By Judith Gayle | Political Waves
You’ve no doubt heard that old bit of wisdom disguised as a joke, “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer is obvious, pointing us back to what is elemental to the problem: since it’s too huge to swallow whole, you eat an elephant one bite at a time. Any project, no matter how overwhelming, begins with the first step, followed by the next and the next. Some projects are short-term, some long, but all of them require prioritizing and evaluating, and if we’re going to see them through to completion, we must keep moving forward, even on days when the elephantine proportions of our task dismay us.
In describing the elephant, I’m discounting the current TIME magazine cover featuring Chris Christie, conceived and executed by someone with the corroded self-image of the Mean Girl in your high school homeroom.
And while not ignoring the non-partisan corporatization of our political system, which has all but snuffed out the notion of public service, of statesmanship designed to further the public good, I have no choice but to point to the radicalization of the right-wingers as the elephant-at-large, as defined by Tim Dickinson in Rolling Stone: “As it works to lock in as many retrograde policies as possible before it finally chooses to either modernize or die, the Republican Party is like a wounded beast: Rarely has it been more dangerous.”
Those of us who read liberal press on the internet have a good picture of what’s going on in the larger world, the environmental movement, the alternative parties, yadda. Those who favor conservative press have a good idea of what’s going on in FAUX News, the fantasies of the paranoid right and the multiple outposts of regional resistance across the nation that would rather fly a confederate flag than the Stars and Bars. Finding a way to take a bite out of so thin a slice of bitter consciousness is going to require a good deal of mature willingness on the part of the left.
It’s challenging to think kindly of those who, having already voted to cut food stamps for 47 million people, are considering another round of sequestration for women and children’s nutrition programs, and demanding another round of SNAP cuts in the 2014 budget. How do we warm up to those who would leave the homeless in their dilemma, cut Medicare, eliminate Medicaid and privatize Social Security for Wall Street’s benefit? For all of Sarah Palin’s theatrics over liberal death panels, they seem easier to recognize as the thousand cuts delivered at the hands of Republicans.
How do we cozy up to a group of people who are so ideologically self-absorbed that they allowed government to die for two weeks at a cost of — according to the Office of Management and Budget — as much as 6 billion bucks? In their alternate reality, these same people are holding the Dems fiscally responsible for not capitulating to their demands. How much food would $6 billion buy those who are trying to exist on .88 cents a day, I wonder? How much cold-weather heating assistance for the poor and elderly would that buy, now that those programs have been canceled? How much housing help?
In too many ways to count, the elephant in the room — that thing which we ignore to our detriment — defines our current political problem (and quite mystifies other nations, looking on, trying to figure out what the hell ails the former superpower of the civilized world, allowing a handful of rubes from the sticks to bring government to a standstill). Aided and abetted by the fascistic triad of politics — an amalgam of government, corporation and religion — the sum of this elephant’s parts is a solid patchwork of resistance, slowing the forward progress that showed us a heartening glimmer of its former self in the elections this week.
As with taking the elephant in one bite at a time, we have to approach such ignoble and, from my point of view, dishonorable behavior one issue at a time. The good news is that we seem to be doing just that, backed by the growing desire of the American collective to embrace common sense. Tuesday’s vote gave us a few examples of little bites, well digested.
New York’s new mayor-elect couldn’t be much more progressive, and it will be interesting to see how he handles the big-money critters who are staring him down as we speak. He’s set to meet a wall of money and influence, pushing against his liberal agenda. Let’s hope he calls on those who supported him, tapping the power of the people, because the country itself is farther left than the politics it embraces. Bill de Blasio has a clear mandate. I’d like to see him use it.
The culture wars seem to have lost some of their zealots. Over 60% of voters are in favor of legalizing marijuana, and last week, citizens in Washington state and Colorado voted to open four more cities to recreational marijuana use. Although the fed still considers pot an illegal substance, the Department of Justice has announced that policy will focus entirely on state laws, licensing, and sales to children. We need to keep an eye on them to make sure they don’t overstep this new policy.
