Let me get right out of the way and done with: this really isn't much of a diary. At the same time, this is DK4, and not-much-of-a-diary seems to be far less the infraction than it had been in the site's previous incarnations.
So, yeah, perhaps this would be better suited as an open thread comment and link, but this struck me as too rich and laudable to not share as a stand-alone item.
So then -- behold this YouTube clip, which came to my attention earlier this morning by way of a good friend / twice-former roommate / talented artist who lives in Portland, Maine. I am not sure who is responsible for this uber-clever bit of mobile, high-tech public art activism, but I'd sure like to find out so that I might convey my appreciation directly.
I'm a native Mainer who moved west to California just over ten years ago. I love my life in the Bay Area, but anyone who is from Maine and who has ever moved away knows the fact that you never really leave it, nor it you. Maine's a very challenging yet undeniably compelling chunk of the planet. My having been born and raised there, and having returned for a good chunk of my adult life post college and graduate school, has indelibly imprinted my character and how I view the world. Having easy access to lakes, mountains, forests, the ocean played a big hand in my having (for a good while, anyway) gone into the environmental sciences.
It has been agonizing to see so much news coming out of the great State of Maine over the past few months getting traction in the national media, virtually all of it bad, and all stemming from the blinkered, bombastic, boneheadedly Bozo-esque antics of the accidental governor whose bull in china shop manner of conducting himself suggests complete oblivion to his having not even received 40% of the vote.
The Department of Labor mural imbroglio has been especially galling. I'm certainly heartened to witness the U.S. Department of Labor having stepped in to say "not so fast, bucko," reminding what passes for a governor that teabagger fiat is insufficient grounds for removing public art that runs counter to his anti-worker sensibilities.
And I'm heartened for sure by acts of non-violent, non-destructive creativity such as we see here.