I recently learned that an old friend passed away. Carol was an old school hard nosed reporter fiercely dedicated to the truth and local journalism. I was deeply touched to see that, in lieu of flowers, her estate was suggesting donations to an organization that I helped start. So that means it’s time to retell the story of the Lompoc Theatre Project, a curious and enduring legacy of Occupy Wall Street colliding with hyper local politics and corruption. The year is 2011 and I’m living in [...] Continue reading ➠

In the violin world when people ask questions like “how do I maintain motivation to keep practicing?” the answer is: habits are better than motivation. Instead of relying on motivation or inspiration to hit, you should make a plan, have a routine, build the habit of practicing day in day out. Politics are the same. When folks ask "how do we get people to care?" the answer is: culture and ideology are better than individual feelings. Instead of hoping people feel moved to act on a specific topic [...] Continue reading ➠

I’m seeing a lot posts from folks in the US-sphere about how to “prepare” for the next four years. And they’re mostly good, (though, not entirely1) and folks are right to fear what may come. For a lot of folks the coming years are going to be hell; let’s call that category 1. But, in a way, I’m more afraid that, for many nothing, will come at all, or at least only very little will change for them. I don’t mean the rich and racist who are salivating for future horrors; let’s call that category [...] Continue reading ➠

A common chant at U.S. demonstrations for a while now has been "this is what democracy looks like." I disagree. Marches are a patch for when democracy on its own doesn’t deliver the "will of the people". Ideally we wouldn’t be in the streets; we’d all have a our voices heard in the room. But we march anyway. We understand that sometimes you have to pull on the levers of power you can reach, even while you work to dismantle and rebuild the machine. The U.S. is, if we are being wildly generous, a [...] Continue reading ➠