Despite the distasteful backdrop of the Cuccinelli/McAulliffe race, Mayors Against Illegal Guns are calling the Virginia wins an impressive victory against the NRA, passing around this encouraging YouTube. It does appear to enact a sea change in public opinion over gun safety issues in a state gone purple, but still very much an original Federalist colony.
And despite Florida’s vote to reaffirm Stand Your Ground — the controversial law which was knee-jerk reaction to decades of badly conceived self-defense law — Obama has announced that insurers will now be required to cover mental health and substance abuse treatment, much as they would any other illness. Consider this a clear indicator of Obama’s determination to deal with the gun violence issues so glaringly displayed in the Trayvon Martin case. The regulation itself was passed by the Bush Congress in 2008 as the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act, but has not been enforced. With ACA rewriting health services, the timing is perfect.
Chris Christie is returning to govern New Jersey, and the Pubs are thrilled with this win, suggesting that it signals a return to Republican values and perhaps even the presidency, even though they have consistently refused moderate Christie a place at the Bagger table. Larger than life (no pun), Christie has the kind of energy hard to overshadow, and the Dem candidate running against him couldn’t clear that hurdle. On the other hand, not all things Christie made the mark: the governor’s recent veto of a bill to raise the minimum wage was overturned by voters, who ushered in a new minimum of $8.25.
Living wage is an issue this year, with little Seattle suburb Sea Tac voting $15 an hour for most workers at Seattle’s main airport. Already boasting the country’s highest minimum ($9.19) Washington voters were attempting to bring the issue into awareness nationally, and Obama must have noticed, because he gave an address today indicating that he will back the Harkin/Miller legislation to raise the minimum to $10.10. That’s over a dollar more than he suggested in last year’s State of the Union address. We need to thank brave fast food and restaurant workers for bringing this topic front and center.
How do we eat an elephant? Right where we stand, as did the citizens of Boulder, Colorado, who “… didn’t just win a lopsided vote on Tuesday; they struck a blow at the core of the fossil-fuel-powered, shareholder-controlled utility model.” A city-owned electric utility start-up, outspent 10 to 1 by its corporate competition, won its bid to continue exploring local power. Said its spokesman, “With this behind us, we are able to continue working to create a model for how communities around the country can take control of their energy future.”
Team players, working for the common good of all? What a concept! And even though the profit-inspired activity of those who victimize others for their own and their shareholders’ good makes us growl like pit bulls, circling with fangs bared, we dare not snap because it serves no one, in the end. It just makes us like them, willing to punish rather than educate. What we DO need to do in order to consume this great unworkable beasty is find WORKABLE answers better than those it offers us. We need efficient, potent propositions to replace the lies and innuendo the beast trumpets, selling us horse-feathers and snake oil.
The answer to all this is self-evident. It lies in the heart of the people, working to help one another. There are amazing stories of grassroots success in California, Illinois and Texas. There are populist innovators in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Washington DC. People who hadn’t thought of themselves as movers and shakers surprise themselves with their success. The truth is that even when we do not choose to become involved, we are involved. It’s our world to make. Better that we take responsibility for its creation than simply exist in a system provided by others.
There’s no sense blaming bad guys. There’s plenty of bad guys to go around, lots of corporations sucking up the welfare that should be going to the unfortunate, all manner of shape-shifters, orcs and balrogs, tempting us to go to the dark side, take care of ourselves to the detriment of our fellows, take umbrage rather than seek common cause. That’s the ancient pitfall of humankind’s lower nature, dependent upon dark illusions of ambition, power and fear, and we dare stay in its grip no longer.
Our higher nature asks for something different from our as-usual experience. The same mind that has created all this cannot solve the problem, and so we need to open to a new way of seeing our situation, a new perception based on a higher, more compassionate and loving ideal. We need to face the elephants that confound us with a renewed willingness to forgive and transcend differences, to find the win/win that is buried beneath our insistence that there is only one way forward. There is always more than one answer — even more than one that serves the whole — and a choice to add our energy to a cease fire between us and those who do not see the world as we do would be a good start, even if one-sided (ours.) It would be the first bite, the hardest to chew — and the most important.
