraq, Asia, Argentina, and parts of Brazil.  Then the United States.  Sound familiar?  Austerity = inequality!

The human cost of austerity is unfathomable, its scattered wreckage clear.

Fast forward to the Occupy Wall Street Movement.  The OWSs are on to something.  They are in agreement with Klein's thesis.  Supply side economics is not the full answer to economic growth.  There also needs to be a stronger dose of Keynesian economics, meaning the government needs to insure the equalization of wealth, human stewardship, equal justice, and equal opportunity.  After all, the people are the government, or, the government is the people.  Remember Lincoln's famous dictum: "...that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from this earth."  Hmm, was Lincoln on to something?

Corporations, banks, Wall Street, are sitting on between $1.4 and $3 trillion of cash.  Meanwhile, to quote Robert Reich, "In the late 1970s, the richest 1% received 9% of total income and held 18% of the nation's wealth.  By 2007, they had more than 23% of the total income and 35% of the nation's wealth.  CEOs of the 1970s were paid 40 times the wage of the average worker.  Now they are paid 300 times the typical workers' wage."  Austerity = inequality!

This past Sunday, the Memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was dedicated.  He spent his last days in Memphis supporting the efforts of the sanitation workers.  President Obama is out on the stump promoting his Jobs Bill, or now pieces of it since the supply siders nixed it in the House and Senate.

Austerity, according to the supply siders is supposed to equal prosperity.  Austerity, by some magic formula, is supposed to cause a trickle-down effect, creating wealth or at least a sustaining wage for everyone.  On the contrary, austerity = inequality.  Austerity creates a trickle-up effect!  Austerity means prosperity for only the connected, the corporations, the Wall Street barons, the upper tiny minority.  Austerity is economic slavery where the shrinking middle class and growing lower class become serfs of the landed class and the owners.  The rest of us lose our schools, our teachers, our police, our fire fighters, our human services, our Social Security, our jobs, our....

We need an economics of love.  The Gospel lesson for this Sunday is from Matthew 22:34-40 where Jesus talks about the new law, the Greatest Commandment: love of God and love of neighbor.  We are created for each other, to make sure everyone has enough.  This Jesus love is not about austerity, but generosity!  Generosity = equality! Generosity = justice!

Peace!
Ron

Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!

In a time when people are crying for jobs, the passing of Steve Jobs provides an occasion for seeing a way towards creating those jobs.

The place to begin is a portion of his Stanford University Commencement Address in 2005.  Some have called this address the "Gettysburg Address" of all commencement addresses.  The context is his diagnosis with terminal pancreatic cancer.

Remembering I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever

encountered to help me make the big choices in life.  Because almost

everything - all expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or

failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only

what is truly important.  Remembering that you are going to die is the

best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something

to lose.  You are already naked.  There is no reason not to follow your

heart.  Stay hungry.  Stay foolish.

Knowledge of impending death means each moment is important.  Don't waste time.  Focus now.  If you want to accomplish something, get on with it.  Make your life count for something.  Don't worry about all the consequences because you won't be around to take all the flak.  Fear nothing!  Create something helpful!  Try it!  Take risks!

It is significant that Jobs was a college drop-out who teamed up with a friend to start his computer journey in a garage.  Jobs was also fired from Apple.  He said it was the best thing that ever happened to him because it freed him to travel another direction which ended up being the most creative journey of his life.  

Jobs also realized that what he was able to do, he could not have done alone.  He said: "My business model is the Beatles.... they balanced each other and the total was greater than the sum of the parts.... great things in business are never done by one person, they are done by a team of people."  

One of his favorite quotes was from Picasso: "Good artists copy.  Great artists steal."  Steve Jobs studied the works of others and was able to connect their genius with his genius.  He said: "You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards."  He had respect for others' insights.  

