Show 53: Indivisible, Action & Rural Spaces
9 January 2017 – We’re baaaaack…!
This week we kept is simple and talked about what we can all do to fight the good fight. For short term specifics we talked about the ACA Day of Action, scheduled for 15 January in cities and towns all around the nation and a sampling of many of the actions scheduled for Inauguration weekend.
Will used his block to talk again about the importance of Democrats who live in rural spaces, how to listen to them and how to activate them. I talked about the Indivisible Guide a fabulous new tool for optimizing the effectiveness of protest actions aimed at your members of Congress. Here are the “tools” links recommended by the Indivisible Guide:
- Call My Congress– Congressional office contact information
- GovTrack– Congressional district maps
- Vote Smart – voting history
- Open Secrets– campaign donation data
- Google Alerts – set one for all your representatives, federal and state so you know when something is written in the media about them
- Google News – find out which reporters are covering your representatives and district then follow those reporters on Twitter; remember to personalize your news with the names of your members of Congress
Here is just a sampling of the actions scheduled for the short term:
- The Women’s March
- Students Walk-Out Against Trump
- Not My President
- Occupy Inauguration: Chicago – one of many, many local protests planned look for one near you
Finally, here is that great New Republic article, Progressive Protesters are Ready for Trump. Thanks, Obama, by Graham Vyse and the New York Times editorial by Charles Blow, The Anti-Inauguration.
We have a fabulous interview coming up next week with Catherine Vaughan and other founding members of flippable.org. Until then, carrots! – Arliss
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Show 54: Flippable.org, Journalists, Emoluments
16 January 2017 – The genius of flippable.org is that it engages us with “small bite” activism. On a weekly basis Flippable suggests little bits we can each actually do to help Democrats take back state legislatures and governor’s mansions around the nation. Catherine Vaughan and Chris Walsh, two of the three Flippable founders, join us to talk about the genesis of the project and the leadership they and their team are collectively providing to flip targeted state legislatures from red to blue. I know that 2018 and 2020 seem like a long way away but in political terms they are, basically, tomorrow. Time is short and, as Catherine says, we can sleep after the 2020 election. Between now and then, we work. What I love about Flippable is that I can do the things they suggest in a reasonable amount of time and still know that I am making a difference. This is the drip, drip, drip, drip constant activism, constant pressure that matters.
Will and I started the show talking about specific journalists. I dive into the genuinely remarkable life of Clare Hollingsworth and Will wonders about what the hell happened to Glenn Greenwald. Clare Hollingsworth was the first female war correspondent (as we know that profession today). She is the reporter who got the scoop and broke the story that World War II had begun. She was the first person to figure out and the first reporter to break the story that Kim Philby was the infamous “third man” and that he had defected to Russia. Hollingsworth was at the very front, in fact often behind enemy lines, of all the many conflicts she covered and her reporting was renowned for peeling back the layers and complexities of war. Clare died on 10 January at the age of 105. To her final day she kept her shoes and passport right next to her bed in case she was called by her editor to report a story from the field.
Glenn Greenwald, on the other hand, has become a Russian shill. He has allowed the Snowden case to push him past the point of rational thought when it comes to Russia and he has taken to reporting the world through a Russian lens. Once upon a time Glenn was one of the great left-wing reporters but that was long ago. Buh-bye, Glenn. Don’t let the borscht hit you on the way out the door.
In my block I give some background on Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the Constitution, the Title of Nobility Clause known today as the Emoluments Clause. It is likely that Congress and the courts will not be able to use the constitutional provision as a stand-alone way to remove the President Collect from office. However, if other matters (say a traitorous relationship with Russia) was to move public opinion enough, the Emoluments Clause may become the handy “big stick” the GOP needs to impeach Trump and get us to a horrible but not nearly as dangerous, President Pence.
This next week is going to be really hard on all of us. Join flippable.org, read up on Clare Hollingsworth. Hold on to hope. Many Carrots! – Arliss
Note: we will not have a new show next week as I am traveling on business. We will be back on 30 January with an interview with the Armando.