Our current astrology is full of opportunity for self-revelation and enlightenment. The political situations presenting themselves are as cleanly drawn as cartoons, asking us to draw informative conclusions. There are social and political movements all around us, asking for our participation, not just those that fight against injustice but those that work for inclusiveness and kindness, that support public assistance and empowerment, that create opportunity as well as education. We are not helpless, but first we must awaken to our need to participate if we are to give and receive help.
And the first step is to pare down the size of that huge thing in the corner, getting past our avoidance and watching it shrink in stature even as we face it fully. The moment we no longer see the other guy as the enemy, everything can change. Such alchemy quickly invades the heart. Change can come as we take one bite at a time, one baby step, one courageous act building on another, but first we must decide to proceed differently than we have in the past. Let’s affirm our ability to open hearts with kindness and inclusion and forget about changing hardened minds. As ACIM gently affirms, “I can have peace instead of this.” Let’s see what we can accomplish one bite — one prayerful decision, one ethical choice — at a time.
They were moved out of the room pretty smartly when the war came.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-24745705
Not all elephants are the same apparently.
http://astrotabletalk.blogspot.com/
Thanks, be, for always finding the signs that dovetail into possibility! I DO believe we’re coming around — albeit bloodied and bruised — to a better day. Those who want a clear picture of both the challenges and the possibilities should visit Moyers and listen to John Nichols and Robert McChesney discuss the corrupting influence of money on the system and be encouraged by their optimism that the Average Joe and Jill are not just listening but engaged in push-back. Here’s your cobwebs and your Roman head, yeti — it simply MUST change if we are to survive as a democratic republic.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/john-nichols-and-robert-mcchesney-on-big-money-big-media/
Then hit the Home Page and listen to Heidi Boghosian discuss the realities of spying and the attack on our civil liberties. Moyers always adds educational value to the mix, getting past politics to the real issues.
We’re not at odds, Patty. I think people who receive public food assistance should be mandated some basic instruction in how to maximize nutrition without necessarily compromising convenience. Too many of the adults receiving help these days are holding down a job or two and don’t have time to spend hours preparing food. I come from early exposure and appreciation of the “Mother Earth News” lifestyle and I know how to do all those things — but making that transition requires dedication and mindfulness. That doesn’t come instantly to people who have not been taught HOW to learn, or HOW to think critically and especially not to those who have been raised on Kraft mac n’ cheese and Ding Dongs. Give a kid a choice between a candy bar and an apple and his brain function will take the feel-good choice. In my opinion, drawing any conclusion about that individuals worthiness or aptitude would be an error. It’s a matter of socialization.
We badly need education and your thought that we should include that in high school is a good one, but we can’t even include music or art or phys-ed, these days — the chances that we’ll offer actual life skills seem slim. The whole topic of public education hurts my feelings, given my background in education and the generations of teachers that precede me. It’s a tragedy but there are answers and we’ll find them.
The people who are disgruntled by the possibility that others are taking advantage of SNAP by buying luxury items should push to put some limitations in place. I don’t have a problem with eliminating things with empty calories like soda or candy from the list of commodities available and I agree that the purchase of junk just keeps the wheel turning. Still, the problem with basic food prep and storage is that it’s time intensive and those who get the stamps may or may not have time to spare. Although I have qualified for SNAP for at least a decade, I don’t go there, but I can tell you this — when you have no money for anything extra, you miss convenience most of all. Just the ability NOT to have to keep your nose to the grindstone after a hard day, cranking out a meal that requires prep from A to Z, is a yearned-for blessing.
This is, of course, a whole conversation with much to discuss but I believe the answer is … echo, echo … education. Something at which we need to get MUCH better. Pat on the back, as well, Patty, for all your good works — sounds like your civic contributions earn you “a star in your crown,” as me Mum would say.