I have learned in life that you can always do something.  Even when there are times of scarce resources, you can always dream, always write a letter, always read a book, always meet with a friend, always bat around ideas, always make a phone call, always visit with a leader, always comfort a friend, always reconcile with an enemy, always lay plans for the future, always spend time Google-ing, always love your spouse and family, colleagues and the poor, always march and demonstrate for peace and justice, always join a committee to make life better for folks, always start a group, always scrounge for financial resources, always take time for the family and neighbors, always look for a way through, always seek employment, always support each other, always worship Jesus, ALWAYS....  There are always ALWAYS. 

ALWAYS isn't easy.  We need each other.  This is one of the lessons of the "99%".  The "99%" are those who are Occupying Wall Street, saying "We have had enough of your greed and selfishness.  We demand fairness."  In 1977, the top 1% of wage earners controlled just 9% of the nation's wealth.  Today they control 24%. And the gap is widening.  Yet, these 99%ers are dreaming, working together, innovating with passion, casting risk to the wind, cleansing their wills of fear, acting foolishly (according to some), embodying Bob Dylan's classic phrase: "When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose."

As I read scripture I am always struck by the Exodus deliverence story and Jesus' empathy with people's life situations.  I am also struck by God's call to be faithful and Jesus' call to discipleship.  The faithful are never left to wallow in hopelessness or powerlessness.  There is acknowledgement of people's plights, support and comfort in the difficult times, as well as opening the door to the future with promises.  Christ makes ALWAYS a reality.  

Jobs?  Christ is ALWAYS with us in our struggles; yet, also, Christ is ALWAYS calling us to act, to "stay hungry", and "stay foolish"!  

In I Corinthians 15, Paul writes: "O death, where is your victory?  O death, where is your sting?  Death is swallowed up in victory!.... Therefore, my beloved, be steadfast, immovable, ALWAYS excelling in the work of God, because you know that in Christ your labor is not in vain." 

Press on!

Peace!

Ron

    

Music-In the Midst

Linda and I find ways to experience music at the places we visit.

On our recent European journey we attended an afternoon concert by "Elf" at St. Martin-in-the-Fields next to Trafalgar Square in London.  We were experiencing jet lag and needed a place to sit, relax, and re-energize.  Elf was the perfect energizer!  Three men in their 50's, one on piano, one flutist, and one on the French horn.  Their music is a combined blend of jazz, classical, and romantic styles.  Though there were moments when we dozed off, their music was a wonderful stimulant!  It revived us.

Evensongs at St. Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey provided quiet moments of prayer, heightened by pipe organ music and choirs of men, women, and children.  Stillness in a churning world.

Sunday morning in Berlin drew us to the Berliner Dom, a huge Lutheran church on Museum Island.  Its granite outside walls are still covered by "fire-black"  from Allied bombing and WWII final days fighting between the Russians and Germans.  The worship?  Imagine a huge pipe organ pouring out some of the finest organ compositions, a chamber orchestra, a four-part choir, an opera quality soloist, and finally a nearly full sanctuary singing hymns!  Christ is alive!  This is most certainly true!

Upon arrival in Annecy, France, we strolled through the tree-filled city park, located on a lovely peninsula.  Dance music pulled us towards an open air dance floor where couples twirled, and joy and love stirred by the rhythm and lyrics of the band.  Magical!

A walk through the paseo of Albufeira, Portugal, where hundreds of street cafes and restaurants had a large screen television set to the latest soccer match between Real Madrid and Barcelona, brought us to a Roman Catholic Church, packed to the gills with standing room only, as they celebrated some Christian event.  Candles everywhere!  The music was provided by singers and a guitar choir.  One of the songs had strains of "When the Saints Go Marching In"!  Color!  Spirit!  Faith alive!

There wasn't much music in Tangier, Morrocco.  What music there was consisted of single people blowing a flute-type instrument.  No joy.  Indeed, I barely remember any music.  We spent most of our time walking the narrow, smelly streets of the "kasbah", or old Tangier.  "Kasbah" means fortress, and it was a walled area enclosing small shops, much poverty, and many people seemingly living aimless lives.