Show 55: Armando on Emoluments Standing Plus
30 January 2017 – Armando Llorens, attorney and Daily Kos front pager, cleared-up all the questions I had about the emoluments clause of the Constitution and standing. Plus, typical of Armando’s frequent contributions to David Waldman’s Kagro in the Morning, Armando lead us merrily off track and onto the subject of NAFTA and how Trump’s special brand of crazy (literally) can significantly damage the US economy in the area of trade. Happily, there were many other brief side tracks too. There’s a reason so many of us follow Armando on DKos and on David’s show.
Will spoke about his visit with both anarchists and Trump voters on Inauguration Day. It was easy for Will to get from his apartment in DC to the Mall that day but not so the next. The difference in crowd size and sensibility during the Women’s March was immense and it’s great to hear Will’s first hand account. See below for video and more detail on Will’s experience at the Women’s March.
We started the show by talking about two new segments we plan to regularly include in future shows. First, we invite you to email us at ImHoppingMad@gmail.com with your submission for The Lying Liar Lie of the Week. Pick the Trump administration lie you think is the most egregious and let us know what it is and why you selected it. If we can (and if you want to) we will even arrange to record a brief segment with you. We give extra points if you bring the funny. The other new segment is Damage Report in which we will call attention to the most dangerous Trump administration action of the week.
We will be back with an all-new show next week and then we will go dark for a few weeks while I have major surgery and deal with the not insubstantial recovery. We will definitely be back as soon as we possibly can. Carrots! – Arliss
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Womens’ March Special Reporting:
I took a few videos when I was at the women’s march. I’m including a map below which shows where the videos were taken to give you an idea of just how large the march was.
This first video was taken at D & 7th, two blocks north of the mall. This is what almost all of the side streets looked like on the 21st. We couldn’t even get to the south side of the mall. There were just too many people.
This next video was taken at the Gallery Place metro. There was an endless crowd streaming out of the station. So many people arrived throughout the day that they were having to temporarily close stations for safety, in order to clear the platform that the next group of people could exit or board trains safely. It took hours to get people home.
When waiting for my wife to arrive, we grabbed a cup of coffee near the ellipse. Our thinking was that we’d march south on 15th, join the marchers just as they entered the ellipse, and be part of the march there. That plan was foiled. This was the picket outside of the White House near 15th and Pennsylvania Avenue.
After my wife arrived, we headed south on 14th street. And then we ran into this. A wall of people heading north on 15th street. There was no way we’d be able to get to the march route on Constitution Avenue. We had to go east.
15 minutes and a block later, we found 14th street just as choked with people. There was still no way to get to the march route. So we decided to take side streets to the ellipse.
There we were, at the very northern edge of the ellipse, just south of the White House. By this time, the march was supposed to be over, but most of the march hadn’t even reached the ellipse yet.
At this point, it was time to go home. We’d marched. We’d reached the ellipse. We’d temporarily joined people in the mall (though unfortunately, that video was corrupted so I can’t share it with you.) This was the site of people leaving the mall two whole hours after the march was supposed to have ended. We’d spent about an hour fighting our way through the crowd so that we could head home. In this video, you can hear one of the rolling roars that routinely tore through the crowd. You’d hear it in the distance, and then people near you would take up the cheer. Every few minutes, the entire center of our federal government shook, as more than half a million people raised their voices together.
I’ve never seen anything like this in my life. Being there was an absolute privilege.
I hope we can all do this again on Tax Day (April 15th) and literally shake the foundations of this government with our voices once again. Some people laugh at protests.
Remember Spicer’s fearful, shaky press conference? Remember the lies that the Trump team attempted to tell during the match? They’d spent all day cowering in a building, listening to the roars of the crowd outside. The windows of their offices had literally shook with the discontent outside. Their building was surrounded all day – to the point that staffers weren’t able to make it to the entrances.
The crowd was peaceful. But for a group of paranoid conservatives who had spent years dreaming of leading a crowd like this against Obama, who had just driven a wave of populism, to discover this level of opposition on their first day was chilling.
We didn’t just make our voices heard. We scared them.
And we’re not going to stop.
–Will