Agreed on Christie, Salamander. Watched him today on Sunday Pundit TV, my son said, “He’s still a thug.” Hard to argue that one. And as to presidential run, I can’t imagine he’d make it through a tough season of debate without showing his temperamental colors and souring his chances with many Americans. As to your comment about why people become Pubs, tired of all the dysfunction they see around them, let me echo the solution: education, which includes the end of black/white, us/them thinking. The problem with this kind of “tough love” stance is that it perpetuates the punishment model and demands of people — after pigeonholing offenders as “the problem” — a “straighten up and fly right” attitude or they will be dropped out of the tribe. Then, of course, they create their own tribe, surviving as best they can, and we hire more police to deal with them because we’ve made them dangerous by isolating them.
This is the story of the ghetto, which we MADE by not mandating equality of education and opportunity and if we become that critical voice that puts people on the defensive, we simply can’t be so naive as to think we aren’t part of the problem, certainly not the answer. So I see this as a vicious circle that only maintains the status quo and does little to improve lives or stabilize community. There is so much we could do about this situation, it seems so very clear to me, but we cannot do it until we stop seeing these people — for whom, as you mention, we are morally responsbile — as ‘losers.’
I’m going short on this response because the weather, like gravity, is “not our friend” right now and by Monday night, according to the newscasters, the Pea Patch is expecting frigid January temperatures. I’d been counting on a bit more Fall to accomplish my cold-weather button up, so I’ve got to get crackin’ while I can.
And on that topic, prayers for the 10,000+ souls who may have left the planet due to the largest storm on record hitting the Philippines, and a spirit of Grace and comfort to those who must deal with the aftermath. God/dess bless us all!
Thanks for your conversation this weekend, dearhearts. Fair weather to you all.
The situation in New Jersey is a concern. Not only did Chris Christie get re-elected, but the core of the Democratic Party lent very little support to Dem challenger Barbara Buono. The only reason why Chris Christie appears to be less damaging than Rick Scott (in FL), or Scott Walker (in WI) is because Chris Christie has to deal with a state legislature that mostly consists of democrats, so they keep his policies in check. Of all the state job applications, NJ is the only state that requires applicants to pay a $25 fee to apply for state jobs. No other place requires people to pay to apply for jobs. It is clear that Chris Christie is trying to demotivate people who want to work for state government. But the reality is that there are people who thrive best in state government.
I think Bill de Blasio did an impressive campaign in New York City. He has the ability to balance his principles with the group dynamics surrounding him.
I don’t think Bill de Blasio will make big changes, but I think he will resolve at least the top two biggest problems in NYC: the insane cost of living, and stop-and-frisk. Then, I think what Bill de Blasio will do is pave the way for other progressives.
In the case of Virginia, I am glad Cuccinelli lost, his zealotry was pretty scary. McAulliffe could be a House of Cards character, but as sleazy as he is, he is good with money. While McAulliffe promises to expand Medicare to Virginians (Virginians need this, considering how low salaries can be in Virginia), I would like to know whether he has any plans to increase the salaries of state workers in Virginia, who in many instances get paid salaries as low as $24,000 a year, and I’m not sure that is enough to cover cost of living expenses, even if some parts are cheaper than others in VA…(in Maryland, where I live, it’s rare to find salaries that low for full-time jobs).
I think people have reasons why they become Republicans. On an individual level, many people get tired of having to deal with relatives or friends who get addicted to drugs, who get into trouble, who constantly complain but do nothing about their problems, and who don’t have their act together. It is toxic to interact with such people, who end up becoming energy sinks if they don’t listen to other people, or help themselves within a certain period of time. In such situations, it’s best to end the relationship. By extension, these people think that the unemployed, the destitute…don’t have their act together, and think that public funding to help these people should be removed.
It’s not the compassionate thing to do however, it is still a moral obligation to take care of addicts, the unemployed, the mentally ill… In any case, there are 12th house people (who are in a “serve or suffer” situation) who need an outlet to pour energy into helping the sick, the needy…
And then, not everyone has smooth sailing in their lives. People can be beset by adverse situations at some point in their lives, as well as harmonious periods.
And then, people can have difficult transits, where a rough patch can last 10 years, for instance.
Also, it’s important to see the intrinsic value of work. Some lines of work follow the concept of the triple-bottom-line, while other lines of work are a drain on the social and ecological fabrics. This is one of the things money fails to measure adequately.
