Posted by Dr. Amrit Chadwallah 
Everything is miscellaneous? A meditation by Tom Matrullo. That Matrullo should write his own book. Perhaps he has, and now strews it into the ether, page by page.
July 15, 2007
Michael Moore Blitzes Wolf Blitzer
Posted by Joseph McPatriot
The man is a communist. No wonder he loves Cuba. His whole site is Un-American.
July 03, 2007
A Toast for Joe Breiteneicher
Posted by The Happy Tutor
It has been how long? Two weeks or so? I just can't get you off my mind, Joe. You were face to face with some of the wealthiest and smartest philanthropists in the world, but every time you passed the Dumpster, you would pound it with the back of your fist, and laugh and swear and holler a greeting. You had honor and spoke out for same. You keep me writing, wanting to hear your laughter. Lonely feeling with you gone. Here's a toast to you, Joe, from one you helped, one of many.
November 08, 2006
Valdis Krebs - Building Social Networks
Posted by The Happy Tutor
Call them Tongs, or nodes on a network, or a wirearchy, but we create tight little hubs, and then the hubs connect: gifthub, the world we want, greenmedia toolshed, and funder networks like Tides, Momentum, Threshold, Foundation Exchange, Omidyar.net, and leftist political thought around the elusive Mr. Scruggs. Today few people span these Tongs, and they do not always make easy mutual company, since they are strangers to one another. But little by little the Tongs are touching and coalescing into what may be a new species of progressivism. Marty Kearns has spoken on social networks to the funders around Tides. Tracy Gary has spoken highly of him. He had planned to attend our Open Space for Giving Conference a few years ago. Valdis Kebs, who is in Tom Munnecke's network, and Jean Russell's (Jean being a friend of mine and Tracy Gary) could diagram this as a time lapse photo. Valdis blogs here. Most of this networking is invisible to the larger world. This is our sojourn in the wilderness. We are not asking what will play well in Peoria, or how to frame sound-bites to sway the multitudes. In these networks we are honestly lost and just trying to think things through for our own consumption. That is actually a more productive way to think than waiting for the blastfax talking points from Headquarters. The right is drawing now on it's own maverick thinkers from a generation ago. And already what had once been a living body of ideas has become a dead ideology enforced literally at the point of a gun, the threat of a dungeon, and - in reality - torture. A little independent thought would be in order, even if we have to withdraw a few hundred yards from the loudspeakers blaring "Freedom - Keep moving and no one will get hurt." We can hide out in the Tongs until our views are refined and validated by other people speaking to us as thoughtful human beings, rather than corporate factotums and political operatives. (Present company excepted, Smoky Joe.)
May 22, 2006
Christian Sheeple?
Posted by The Happy Tutor
Maybe sheep are not so dumb. Some of the flock are waking up. Perhaps liberation-theology will overturn our bondage to wealth? Or perhaps the material girl is a Jesus that Candidia could endorse?
March 01, 2006
Don't Think Like a Donkey
Posted by The Happy Tutor
Please my fellow dumpster denizens, read this one page article by a community organizer who attended the Momentum Conference, of progressive funders, awhile back, as did I and our Born Again Author Function. I believe the points Jethro Heiko makes about democracy, social organizing, and not thinkling like a donkey are critically important. Many of us feel isolated. In reality, in other places, other rooms, people are coming to conclusions not unlike those reached in the Dumpster. Interesting how Heiko's org, The Action Mill, got so much done for so little with their "Turn your Back on Bush" campaign. "Freedom" ( audience turns 180 degrees to prove him right) "is on the march." Check out the websites Action Mill has created.
February 21, 2006
Jesus with A whip
Posted by The Happy Tutor
For "Jesus Saves" in MSN Search Wealth Bondage on Jesus places seventh among the ten unpaid listings. I think maybe God the Father, the Son or the Holy Spirit is trying to tell the moneychangers something. Jesus is coming again and he carries a whip. He is going to kick MBA ass, from the President and CEO of Wealth Bondage on down.
The Good Book is inerrant: "Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. Matthew 21:11-13 (RSV)" Matthew is referring to those in modern times who mistake Divine Providence for the Market. Jesus is coming to turn the tables on those who, for worldly advantage, have taken his holy name in vain. Beware, ye Blashpemers, the wrath of the patient man!
February 19, 2006
Joe Bageant on Community, Democracy, and Sticking Around to See How it Turns Out
Posted by The Happy Tutor
Joe Bageant, "Welcome to the Middle-Class Lockdown":
Who are my people? Some of the worst people on the planet are ready to answer that question for us in a way that serves their own ends. They stand ready to answer other questions too, such as, where did we come from? Why are we here? They are the cadre of empire's paid professionals who write the history and the news stories that fill the deep need for a "story of the people."
One of the most impassioned and eloquent pieces I have ever read on the state of American culture. Joe is old enough to remember community, democracy, and the ideals of Martin Luther King. There is no "call to action" in his essay, only the forlorn thought that maybe he will emigrate and live simply, or maybe not, maybe he will stay. I have been asking myself all day, while on the net, or at the store, or just sitting around: "What can I do to build community among those who care? How can I put my gifts to work in that effort? Would anyone appreciate it, and pay it back, around or forward?" Talking to you is better, I guess, that talking to myself alone. Joe, I think, is motivated by a similar blind urge.
February 14, 2006
Jesus Saves
Posted by The Happy Tutor
In response to How Jesus Saves, a reader who asks to be anonymous sends this extraordinary photo of a church tower seen obscurely through tree branches rising like a dry flame. "If winter comes, can spring be far behind?" as Shelley wrote in Ode to the West Wind. 
October 09, 2005
Threshold Foundation
Smoky Joe, JD, in Defense of Freedom
Monica, get your sweet ass in here. File this crap under signs of hope. And get me a complete list of their donors.
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