An evening on the "Balcony of Europe" in Nerja, Spain, treated hundreds of folks to music from "Ikaiki Amayu", two musicians from the Andean mountains of South American, playing traditional pan flute instruments.  The music was magnetic, drawing people like flies to light!  Gentle, romantic, uniting, amidst a rising moon and pounding surf.

We attended a Flamenco dance and music concert near the Mezquita in Cordoba, Spain.  The  space was small and intimate,  packed with people, including about 50 high school age youth.  Linda and I each sipped on a Sangria as we watched and listened to two talented guitarists, two robust vocalists, and a half dozen dancers who tapped and sweated their way through a most passionate program.  We learned that Flamenco has Gypsy (Roma) and Moorish roots. Go prepared to marvel at the footwork, the color of the women's dresses, and the physicality of movement.  Flamenco is not for the faint of heart!

Then there is Portugese "Fado". Fado was born out of despair, poverty, and struggle.  It is mostly minor key music with a bluesy feel, and deep passion.  The CD jacket explains Fado thusly:  "What people is this who, in the middle of the 19th century, surrounded by hunger, disease, and illiteracy, created a song to nurture the soul, strengthen the heart, and keep thought alive?.... What song is this?  It is called Fado and its birthplace is Portugal."

We were drawn in to the Cloisters Cathedral in Belem, Portugal to listen to a children's cello recital and concert.  What a lovely mix of parents, relatives, performers, tourists, and strangers, all listening to dressed-up, spiffed-up youth, guided by their musical mentors, expressing their musical dexterity, with sound bouncing off the centuries old stone walls!

Throughout our journey, as we listened to music, we also watched and listened to televised reports of economic chaos in the United States, Europe, and the world, starvation in Africa, suicide bombings in the Middle East, political gridlock in the USA, endless war, fires in Texas, and you name it!  And then there was soccer!  Europeans are absolutely catatonic about a sport where goals are as frequent as days above freezing in a Minnesota January!

"In the midst" of the life realities, the music drew people TOGETHER from all over the world, locals and globals.  During these times there was no fighting, no killing, no swearing, no arguing, no gamesmanship, no debating.  There was a sweetness at each event.  I am reminded of an old Coke commercial where people are lined up along a mountain ridge, each holding a can of Coke and singing, "I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony...."  Music reflects society, but it also transforms society.

Is there a lesson for the world here?

Go to a concert!  Better yet, get some people together and make music, even if you just "make a joyful noise" to God!  Become ONE!

Peace!
Ron

Letter to President Obama

Yesterday, I wrote this letter to President Obama.

President Barack Obama
White House
Washington, DC 20500

Dear President Obama,

The nation is at risk.  We need an Economic Call to Arms.  You have rightfully spoken eloquently about our need for renewal, about shared sacrifice.  Now is the time for courageous action.  The nation needs you to be an engaged president we voted for and not only a detached professor.  You analyze well, now we need you to boldly lead.

In the spirit of Lincoln and FDR, we need you to call us to greatness.  Now.  I would suggest calling Congressional leadership back to Washington and propose the following: across the board action from corporations, banks, Wall Street, individuals, the Fed, and the government to create a People for a New America effort, focusing on jobs.  The jobs would be for infrastructure, investment, and innovation.

Tell the people what you are doing.  If Congress balks at this effort, go to the American people and make them pay a political price for saying "No".  Fight for the proposal.  Keep fighting.  Go public day after day.  Let the people know you are fighting for us.

The people need to see you as a fighter for us, not as a detached political philosopher.  The nation is at risk, Mr. President.  Your presidency is at risk.  We need you to lead us.  We need you to call us to economic arms.  We will respond.  We are Americans!  Call us to greatness.  GO BIG!

 A Patriot,

Rev. Dr. Ron Letnes