My reality is that I have family members who have their act together and help around the house, but there are also family members with serious issues. Nonetheless, one has to accept picking up the slack without complaint, for the sake of preserving the family unit. So by extension, people in a community have to pick up the slack when other members of society have issues.
In my case, knowing my family situation, the political situation of my community, my personality, and the fact that I have Saturn and Uranus tightly together in my chart, I have been improving my community in the following manner:
1. By having a part-time job at a local video store, where customers and workers are treated well, and is an invaluable source of culture.
2. By helping my mother as much as I can
3. By working towards a full-time government job where I can assess water quality, drought, and flood conditions.
I believe it is possible for people to achieve positive things in this world, it’s just that people are in different positions that determine whether they can do something or not.
Wandering-Yeti, I think we were thinking about the same thing. Thanks for the book review – I’ll have to read it.
I agree with part of what you are saying, but not all. I think a lot of conservative people recognize that the past 60 years have turned a nation of self-sufficient hard-working people into a herd of cattle. Sure, there are always situations where someone should have had food stamps, and there still are, but most of the people I know on food stamps do not even TRY to manage their money. They don’t match coupons to ads, or shop the best weekly deals. Even Wal-Mart will match any ad price. My daughter took a part-time job at a gas station deli, and has been pretty darned horrified by the number of people who think nothing of spending $50 in food stamps on frozen pizza and take-out coffee. She says it happens all the time, and they aren’t homeless. In fact, a freshly cooked pizza from the deli is cheaper than the frozen, and much more tasty. It appears that a lot of people don’t bother to read, let alone add their dollars and calculate how many meals the money has to purchase through the end of a month. If I were trying to destroy a nation, this is exactly how I would do it. It is no accident that Hitler modeled the internment camps after the US Indian Reservations. I asked my sister in law if she wanted a box of tomatoes, and she said, “What would I do with them?” Really? You don’t know how to turn fresh vegetables into delicious soups, stews, chilies, salsas and chutneys? She isn’t the only one. The food bank people tell us that unless the food is already prepared, most of the people don’t know what to do with it. Forget a bag of beans and box of cornbread, they want frozen meals.
I recently started working with my church group that feeds the poor of our area. The church built a warehouse type structure a couple of years ago to house donations and gathered foods. A separate group from our county uses the kitchen and freezers to freeze meals for the poor from food they salvage from restaurants. One of the largest restaurants in our area said that donating the food had saved them a lot of money because they were able to get rid of one dumpster, and a volunteer CPA wrote up the paperwork for their donations to be a legal charitable gift. One after another of local restaurants have signed on to this program. The church food bank gives out around $140 a week in groceries and food to families of our part of the county, and that is to hundreds of people. The part I help with is reheating food to serve meals on site. We also prepare meals to take out to a trailer park (500 trailers) where many people only make minimum wage and don’t have much more than enough to pay rent and utilities. I live in a small town, yet in our school system there are over 250 homeless children registered!! Many of the homeless families have gone in together to rent a house so they can have a roof over their heads, plumbing and heat. They need help, and we try to help best we can. We gave 950 coats away two weeks ago, and now we are gathering the thanksgiving baskets. Next will be Christmas gifts. There is a lady in our church who started a community garden for people with financial needs, and she is teaching them how to grow and preserve their own foods. It’s a huge job but she’s stayed with it. She wrote and received grant money to help buy garden tools and seeds.
There really is no limit to ways a community can help each other grow, but truly, I find it alarming that so few people know how to prepare raw foods. One of my favorite stories that my mother told me was of mailing a ham-bone to her father and step-mother back in the 50s. I thought it was funny at the time, but as poor as we were, we always ate well and wore fine clothes purchased from Goodwill. We didn’t waste anything and re-used every bit of plastic and paper. They used to turn advertising paper over to write letters on the back. It makes me mad to read how that generation ruined it for everyone else. Yeah right.
