Let's plan a convoy. I think that getting out and becoming a community is better than sitting and feeling powerless. I am not real big on being powerless.
We've been able to see this train coming down that track towards us. We know that we are in a plutocracy now and not a democracy. We know that the repubs are getting excited about shutting down the government. THEY ARE THRILLED! None of them care about the people. None of them care about the consequences of their actions. They all seem to have the same mindset, they don't need to worry about reality they create their own. Remember that from Bush's crony? WE are the ones who have to deal with their reality according to them.
At the same time, Dems are bending like weak reeds, unable to stand up for us.
I see millions of us moving slowly state by state towards dc. And as we go we hold meetings in the state capitals extolling the virtues of being responsible. We pay our taxes and companies who are on our soil should also pay taxes and the government should not be shut down to support the Koch brothers and Adolf Coors.
We can stop at medium towns and march and if people want to join us great.
Whenever we are in a spot where there is a pol office, perhaps we can picket and leaflet for a short time there as well. Let them know WE KNOW who and what they are! We can stop at state capitols and let them know THE PEOPLE ARE MARCHING!
I see us sitting around at night maybe making "stone soup" laughing about this or that, finding old friends, making new friends, feeling as if we are a part of a history making achievement. I can see us getting up the morning packing up and loading up. We all come together for information about how to act and what will happen. And then we take buses into the next place and do the same again.
The people's march is on the move.
On the West coast people could start from Washington State or Oregon or California and move to the adjacent states picking up people along the way. Southern States could move slightly northwest and Northern state could head south.
The powers that be would hear us coming. It wouldn't be weekend thing you see. Maybe a four day weekend. The anticipation of the hordes of people moving towards the US capital even more than any actuality would be enough to give the puppet folks a chill. The media could ignore us except for the local papers picking it up along the way. Every event is uploaded to youtube and we have a twitter hash tag for people to follow. And, maybe we could use the livestream site as well so that people can become more and more a part of what we are doing.
As we get closer to dc, or maybe as we go, the rallies could become a little more elaborate - enough to pull in CSPAN coverage. In every state we could pull in any rising progressive political star we could find and showcase them. And we could let the less than progressive pols come into the fold and make them feel that it is important that they welcome us and bask in our strength.
The signs and marches will fill up local papers and facebook and twitter and dKos diaries. Just as we have seen with the Wisconsin marches.
Labor unions, teachers, unemployed folks, people who have been temporarily laid off because of the government shut down can join us. People can come and go and not stay on for the whole time, if we pass through their state perhaps or an adjoining state.
At the end, we have made a mark and rubbed up against each other enough to establish a better community and develop our network ties.
This is not exactly what the Vietnam vets did to help pull that war off track. They camped on the mall for quite a while. But I think with the local coverage we could really make something percolate.
From a comment of mine:
There are vets amongst us who have tactical experience surely they can map out routes and we have community activists, surely they can help us rent buses and allocate the rents amongst us. And we have young ones who know how to twitter and facebook and all that. Let them feel us coming. Let the very ground shake under our feet. Let them know we matter!
So we need good routes, ones that will allow us to march and educate as we go. People can come in from surrounding states and join in the fun and some of them and others can join the convoy.
We need community activists to map march areas, get permits, find camping places, set up toilets, see if we can get food and water donated at local events.
We might use Wiki to enumerate all the state's local, statewide and national pol and what their voting record is. We want to become so familiar with them that we can, when we introduce them at whatever podium, we can say exactly what it is they do for us and then we can add what MORE we need them to do for us! They will feel us, hear us and smell us and know that WE know them. And we haven't done that really that I know of. It will be a way to bring the communities closer to us.
We need actblue to help with donations which will go into things like lawyers fees, permit fees, portable toilets, camp ground fees, bus rentals, sound stages and whatever else needs to be thought of.
We need good speakers at each and every spot. Rabble rousers all except we also need humor, lots of humor.
Maybe some hot air balloonists would be willing to help and give us beauty and signage? Same with small aircraft? At any rate, maybe helium balloons and big banners?
And the message is simple: Fairness. You cannot ask the middle class to take all the sacrifices and ask the fat cats and the corporations to take none. You cannot take from the middle class and give to the bloated 1%ers without paying a political price. We need to nail individual politicians from each state we go into. Either they stand with the middle class or they are hurting us. And when we get to each locality or capital we outline the good ones and the bad ones and pamphleteer the whole state with what we see are good pols and bad pols. We are not using personal characteristics but actual voting records.
Updated: We have to know who we are electing and who is in the wings. Who could we call upon, for example, to primary a blue dog or to come in when there is a recall. From a comment I did:
Who are your pols, local state and federal and how do they vote. Remember, when we come through that state we want the pols to shiver knowing that WE know who they are and how they vote. And we will provide a platform during the rallies for them to speak, but they need to know what we are looking for like fairness in taxation, job creation, infrastructure with a green hue things like that. When we go through an area we are providing an education to the folks as to how their politicians support them or not! And the votes we are looking for are the ones that support the working class. The culture warfare is so passe (even though the tbaggers don't believe it) and we will make it even more so!
Then, where are good places in your state for rallies, marches, camping? And what are the permits, fees, etc needed. Are there unions and would they be willing to participate? And we would also provide them that same platform as well.
What are the surrounding states? We will anticipate that some surrounding state folks will come to your in state rallies and in turn, you can go to theirs.
Do you have an in-state celebrity? Somebody that can help draw crowds?
I went to wikispaces and created a wikispace for MissouriPoliticians. I hope to fill it up with local, state and federal pols with some information about how they vote, their views, links to their sites, etc. All of you from other states, please create a wiki space for your pols. Thanks. We need this information to educate ourselves and others.