Maybe high school curriculums should be changed to require family planning, home economics, gardening, and so on. I live in farming community, but there is no ag dept at school. No-one is required to take home economics, and whatever family planning is taught is part of health class, which most kids think is a joke. Then taxpayers end up paying for the mishaps and mistakes. There is a lot wrong and I don’t think anyone knows how to fix it.
I don’t think it’s so much that people need to grow up, they just need to grow. They need to re-learn what the ancestors knew and not be too good to do those things too. Stop letting agro-business run our lives. I’d bet my last dollar that food stamps were part of some grand plan to control the poor, the same way the Indians on the reservation were controlled.
I’m currently reading Druids by Morgan Llewellyn, a historical novel taking place in Gaul as Rome began to invade. The Celts might have been dominators, but at least they had the Druids, the trees, natural medicine, joy in life. The Roman way was to shut the door on the living world, to turn medicine into religion where you just pay bribes to statues and nobody remembers how to work real magic or medicine. All of their gods were jealous humans, the hubris of a single life form declaring itself as the One True Form. As I see it the Roman pattern is still going. It’s hubris is to make such a ruckus that no one has the time to be still enough to notice the subtle features of the cosmos, effectively shutting the door on the source so it can pretend to BE the source.
Yes, we have to look beyond the empire. This time could be a reversal of what happened then, but man are there a lot of cobwebs. The corporations and the cops still have the Roman head, the metal head, the desire to be seen as the One True Source and they’ve got more heavy metal than they’ve ever had. But here we are.
Wondering if things have to be so bad (more cuts to food stamps, etc.) that even the most myopic among us can see it and feel shame. Talk about mean girlness; the 2-year old mentality that promotes this behavior and attitude needs disciplining from the grownups. Dealing with our demons that have stewed for decades, if not centuries, now requires a knuckling down that many are loathe to accept. The time is right; we’ve had yet another Saturn Return (symbol of maturation) and based on the examples you have provided us today Jude, the tide is turning in our favor. Teamwork indeed!
At this moment, transiting asteroids Psyche and Persephone are conjunct the U.S. Sibly chart’s ascendant. Martha Lang-Wescott tells us that Psyche symbolizes a “recognition of childhood trauma” and that Persephone symbolizes “how you handle transitions and the rites of passage in your life”, and of course, the ascendant is how we see our USA self. It is time for the US to accept the responsibilities of being a grown up and stop acting like a 2 year old. Man up. Bite the elephant. (Think of that commercial where the elephant sits on the man who can hardly breathe!)
Think about this. When transiting Uranus entered the sign of Aries the 2nd time (3/11/11) it had the USA’s future written all over it. The Moon was conjunct the U.S. (Sibly) Uranus, Mars was trine the U.S. Sibly Sun, Saturn was conjunct the U.S. Saturn, Neptune was conjunct the U.S. Moon, Sun was square the U.S. Mars, Juno was conjunct the U.S. Neptune, Ceres was conjunct the U.S. Pallas-Athene (and Moon). Uranus was conjunct the U.S. nadir (IC) root and, when set in Washington DC, the ingress chart’s MC (midheaven) was conjunct the U.S. Sibly Sun. Talk about consciousness raising. 🙂
Presently, transiting Uranus has been conjunct the Jupiter and descendant of its own (2nd) ingress into Aries chart. It has squared the U.S. Sibly Venus and Jupiter and is soon to square the U.S. Sun and oppose the U.S. Saturn. If you take the sextile in the Uranus ingress chart between the Moon in Gemini and Jupiter in Aries and add to it the present Scorpio solar eclipse, you get a yod (need for action) produced by the quincunx aspects (adjustments) between Moon (the People, needs) and solar eclipse and Jupiter (expand understanding) and solar eclipse. Could it be any plainer than the nose on our collective face?
As above, so below is the old saying and everyone that reads your words (past, present, future) can find a way to fulfill their part in what the stars indicate and you have delineated as happening now. Teamwork is easier than trying to do it all alone. Listen to your family, your neighbors, your community and we – you, me, all of us can find a way, love’s way, to grow up; one baby step at a time, and be a responsible citizen of the world. It is NOT an impossible mission folks.
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